text:
The Hazel Wood: A Novel (CD-Audio)
By Melissa Albert, Rebecca Soler (Read by)
Hardcover (January 30th, 2018): $16.99
The Hazel Wood spins a tale reminiscent of the Brothers Grimm: fairy tales don't always have a happy ending. Seventeen-year-old Alice's grandmother created a collection of stories that all take place in the Hinterland. When her mother is kidnapped by someone who claims to be from the Hinterland, the tall tales suddenly take on a new life. With the assistance of Ellery Finch, a superfan of her grandmother's cult classic, Alice must dive into a dark world if she wants any chance at happily ever after.
— Rebecca, Atlanta
"If you like your fairy tales dark and spooky, you will love The Hazel Wood. It is brilliantly twisty, with a not-always-likable main character named Alice whose whole life has been one bit of bad luck followed by another. Now her mother is missing, and the disappearance may have something to do with Alice's estranged grandmother, the author of a collection of creepy short stories with a cult following. Joined by her classmate Ellery Finch, a boy with questionable motives, Alice sets off for her grandmother's estate, the Hazel Wood, to confront her and to find her mom. But the Hazel Wood has other plans for Alice, and only by facing her destiny can she rewrite her own fate."
— Jenny Chou, Boswell Book Company, Milwaukee, WI
"Highly literary, occasionally surreal, and grounded by Alice's clipped, matter-of-fact voice, it's a dark story that readers will have trouble leaving behind. HIGH-DEMAND: the buzz for this debut is deafening..." Booklist, Starred Review
From rising star Melissa Albert comes a fantastical story of mythic proportions.
Welcome to The Hazel Wood—a fiercely stunning contemporary fantasy audiobook.
Seventeen-year-old Alice and her mother have spent most of Alice's life on the road, always a step ahead of the uncanny bad luck biting at their heels. But when Alice's grandmother, the reclusive author of a cult-classic book of pitch-dark fairy tales, dies alone on her estate, the Hazel Wood, Alice learns how bad her luck can really get: Her mother is stolen away—by a figure who claims to come from the Hinterland, the cruel supernatural world where her grandmother's stories are set. Alice's only lead is the message her mother left behind: "Stay away from the Hazel Wood."
Alice has long steered clear of her grandmother's cultish fans. But now she has no choice but to ally with classmate Ellery Finch, a Hinterland superfan who may have his own reasons for wanting to help her. To retrieve her mother, Alice must venture first to the Hazel Wood, then into the world where her grandmother's tales began—and where she might find out how her own story went so wrong.
Praise for The Hazel Wood:
"The Hazel Wood starts out strange and gets stranger, in the best possible way...Albert seamlessly combines contemporary realism with fantasy, blurring the edges in a way that highlights that place where stories and real life convene...a captivating debut." — New York Times Book Review
"The Hazel Wood will be your next obsession." —Stephanie Garber, author of Caraval
"Thoroughly, creepily captivating." —Kristin Cashore, author of Graceling
"This is one of the best books I've read in years." —Jennifer Niven, author of All the Bright Places
"A dream of a book I cannot recommend highly enough." —Seanan McGuire, author of Every Heart a Doorway
Melissa Albert is the founding editor of the Barnes & Noble Teen Blog and the managing editor of BN.com. She has written for McSweeney's, Time Out Chicago, MTV, and more. Melissa is from Illinois and lives in Brooklyn, New York. The Hazel Wood is her first novel.
Rebecca Soler is a film and voiceover actress who won a 2009 AudioFile Earphones Award for her narration of After by Amy Efaw. Her audiobook credits include work by authors such as Judy Blume, James Patterson and Sarah Dessen. Soler has also narrated the popular young adult series The Lunar Chronicles by Marissa Meyer. Her voice over credits include various video games, like Star Wars: The Old Republic and Red Dead Redemption and television shows such as Pokemon, Yu-Gi-Oh, and Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles. She lives in New York City.
2019 YALSA Amazing Audiobook
"The Hazel Wood is thoroughly, creepily captivating, with surprises I never saw coming! Such a refreshing and beautifully written inversion of the classic fairy tale-inspired story."
—Kristin Cashore, award-winning, New York Times bestselling author of the Graceling Realm series
"This book will be your next obsession. Welcome to the Hazel Wood, where bad luck is a living thing, princesses are doomed, and every page contains a wondrously terrible adventure—it's not safe inside these pages, but once you enter, you may never want to leave. The Hazel Wood is pure imagination candy."
—Stephanie Garber, New York Times bestselling author of Caraval
Publisher: Macmillan Young Listeners
Series: The Hazel Wood
Young Adult Fiction / Fantasy / Contemporary
Young Adult Fiction / Fairy Tales & Folklore
Young Adult Fiction / Fantasy / Dark Fantasy
Library Binding, Large Print (February 7th, 2018): $31.45
Pre-Recorded Audio Player (February 2018): $100.09


Acupuncture is often not the first option used to treat both acute and chronic pain, but it is a scientifically effective method that is now finding more support from physicians and healthcare professionals.
Acupuncture stimulates the Central Nervous System to alter the secretions of certain neurotransmitters that play a role in pain perception, directly effecting specific pain nerve fibers, and increasing endorphins.
Acupuncture treats pain and injury by using individually selected points to stimulate Qi and Blood circulation. Treatments are not limited to treating just the pain, but also address underlying health issues that may contribute to chronic pain, and slow healing.
Acute pain encompasses a broad range of concerns related to musculoskeletal conditions. It includes; injuries sustained during athletics, car accidents, or even acute episodes of a chronic condition.
Acupuncture reduces swelling, pain responses, and bruising, while speeding healing and recovery.
Chronic pain can include pain associated with musculoskeletal conditions, nerve conditions, and autoimmune conditions. It can be from an untreated injury, other health problems, or unknown causes.
Acupuncture reduces inflammatory responses, regulates immune responses, and decreases nerve sensitivity.


Bhagwan Shree Dattatreya is known as avinashi (non-destroyable), Siddharaj, Yogiraj etc. He has been ever advising and guiding his devotees in worldly and spiritual affairs, yogasadhana and devotion to God. He has had many Avatars from Vedic times to date. Of these, sixteen Avatars are regarded as the chief ones. 'Shree Gurucharitra' is a great volume in Marathi in ovi form, which depicts the life-mission of Shreepad ShreeVallabha and Shree Narsimha Saraswati, the two Avatars of Datta which took place in kaliyug. In the fourth chapter of this volume, the account of the birth of Shree Datta under the parentage of Atri-Anasuya in krityug has been given. This is the third Avatar amongst the above mentioned sixteen Avatars. The celebration of the jayantis of the sixteen Avatars of Shree Datta has been introduced at the Shree Gurudev Datta Mandir, Vakola.
After the creation of this universe the living beings had to suffer from miseries as per their past actions. This made Brahmadeva anxious and so he surrendered to Shree Vishnu, the Lord of the universe saying,"Dattoham Dattoham" (I give myself). Shree Vishnu appeared before Brahmadeo and advised him to practise yoga and know the eternal principle whereby he was relieved of the miseries, and had the peace of mind. Those who recite "Dattoham Dattoham", will also gain the same fruit. This Avatar took place on Kartik Shuddha 15, Krittika Nakshatra, Wednesday, first prahar at sun-rise.
This Avatar propagated yoga, hence it is known as 'Yogeshwar' or 'Yogiraj'. He looked most charming, delicate and snow white in colour. Like Shree Krishna, he had one head and four hands.
When Atri lived as a grihastha, he had many sons. They were learned and erudite; but he longed to have a son, who would be famous in all the three lokas and would guide the people to attain the highest goal of life. He, therefore, observed severe penance on the Riksha Mountain. Due to the lustre of his penance, the three lokas suffered from heat and all the creatures and birds became uneasy. All the devas and rishi-munis approached Brahma, Vishnu and Mahesh. Then Brahma, riding on hans, Vishnu on garuda and Mahesh on nandi appeared before Atri and roused him from his meditation. Atri bowed to them and said, "I adored only one God then who are you three?" The three Gods said, "We are the same whom you aimed at. We appear in three forms; but we are one. Maya (illusion) is threefold - sattwa, raja and tama. Raja creates, sattwa protects and tama destroys. These three powers are prominent. Parmatma possesses all these three powers." Atri was blessed with a son by the three Gods as desired. Hence this Avatar is known as 'Atrivarad'. He had lustre like hot gold and a smiling face. This Avatar appeared on Kartik Vadya Pratipada, Rohini Nakshatra, Thursday, first prahar and first muhurta. He had three heads and held Brahma's garland and kamandalu in the lower two hands, Shiva's drum and trishul in the middle two hands and Vishnu's shankha and chakra in the upper two hands.
Bhagwan Shree Hari appeared before Atri as a boy on the Kartik Vadya 2, Mrug Nakshatra, Friday at sun-rise on the first muhurta. He looked bluish as Indranil in colour. His face was pleasant like the moon, his four hands possessed shankha, chakra, gada and padma. Vibhuti was applied on his body and he had locks of hair on his head. He appeared saying, "Dattoham". Atri and Anasuya said, "We shall not be content till you take birth from us." Being pleased with them, he entered in the heart of Atri as a spark of lightning and afterwards took birth as a son of Anasuya.
Amongst the sixteen Avatars of Shree Datta, this fourth Avatar is regarded as the most prominent. Due to the hard penance at the Riksha hill, Atri looked very bright and his body became too hot. Bhagwan Shree Hari came to Atri to cool down his heat. Due to this achievement this Avatar is known as 'Kalagnishaman'. When Atri opened his eyes, he saw before him the most loving Anasuya. The bright lustre of his eyes entered in the body of Anasuya on Margshirsh Shuddha 7 and nine months period was completed in 9 days and the Divine Form appeared before Anasuya on Kartik 15. She entreated the God in humility saying, "I shall not be content until you take birth as a human being from my womb." Subsequently Shree Hari appeared as a newly born baby and lay on her bedstead. At this time it was Mrug Nakshatra and the moon was just rising. Durwas and Chandra also were born at the same time.
When Shree Dattatreya appeared at Anasuya's ashram, Indra followed by the Gods, Rishi-munis, Gandharvas, Charanas, Yogis and saints came to see him. Knowing their eagerness, Shree Datta appeared as a boy and advised them about yoga. He said, "I have no body, no time. I am devoid of birth and death. I take various forms to bless the devotees. Though these acts are transitory this does not affect my tattvic state." This Avatar is known for the propagation of yoga and for removing the obstacles coming in the way and blessing the followers of yoga. This Avatar is, therefore, known as 'Yogijan Vallabha'.
"Shree Datta." I am not discernible.
While this dialogue was going on, 11 Rudras, 12 Adityas, 49 Rudraganas, Rishis, Munis, Sadhyadeo, Gandharva, Yaksha, Kinnar etc. were passing through the sky. Their motion being hindered, they all came down on the floor of Badrivan. Each siddha said that because of his penace, their motion was hindered and they came down on the earth.
Shree Datta, in the body-form, said, "Why do you struggle? One, who can remove the hindrance of their motion and allow them to go through the sky, will be the best siddha.'' All agreed to this and each one came forward and said one after another, "I have removed the obstacle in your movement. You can go to your places.'' But none of them could move a bit.
Then Shree Datta said, "Oh you Rishi-munis and others, you may please go to your places as the hindrance in your movement has since been removed." Hearing this, all those who had descended, bowed to Shree Datta and flew away in the sky. Seeing this, all the siddhas realised that the boy Yogi was the Parmatma. They, therefore, gave up their vanity and surrendered to him.
The boy Yogi, Shree Datta, said, "I am 'Siddharaj', 'Yogiraj'. I am called 'Hari' being Kalagnishaman and remover of miseries. While thinking about Atma and in order to attain me, one should study mantras. I am Mantraraj, undestroyable and Parabrahma. All the universe is under my control; but I am controlled by mantras. All mantras, studied as per due procedure, give siddhi (power of doing certain things) to sadhak." Saying this, he further told them some mantras and their procedure. This is known as 'Siddha Rajagam'. Shree Datta told this again, about 500 years ago, to his great favourite devotee Dasopant of Ambejogai (Maharashtra), who has preserved it in a written script. The publication of 'Siddha Rajagam' will be truly most valuable and appreciable.
This Avatar took place on Magh Shuddha 15 on Magh Nakshatra in the morning when it is the time of the cows.
So, Shree Datta appeared in the form of a Kumar known as 'Dnyansagar'. This Avatar appeared in air at the height of a man, on Falgun Shuddha 10, Sunday, Punarvasu Nakshatra at sunrise.The siddhas tried to bring this Kumar on the ground; but they could not do so. They, therefore, realised that he was Parmatma and surrendered to him and began to praise him.
Shree Datta then said, "Kaam begets anger, anger begets delusion of intellect and untoward actions take place. Those, who go after siddhis, do not get my place and consequently they do not get pleasure.
Therefore, you should adore me, recite mantras and know the eternal principle and lead a moral life. You cannot gain me by intellect or logic. So, one should win over kaam, krodha etc. and continue my devotion.
The siddhas thereafter followed the path, shown by Shree Datta and attained the bliss. This Avatar took place in Badrivan for the well-being of the siddhas, who were staying there.
With a view to test the siddhas and see how far they have progressed, Shree Datta assumed the dirty form of a mlenchha. His face was robust. He had black string round his neck, a zigzag stick in his hand and a black dog followed him. He saw that some siddhas were meditating, while some were enjoying the jokes and some others suffering from miseries.
This Avatar appeared on Chaitra Shuddha Poornima, Tuesday, Chitra Nakshatra, in the second prahar. The siddhas asked him questions as before and he replied in the same style. Then realising him to be Shree Datta, they surrendered to him and began to praise him. Shree Datta then appeared before them in his usual lovely form and advised them to give up doubts and concentrate their minds on him.
The bairagi said, "I am undiscernible, all pervading Avadhoot." Hearing this, Sheel knew that he was Siddhraj Dynansagar of former times. To remove his doubt, he asked, "What is your abode (ashraya) and who is your master ?" The reply was, "I have no abode and no master. I am the master of all the three lokas." Realising him to be his Sadguru, he prostrated before him, seated him with due regard, duly worshipped him and offered him good delicious food. Seeing this, the brahmins scolded Sheel, saying that he acted impiously.
The mendicant then asked the brahmins, "What is Brahman?" The brahmins said, "Om is Parabrahma and it has assumed the form of Vedas. You are unpious and irreligious and so you are not eligible even to hear Vedas." The mendicant said, "I am above Maya and hence not bound by rules and regulations. Vedas and their acts are of three qualities and this world is also three-fold and it is with me in the form of a black dog. This dog is well-versed in Vedas and shastras. He will satisfy you." Saying so, he asked the dog to say Vedas. Like a learned pandit the dog began to chant the Vedas. The brahmins were simply stunned to see this miracle.
Shree Avadhoot called the forefathers of Sheel and in the presence of all assimilated them in himself. The vanity of the brahmins was wiped off and they surrendered to Shree Datta, who advised them to have devotion for him. This pleased them all. They prayed to him to bestow on them the lasting well-being of their families.
This Avatar took place on Jeshth Shuddha 13, Friday, Swati Nakshatra, at sunrise.
Then Mayayuktavadhoot roamed in the region from the south of Narmada to the Mahur hills.
The Gods (harassed by Jambasur), Kartavirya Sahasrarjun and Parashuram met Shree Datta in this region. Shree Datta advised 'Tripura Rahasya' to Parashuram in order to get rid of the effects of his sins of wars against the kshatriyas and to attain the peace of mind.
Shree Datta advised Alark, the son of Madalsa. While ruling as a king, Alark was engrossed in the worldly pleasures. Dnyani Subahu, his elder brother, thought that Alark was wasting away his life as dogs and cats do in enjoyment of passions. He intended to awaken him spiritually. He, therefore, came to his city and asked for his share in the kingdom. When it was refused, he sought the help of Kashi Raja and attacked and besieged his city. Consequently the provisions coming in the city were stopped. Due to this, the subjects could not get food grains and they began to suffer from hunger. Alark was dejected to see this. His mother, Madalsa, had told him to see her letter of advice, placed in the box in times of calamity. He left the city, entered a forest and next morning opened the box and saw his dear mother's letter.
Shree Adiguru Dattatreya, master of yoga, with his disciple Alarka.
It was said in it that in times of adversity, one should forsake all and have the company of a saint and think of salvation. He should go to Shree Datta at Mahurgad for spiritual guidance. This Avatar appeared on Ashadh Shuddha 15 on Tuesday, in the first prahar, on first muhurt.Alark went to Mahur, surrendered to Shree Datta and narrated his misery. Shree Datta placed his palm on his head and asked, "Where is your misery? Just think who you are." Only due to this one question, Alark began to think of himself. His ignorance was wiped off and his ego and greed also vanished. The feeling of enmity was extinct.
Pingalnag recognised him as Shree Dattatreya, the son of Anasuya and so bowed to him humbly and prayed to bless him and give proper advice. This Avatar appeared on Shravan Shuddha 8, Monday.
Shree Datta roamed from the south of Narmada to Mahur in the forest. He bathed in rivers, lakes, at holy places and gave darshan to Rushi-munis. This region was full of black awala trees and so it was called 'Krishnamalaki Tirth'. The Gods, Brahmadeo, Shatanand, son of Goutam had come and seen Shree Datta here.
This Avatar appeared on Bhadrapad Shuddha 14, Friday, Shatatarka Nakshatra in the first prahar of the day.
This Avatar took place on Ashwin Shuddha Poornima, Wednesday, Ashwini Nakshatra, at sunrise. In this Avatar Shree Datta blessed Yadu of Somvansh and Pralhad, son of Kayadhu.
When Yadu Raja was wandering in the forest in the Kaveri region, he saw a Digambar Avadhoot. He prostrated before him and said, "You are young, lustrous and healthy and then why do you stay in such a desolate forest and yet you are joyful and carefree." Digambar Avadhoot said, "I have acquired 24 Gurus from nature and learnt lessons of different types from them. Thus I have acquired vivek, vairagya, peace of mind and contentment.
Yadu prostrated before Shree Datta. The dynasty of Yadu prospered and in later times Shree Krishna, a purna-avatar of Shree Vishnu, was born in this dynasty. Pralhad was also blessed by Shree Datta in this Avatar. After the death of Hiranyakashyapu, Pralhad's thread ceremony was performed by Shukra and he was enthroned as Raja. He ruled his country for thousands of years very efficiently as a most popular king; but he could not have peace of mind being void of Brahmadnyan. So, he roamed in the Kavery regions in a dejected mood. He perceived a lustrous Avadhoot, lying on the ground. His body was covered by dust. Pralhad bowed to him and said, "How can you live in such a dense forest quite hail and hearty and contented." Shree Datta told about some of the 24 Gurus and the lessons learnt from them. Pralhad was fully satisfied and got enlightened.


text:
Worcester Union Station
What is this life?
And what are we supposed to do with it?
Jack Kerouac's novel, On the Road, thinly fictionalizes his travel adventures across late-1940s America. I was, in a milder, tamer way, on the road myself this last week. Most of the way was by plane -- I flew from Gainesville to Atlanta, then Atlanta to Boston. And the train I hopped, from Boston out to Worcester, Massachusetts, I had a legitimate ticket for. The train arrived in Worcester shortly after midnight, so I did have the chance to feel rather beatnik-hobo as I hoofed it three miles in the middle of the night from Worcester Union Station to the retreat center where I spent the week. (For more on that, click here.) Yes, there was a line of cabs at the station, and, sure, I had plenty of cash on hand to take one. But that didn't feel very adventurous. Or like much of a way to look for America along a three-mile stretch of Pleasant Street, Worcester, Massachusetts.
Besides, I'm cheap. And could always use a little exercise.
After the retreat was over, I was on the train back to Boston. The conductor came by to sell me my ticket and noticed the book I was reading. This is either the advantage, or the disadvantage, depending on how you look at it, of deciding not to get On the Road on my Kindle.
"Kerouac," he said. "I dated his niece once."
"Oh, yeah?" I said. "What was her name?"
He thought a moment. "Colette."
"Wow. Was she a Kerouac?"
"No, no. It was her mother that was Jack's sister," explained the conductor as he handed me my change. Then he he was gone on down the aisle. I returned to my book. The train, and Kerouac's prose, rambled on.
When I got home I did some googling around. Jack Kerouac only had one sister, Caroline. And Caroline had one child, a son. No daughter. Maybe the conductor had meant a grandniece of a cousin of Kerouac or something. Or maybe he made it up entirely. Perhaps some part of his brain was remembering something Jackie Kennedy said shortly after JFK was elected in 1960: "I read everything from Colette to Kerouac." In any case, there's something about this Beatnik literary figure that people want to feel close to, somehow, in some way.
Kerouac struggled with what he wanted this book to be for several years. Then, in April 1951, in a three-week burst, staying awake with Benzedrine, he wrote almost without pause. He didn't even want to pause to change sheets of paper in his typewriter. So he cut tracing paper sheets to size and taped them together into one long hundred and twenty-foot scroll. And the thing flowed out of him, single-spaced, without margins or paragraph breaks. That was the first draft. Then there were six years of looking for a publisher and working with editors, and revising. (Previous blog entry has excerpts, and video of Kerouac reading from On the Road and Visions of Cody: click here).
The original scroll of the first draft is now a revered artifact of American letters. In the picture, you see it stretched out like a road – a road of words, without even a paragraph break crack in its pavement, a road that beckons to us on that journey: journey to where?
Where does Kerouac's road want to take us? Kerouac's quest is religious. For him as for the beat generation generally, the journey is a spiritual one. The real road is the inward one, the road to find ourselves, to find authenticity.
What are we, really? And can we really be our true selves? In On the Road, Jack Kerouac gives himself the name Sal Paradise, and he chronicles his road trips back and forth across the United States – to find Dean Moriarty, to go away from him, to go back to him. Three different around-the-country trips are chronicled: one in 1947, one in 1949, and one in 1950. In between the first and the second one, Kerouac wrote in his journal:
In America today there's a claw hanging over our brains, which must be pushed aside else it will clutch and strangle our real selves.
Our real selves. Our real selves?
On his first trip westward Sal and someone he's just met are hitchhiking together.
A tall, lanky fellow in a gallon hat stopped his car on the wrong side of the road and came over to us; he looked like a sheriff. We prepared our stories secretly. He took his time coming over.
"You boys going to get somewhere, or just going?"
We didn't understand his question, and it was a damned good question.
Cassady, left, and Kerouac
We have some dim inkling of where we want to get to – but it's so vague to us that we can't say whether we're going somewhere or just going. We don't know the answer, and we don't even understand the question, but we understand just enough to know that somehow, it's a very good question. The goodness of that very question – which we don't understand, let alone know the answer – impels us forward – in search of an answer, maybe, or else just a question that we can feel we understand.
In that quest, the idea of Dean Moriarty haunts Sal Paradise/Jack Kerouac: "I think of Dean Moriarty," is the last sentence of the book. This Dean Moriarty represents wildness, liberation, freedom, vitality. Moriarty – in real life Neal Cassady – actually was born on the road, "when his parents were passing through Salt Lake City, Utah in 1926" (On the Road, 3). Mother died when he was 10; raised by his alcoholic tinsmith father in Denver; much of his youth lived on the streets of skid row with his father, or in reform school for various thefts. Stealing cars was an early talent and habit. At 19, out of jail, he and first wife "Marylou" – the real life Luanne Henderson – moved to New York, where he and Kerouac met.
Moriarty/Cassady's powerful enthusiasm, unconstrained by law or convention, his insatiable sexuality, and wildness attracts Kerouac, though Kerouac himself doesn't go there. He thinks that maybe he would like to, but Kerouac ultimately has other loyalties, to family and stability.
Life on the road is unpredictable, wild, moment-to-moment. There are times when the money runs out, even for food, and hunger becomes very real. There are also times of reading poetry aloud, and all-night long intense and earnest discussions. And other nights in smoky jazz clubs saying things like "man that cat can blow." And sex and drugs with a variety of partners and substances. There are moments of ecstasy, and also sadness. At one point Kerouac writes:
As the river poured down from mid-America by starlight I knew,
I knew like mad that everything I had ever known and would ever know was One. (147)
from the upcoming film, On the Road
And later:
And for just a moment I had reached the point of ecstasy that I always wanted to reach, which was the complete step across chronological time into timeless shadows, and wonderment in the bleakness of the mortal realm, and the sensation of death kicking at my heels to move on, with a phantom dogging its own heels, and myself hurrying to a plank where all the angels dove off and flew into the holy void of uncreated emptiness, the potent and inconceivable radiancies shining in bright Mind Essence, innumerable lotus-lands falling open in the magic mothswarm of heaven. . . . I realized it was only because of the stability of the intrinsic Mind that these ripples of birth and death took place. (173)
These moments come along with a lot of sadness – whether it's the "feeling of sadness that only bus stations have" (35) -- or the sadness of failing to live the holiness and preciousness of every moment:
We lay on our backs, looking at the ceiling and wondering what God had wrought when He made life so sad. . . . Boys and girls in America have such a sad time together; sophistication demands that they submit to sex immediately without proper preliminary talk. Not courting talk – real straight talk about souls, for life is holy and every moment is precious. (57)
Dean represents for Sal a kind of sacred insanity, a spiritual visionary. About two-thirds through the book, after Sal and Dean have been apart for a year, Sal hits the road again, looking for Dean. When he finds him, Dean is falling apart – but still shining a kind of light. Here's Dean Moriarty speaking of himself in third person:
I'm classification three-A, jazz-hounded Moriarty has a sore butt, his wife gives him daily injections of penicillin for his thumb, which produces hives, for he's allergic. He must take sixty thousand units of Fleming's juice within a month. He must take one tablet every four hours for this month to combat allergy produced from his juice. He must take codeine aspirin to relieve the pain in his thumb. He must have surgery on his leg for an inflamed cyst. He must rise next Monday at six a.m. to get his teeth cleaned. He must see a foot doctor twice a week for treatment. He must take cough syrup each night. He must blow and snort constantly to clear his nose, which has collapsed just under the bridge where an operation some years ago weakened it. He lost his thumb on his throwing arm. Greatest seventy-yard passer in the history of New Mexico State Reformatory. And yet – and yet, I've never felt better and finer and happier with the world and to see little lovely children playing in the sun and I am so glad to see you, my fine gone wonderful Sal, and I know, I know everything will be all right. (185-86)
In real life, this Neal Cassady, with his crazy intensity of life, unstoppable energy, overwhelming charm, and savvy hustle, did only a little writing: published some poems and an autobiographical novel. Mostly, however, Neal Cassady was an artist whose medium was being. The pen, really, was too slow for him: Cassady was a live show. He was a muse, an inspiration, for Kerouac, for Allen Ginsberg, who writes about Cassady in "Howl," the most famous Beat poem, which calls "N.C." (Neal Cassady) the "secret hero of these poems."
Cassady would go on to meet Ken Kesey, author of One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest in 1962, and became one of the Merry Pranksters, a group that formed around Kesey. Kesey wrote about Cassady in the book Demon Box, calling him "Superman." In 1964, Cassady was the main bus driver of a bus – the destination across its front simply saying, "Further" -- immortalized in Tom Wolfe's book, The Electric Kool-Aid Acid Test. Hunter S. Thompson wrote about him in his book, Hell's Angels.
Who was this guy, irresistible to writers as he was also to a great many women – and more than a few men – with whom he slept? What kind of model of life is this?
In one scene from On the Road, Neal/Dean, with his body seemingly falling apart, is thrown out by his wife, and his primary recurrent girlfriend, formerly also his wife, leaves him. Dean and Sal go looking for sleeping accommodations at another friend's place, Ed Dunkel. Ed himself has disappeared for a while on the road, and Ed's wife, Galatea, lets them in and several of the women cohorts of the male Beat characters are there and take the opportunity to express their collective condemnation:
"For years now you haven't had any sense of responsibility for anyone. You've done so many awful things I don't know what to say to you."
And in fact that was the point, and they all sat around looking at Dean with lowered and hating eyes, and he stood on the carpet in the middle of them and giggled – he just giggled. He made a little dance. . . .
I suddenly realized that Dean, by virtue of his enormous series of sins, was becoming the Idiot, the Imbecile, the Saint of the lot.
"You have absolutely no regard for anybody but yourself and your damned kicks. All you think about is . . . how much money or fun you can get out of people and then you just throw them aside. Not only that but you're silly about it. It never occurs to you that life is serious and there are people trying to make something decent out of it instead of just goofing all the time."
That's what Dean was, the HOLY GOOF.
"You stand here and make silly faces, and I don't think there's a care in your heart." [said Galatea]
This was not true; I knew better and I could have told them all. I didn't see any sense in trying it. I longed to go and put my arm around Dean and say, Now look here, all of you, remember just one thing: this guy has his troubles too, and another thing, he never complains
and he's given all of you a damned good time just being himself, and if that isn't enough for you then send him to the firing squad, that's apparently what you're itching to do anyway. . . .
"Now you're going East with Sal," Galatea said, "and what do you think you're going to accomplish by that? Camille has to stay home and mind the baby now you're gone – how can she keep her job? – and she never wants to see you again and I don't blame her. If you see Ed along the road you tell him to come back to me or I'll kill him."
Suddenly we see that this familiar, familiar voice of morality and reason, source of so much rage, is as filled with contradictions as Dean's free-wheeling is. If you were any good you'd go back, but don't you go back because she won't have you. And the people we want are the ones we want to kill.
Where once Dean would have talked his way out, he now fell silent himself,
but standing in front of everybody, ragged and broken and idiotic, right under the lightbulbs, his boney mad face covered with sweat and throbbing veins, saying, 'yes, yes, yes,' as though tremendous revelations were pouring into him all the time now, and I am convinced they were, and the others suspected as much and were frightened. He was BEAT – the root, the soul of Beatific. . . .
There was a strange sense of maternal satisfaction in the air, for the girls were really looking at Dean the way a mother looks at the dearest and most errant child, and he with his sad thumb and all his revelations knew it well, and that was why he was able, in tick-tocking silence, to walk out of the apartment without a word, to wait for us downstairs as soon as we'd made up our minds about time.
This was what we sensed about the ghost on the sidewalk. I looked out the window. He was alone in the doorway, digging the street. Bitterness, recriminations, advice, morality, sadness – everything was behind him, and ahead of him was the ragged and ecstatic joy of pure being.
"Come on, Galatea, Marie, let's go hit the jazz joints and forget it. Dean will be dead someday. Then what can you say to him?"
"The sooner he's dead the better," said Galatea, and she spoke officially for almost everyone in the room.
"Very well, then," I said, "but now he's alive, and I'll bet you want to know what he does next, and that's because he's got the secret that we're all busting to find," (195)
Does Dean Moriarty Neal Cassady have the secret? Doesn't he?
Does he?
Ah, what is this life?
Neal/Dean is a heroic figure in that he attempts to live a life beyond the time-bound compromises most of us make with life. But he's also a sad and tragic figure in that this very same uncompromising stance ultimately leaves him abandoned. (Edington, The Beat Face of God, 100)
At the end of On the Road, Sal drives off with friends leaving Dean alone in the cold.
Conventional morality says: Choose between living for yourself and caring about others. Or try somehow to hew a balance between these opposites. Conventional morality is surely wrong. Living for yourself and caring about others are not opposites. The greatest gift that you can give this world is the gift of presenting to it who you truly are – your most real and authentic self, following no script, creatively present to each moment, ready to surprise and be surprised. And that very thing is also your own deepest desire.
I don't know what to tell you about how to address the challenge presented to us in the figure of Dean Moriarity/Neal Cassady. After all, the point is that my guidance is beside the point. Don't listen to the preachers – even if they dress in black and look scruffy. Listen to yourself.
Ironically maybe, listen to himself is what Dean Moriarty fails to do. Impulses pour out of him, but is he even aware of them at any point before he is in the middle of what they compel him to do? He doesn't so much have impulses as the impulses have him. Is that freedom? Is that calmly greeting the tiger of fear with a steadfast "hello, tiger," presence? Or, instead of fleeing from the tiger into conformity and conventional morality, does Dean merely flee the opposite direction into excess?
I believe that your true self emerges from neither repressing nor indulging. Attend to the impulses, the mad, wild desires. Don't push them down or away; they are always offering you a teaching: listen carefully.
Listen always. Indulge sometimes.
Follow no formula, but a creative and loving and spontaneous wisdom.
This is no easy thing to do. It is the vaguely defined destination of my own life's road trip, the "Further" to which I imagine my bus is headed, the damned good question I don't understand. I do believe, though, that listening to what is going on in us requires cultivating a stillness and silence, so we can hear – and that's something Dean Moriarty could never sit still long enough to do. Kerouac writes:
With frantic Dean I was rushing through the world without a chance to see it. (205)
Yeah, man.
Slow down and maybe then see what this life is.
And what to do with it? You could take it on the road every once in a while.
Labels: Beat Generation Celebration
Compassion and the Faith Instinct
poem: prayer to the rabbit god
Reverence for Life: Toward Beloved Multispecies Co...
Beyond the Veil: Women and Islam

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaCommonCrawl


text:
Archive for the 'Kuznets' Category
Avatar's theme of self-determination proves too subversive and successful in China and is abruptly yanked by censors
January 19th, 2010 TokyoTom No comments
I noted in my previous post – Avatar resonates in China – where standing up for property rights (and against "progress") can be downright subversive – that Avatar had hit a surprising chord in China.
Perhaps not so surprisingly. China's censors have said they have seen enough of the band-together-and-fend-your homes-by-standing-up-to-bullies movie – which has been playing since January 4 to record breaking audiences – and have ordered all theaters to stop showing it after January 22, weeks ahead of its scheduled February 11 closing.
Avatar will be replaced by a state-approved movie on Confucius. As a result, Avatar will not be shown nationwide. (Avatar can continue to be shown only at the very limited urban locations with a 3-D projector – there is no 3-D version of the Confucius movie).
Most reports are based on the following report from Hong Kong`s Apple Daily (I was unable to find the original) (emphasis added):
China Film instructed all locations to stop showing the ordinary version of Avatar and to show only the 3D version. The Central Publicity Department issued an order to the media prohibiting it from hyping up Avatar. Reportedly, the authorities have two reasons for this check on Avatar:
first, it has taken in too much money and has seized market share from
domestic films, and second, it may lead audiences to think about forced
removal, and may possibly incite violence.
A mainland source close to China Film confirmed that the company had
recently issued instructions ordering the 2D and film version of Avatar to be taken down this week, leaving only the 3D version still showing.
Because there are so few 3D cinemas on the mainland, the order effectively prevents the general distribution of Avatar. The source said that the order had come from SARFT [China's State Administration of Radio Film and Television]: "It may be a political decision." Reportedly, even the 3D version will only be able to screen for three to four weeks. Avatar premiered in China on the fourth of the month.
According to the source, the Central Publicity Department has
ordered propaganda departments to ensure that the media does not hype
up Avatar, and that they correctly guide public opinion. At the
same time, it instructed the entertainment news media to shift its
attention to the upcoming domestic blockbuster Confucius. Confucius, starring Hong Kong actor Chow Yun-fat, will premiere across the mainland on the 22nd.
More reports are here and here.
I imagine bootleg copies of Avatar, which were apparently on sale in China even before the movie opened, will soar.
Next up on the censors' agenda? Looks like Google.
Categories: Avatar, China, indigenous, Kuznets, property rights Tags:
Avatar resonates in China – where standing up for property rights (and against "progress") can be downright subversive
It looks as if James Cameron`s Avatar movie – which is seen by many in the West as predictibly shallow, anti-capitalist, anti-imperialist, pro-enviro and racially politically correct – has struck a home-owners` rights chord that is resonating in China, and may reinforce popular demands in China for the protection of private property rights against governments and politically well-connected developers.
These are "rebellious undertones", claims the WSJ in January 11 editorial. This editorial, as well as coverage in WSJ`s China Real Time Report (January 8) and by Xinhua/China.org.cn (January 13), are worth a look.
Here are a few excerpts (emphasis added):
WSJ in January 11 editorial
This is standard politically correct fare for a Western audience,
conveying a message of racial sensitivity and environmental awareness.
In China, however, it has more rebellious undertones.
That's because Chinese local
governments in cahoots with developers have become infamous for
forcibly seeking to evict residents from their homes with little
compensation and often without their consent. The holdouts are known as
"nail households," since their homes are sometimes left stranded in the
middle of busy construction sites. More often, however, they are driven
away by paid thugs. Private property is one of the most sensitive
issues in the country today, and "Avatar" has given the resisters a
shot in the arm.
WSJ`s China Real Time Report (January 8):
While the plot contains obvious allusions to colonialist
resource-grabbing, Li [Li Chengpeng, an apparently well-known blogger and sports reporter] instead sees "Avatar" as an allegory for the
exploitation of regular people by Chinese real estate companies.
In his post, titled "Avatar: An Epic Nail House Textbook," Li draws
a comparison between the tree where the Na'vi live and the homes of
people who resist eviction—known in China as "nail houses" because of
the way they stick up out of would-be construction sites (see articles,
with video, on the subject here and here).
Like the Na'vi, China's nail house residents are often asked to
abandon their homes for little or nothing in return. Chinese real
estate developers, like the company in the film, are typically
quasi-governmental organizations, backed by the rhetoric of progress
and armies of hired thugs that can be brought in when negotiations fall
through.
"The developer sees the tree as an illegal building, its residents
as rabble rousers who don't support municipal development and aren't
willing to sacrifice for the greater good," Li writes.
The post has been viewed more than 200,000 times and attracted
nearly 2500 comments, the vast majority supportive, since he put it up
Others have jumped on the idea, including The Beijing News, which called the film "a nail house parable," and twenty-something literary star Han Han, who defended
the film against charges its plot is weak: "For audiences from other
places, barbaric eviction is something they simply can't imagine–it's
the sort of thing that could only happen in outer space and China."
So what lessons does the film hold for people in China facing
eviction? "Communication is worthless," Li writes. "You can only fight
fire with fire."
Xinhua/China.org.cn (January 13)
While most of the global audience are enjoying the dazzling 3-D experience of the Hollywood blockbuster Avatar, some Chinese see it from a very different angle: a successful battle against forced eviction. …
But in China, the story has aroused a
sympathetic response among many spectators, as they see in the film a
familiar social conflict — forced demolitions by real estate
developers and urban administrative inspectors.
"They are very much alike. For
instance, the conflict in the film also starts with land," a posting by
"A Cup of Green Tea" said in an on-line forum operated by the
www.xinhuanet.com.
"When real estate developers want a
piece of land, the local residents must move away; if they decline to
leave, then real estate developers will resort to violent ways," the
posting said.
Forced demolitions have always led to
opposition and resistance from local residents in China and have given
rise to the term "nail house" in China, in reference to a nail refusing
to be hammered down.
In southwest China's city of
Chongqing, a couple battled for three years from 2004 to 2007 to stop
developers from razing their home. Their neighbors left one after
another, leaving their two-story brick building standing like a tower
surrounded by a 17-meter deep construction site. Their fight finally
came to an end in April 2007 with a negotiated agreement that
nevertheless saw the demolition of their house.
In June 2008, Pan Rong and her husband
stood on the roof of their house in Shanghai and threw Molotov
cocktails at the approaching bulldozer. Pan's efforts to protect her
home failed at last when the bulldozer destroyed the walls, forcing the
couple out.
In November last year, a 47-year-old
woman, Tang Fuzhen, in the southwestern city of Chengdu, set herself on
fire to protest the forced demolition of her house and died later.
In both cases, the local governments insisted that the forced demolitions were lawful and accorded with regulations.
"I am wondering whether Cameron had secretly lived in China before coming up with such an idea of writing the story of Avatar, but with a promising ending in the film," said renowned football reporter, Li Chengpeng, in a blog article on www.sina.com.
"In a word, I think the film is a successful eulogy of the fight of 'nail houses' against forced demolitions," he said.
The Chinese central government is increasingly aware of the negative impact of and public discontent toward forced demolitions.
China passed its landmark property law in 2007, highlighting the protection of private property.
On Dec. 7 last year, five professors
from Peking University claimed in an open letter to the National
People's Congress, the country's top legislature, the Regulation on
Urban Housing Demolition Administration was unconstitutional and
violated the property law.
The existing demolition regulation
took effect in 2001, allowing forced demolition. The government has
finished a draft revision to the regulation.
The draft revision, with its content
still unknown, put more restrictions on the government's administrative
power in demolition procedures, and was aimed at easing growing
tensions caused by forced demolitions, legal experts said.
"To audiences of other countries,
forced demolitions are probably beyond their imagination," said young
writer Han Han, well known for his always controversial remarks, in one
of his blog articles on www.sina.com.
"So I think Avatar is a great movie. I give it a full mark of 10, also taking into consideration the 3-D and IMAX," he said. …
However, "A Cup of Green Tea" voiced a
note of warning: "I strongly advise real estate developers and urban
administrative inspectors see the movie and learn from it."
This relatively surprising reception of the Avatar movie in China is obviously something to be welcomed by all those who favor markets and freedom – as well by evil greenies (and Japanese and others downwind/downstream) who want cleaner air and water – since it is clear that enforceable and transferrable property rights is one of the key mechanisms by which developing societies move along the "Kuznets environmental curve" from pollution to a cleaner environment.
Let`s also hope that the Chinese also start to recognize that their consumer demand is (like that of Western consumers) fuelling Avatar-like destruction elsewhere around the world, and choose to act as responsible consumers, by insisting that indigenous rights elsewhere by protected.
To Ron Bailey: yes, an "invisible hand" controls population, but property rights & rule of law are not universal and, as Mises noted, require effort
June 19th, 2009 TokyoTom No comments
Ron Bailey, science correspondent at ReasonOnline, has a very useful post up that outlines how markets and the institutions that underpin them explain declining fertility in Western societies, and that suggest grounds for optimism when looking at population growth in the developing world.
However, he leaves a few things out in his ongoing effort to show that the "Neo-Malthusians" are wrong to worry about population, including the following:
the West lies at the end of the demand chains that have swamped both unowned commons in the oceans and traditional, community-based property rights systems in developing nations (and that have fuelled kleptocrats for decades);
as developing nations grow, until clear and effective property rights systems are established, they will put stresses similar to those that the West did on open-access commons – including on the climate system as their fossil fuel use grows; and
establishing property rights and other institutions conducive to markets and wealth don`t spring up magically, but take time and concerted effort (and leave gaps), as Ludwig von Mises noted- and which is the lesson of the "Kuznets" environmental curve.
I remarked on some these in the following, which I posted (or tried to) at Ron`s comment thread:
Ron, in general I think your post is insightful and helpful, as it points the way to property rights and rule of law as ways that human societies can improve their well-being while controlling their population via the choices of individuals. This provides a fruitful focus for all participants in the discussion, including both the "conservative" and the "envirofacist" nature-lover poles.
However, for me at least it`s not a new insight (I studied some population dynamics, carrying capacity & sygmoid growth curves, was long familiar w/ Hardin & noticed in the 80s that the places where pop growth was highest was where property wasn`t adequately protected.
And you might not have not have noticed, but decades before Hardin, Ludwig von Mises explained how environmental problems arise from the lack of clear, appropriate and enforceable property rights.
More importantly, I think you fail to address both the West`s role in ongoing environmental destruction outside of their countries and the need for those concerned about environment and human welfare to continue to push and contend – both property rights on the supply side, and management (consumer pressure, boycotts etc.) are still needed on the demand side. I blogged on this two years ago, here: "Too Many or Too Few People: Does the market provide an answer?".
There are real problems and they aren`t magically solved (as Tierney seems to think, a la Kuznets). Mises pointed not only at the problem of externalities, but also at the transitions that societies make, deliberately or through changes in customs, to reduce externalities.
There is a lot of hard work ahead of us, and preferences and initiative matter greatly. I appreciate your efforts to educate and to push the ball forward.
Sincerely, Tom
Categories: Hardin, Kuznets, mises, Ron Bailey, Tierney, tragedy of commons Tags:
Envirofascists at Heritage Foundation worry about China's environmental problems
September 4th, 2008 TokyoTom No comments
The bleeding-heart liberal do-gooders! Puzzlingly, this Heritage Foundation essay completely fails to mention the predominant role of the state and the lack of property rights in generating the problem.
They make Tom Friedman seem like the real advocate of freedom.
[Snark alert: high]
Categories: China, Enviro Derangement Syndrome, Heritage Foundation, Kuznets Tags:
Tom Friedman/NYT roots for freedom and property rights as ways to propel Chinese progress along the enviro Kuznets curve
September 1st, 2008 TokyoTom No comments
Here's the money quote from Tom Friedman's interesting op-ed at the Sunday New York Times:
"The problem for the ruling Communist Party is this: China can't have a greener
society without empowering citizens to become watchdogs and allowing them to sue
local businesses and governments that pollute, and it can't have a more
knowledge-intensive innovation society without a freer flow of information and
experimentation."
Spoken like a true enviro-Nazi!
My prior posts on the environmental Kuznets curve are here.
Categories: China, Enviro Derangement Syndrome, Kuznets Tags:
Chris Horner/CEI: Confused or alarmist on Kuznets, China and climate?
August 9th, 2008 TokyoTom No comments
The right-wing Business & Media Institute has published a rather confused piece by Chris Horner, senior fellow at the Competitive Enterprise Institute, in which Horner, while noting China's progress along the environmental Kuznets curve (as I discuss here), prefers to wring his hands that the West, in order to deal with climate change, may feel compelled to adopt the same strong-arm approach that China has taken to trying to partially clear its filthy skies over Beijing during the Olympics.
But Horner has his paradigms all mixed up. Environmental Kuznets curves are discussed with respect to particular countries – and for good reason, as a society's response to externalities is largely dependent upon the particular mix of property rights and other institutions which such society may rely on to protect its people and their property from harms generated by economic activity. But despite Horner's worst nightmares, there is no "world government" (even as growing trade and wealth is gradually bringing different countries together and establishing a very interconnected world, a world that encourages China by allowing it to host the Olympics), much less a red-handed governing elite that can impose its will on the rest of a powerless world.
Indeed, while one might very well conceive of a global Kuznets curve, it's quite obvious that information and transaction costs, political disunity and differences in wealth and perspective across the nations of the world make it very difficult indeed for self interested countries to reach meaningful and enforceable agreements with respect to shared resources like the atmosphere. Even so, we are more likely to see such a political agreement or resource-management much earlier than we are to see the establishment of a unified global government that is capable of exercising a monopoly on force the way the Chinese government does.
It's the very difficulty in reaching such agreements that underlies some of the pessimism among many that man is capable of addressing in a coordinated and meaningful way various global and regional problems, from those relating to unowned or open access resources to those relating to development and poor/kleptocratic governance (from Zimbabwe to the USA).
Further, on climate change discussions, the effort has stumbled not because of strong-arming of the kind that alarms Horner, but because Western nations have tried to craft overly sophisticated and bureaucratized trading mechanisms (based in large part on US insistence and experience) that were intended to reduce costs overall.
Accordingly, Horner's "alarmism" is rather surprising. One would think that the difficulties that the enviros have encountered in trying to coordinate global climate change policy would hearten Horner, who is a strong climate change skeptic, both on the science and on policy grounds. Is Horner secretly concerned that maybe the enviros are right, and that delay on the policy front is buying us unavoidable future costs – in which case governments might decide to act with greater alacrity that they have shown to date? If not, what is he worried about?
We've encountered "beam me up" Chris Horner before; as previously, I find his views to be puzzling – unless Horner, like "skeptical" scientists Pat Michaels and Chip Knappenberger, is becoming a warmer. As Michaels and Knappenberger wrote in January:
"First off, it will take nothing short of a miracle for the 50% reduction to take place, and secondly, it probably wouldn't stop the temperature from rising 2ºC above "natural" levels. …
"But the targets won't come close to being met as a bits-and-pieces solution will not achieve the goal of halving current global CO2 emissions by the year 2100—much less any year before then. In fact, more than likely, these legislative efforts will not, to any noticeable degree, even begin to separate the blue and the red curves for a long time to come—far too long to avoid elevating global temperature 2 degrees above "natural" levels.
That's what the future holds in store. Get used to it."
Categories: AGW, carbon pricing, China, climate change, Horner, Knappenberger, Kuznets, Pat Michaels Tags:
"Environmental Kuznets curve" and Onion's spoof of China's Status as World's Number One Air Polluter
July 12th, 2008 TokyoTom No comments
Sorry; this was too good not to share:
China Celebrates Its Status As World's Number One Air Polluter
China has now outstripped the rest of the world in GHG emissions, as well.
Government ownership of (and favoritism to) much of industry, a lack of clear or enforceable property rights and an inability of injured citizens to seek recourse for damages will all delay Chinese progress along the "environmental Kuznets curve" – which in my mind simply reflects the various information costs and transaction costs within a society in becoming aware of and responding to environmental problems. Environmental problems are "problems" only because a lack of information or social infrastructure means that certain producers (and consumers of their products) are able to shift costs of production to others, who either may be unaware of the risks, unaware of who is producing them, or unable to organize and lack institutional abilities either to protect their rights or to transact with those who generate the harms.
Institutional deficiencies in China unfortunately mean that China will experience a higher peak in environmental damage than if it openly acknowledges its environmental problems and moves quickly to widely publicize pollution information, and to strengthen property rights, tort rights and access to fair courts (or, alternatively, to follow the Western example by abandoning common law approaches in favor of stronger statutory, regulatory and criminal measures).
More posts here on the environmental Kuznets curve.
Categories: China, climate change, GHGs, Kuznets, property rights Tags:
John Baden: is this free market enviromentalist stalwart a Mt. Pelerin misanthrope/watermelon?
December 16th, 2007 TokyoTom No comments
[snark meter – medium]
John Baden, a former logger and oilman, has long been a pillar of the "free-market" environmentalists. He founded and leads the Foundation for Research on Economics & the Environment (FREE) and founded and headed the Property and Environment Research Center (PERC), both based in Bozeman, Montana. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_A._Baden; http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Property_and_Environment_Research_Center.
But don't let his Mont Pelerin Society (http://www.montpelerin.org/home.cfm) membership fool you; John is very green on the outside and, with so much green, might he not be more than a little pink on the inside?
He recently summarized advice he had given (on request) to policy advisers for a Democratic presidential candidate and a Republican one. Allow me to quote freely (emphasis added):
"Both parties need help—but in opposite directions. Republicans need sensitivity to Green issues, Democrats sensibility regarding incentives."
"We are … eager to help all candidates develop sound policies, ones we believe will foster responsible liberty, environmental quality, and modest prosperity. Over the decades, we've made compelling, well-respected arguments against the Green tradition of greater bureaucratic powers, increased federal control, and heightening paranoia over environmental issues. …
"From the Civil War until the first Earth Day in 1970, the West's politics, culture, and economy were oriented toward the exploitation of its natural resources. But the extractive sector no longer drives the Western economy and hasn't for several decades. Today's economic drivers are amenities, services, and symbolic manipulation, not the traditional material stuff of wood, wheat, water, and minerals. …
"Here's the reality some politicians ignore at their peril: we've high-graded our best, most accessible resources. The richest ores, finest timber, and best dam sites have been developed. The easy fruit has been picked and the Western economy can no longer rely on the extractive sector. No ghost dance will bring them back.
"Ray Rasker notes that since 1970, "Montana has added over 150,000 new jobs, and not one of the new net jobs has been in mining, oil and gas, farming, ranching, or the woods products industry." The extractive industries are notoriously unstable, and commodity prices always undulate. The timber industry, for example, has largely abandoned the West for the Southeast and foreign countries. …
"Now, increased opportunities in the West are created by high-tech enterprises and services. The service sector includes professional occupations in law, health care, software, data processing, education, and finance. Although they are not the traditional Western jobs, these occupations, like those in extractive industries, depend upon open space and natural resources.
"Why? Because professionals seek locations rich in environmental amenities, e.g., wilderness, open space, fish and wildlife, and recreational opportunities. Data indicates the West's roadless public lands, wilderness areas, free-flowing rivers, national parks and forests, open ranges, and healthy wildlife habitats generate much of our economic growth. Folks don't move here by accident nor do they do so to maximize income—quality of life trumps.
"The GOP and the Democrats compete for well-off and well-educated voters, those David Brooks describes in Bobos in Paradise: The New Upper Class and How They Got There, and the Democrats are clearly winning. This is no accident; the nation has become immensely wealthy, and with wealth and education comes heightened environmental sensitivity. When Americans become wealthy most think, or at least posture, Green.
"President Clinton capitalized on these demographic realties when he set aside 40 million acres of National Forest as roadless areas. Many fiscal conservatives and the vast majority of Westerners applauded the decision, even those who disliked Clinton.
"These roadless areas were undisturbed for good reason; most have low economic value. Without explicit or implicit subsidies, resource extraction on these lands is infeasible. Federal lands are political lands where heavy subsidies are the norm. Traditional politics have ignored or discounted the full costs of exploitation. Citizens now demand more honest accounting of both economic and environmental costs.
"A candidate who hopes to capture the West's electoral votes should not take seriously any campaign policy that ignores links between ecology and economics. Westerners are Greener, more sophisticated, and better informed than 30 years ago. Few are dependent on traditional resource exploitation. A good candidate will discern the implications and propose appropriate policies."
http://www.free-eco.org/articleDisplay.php?id=573
Inquiring minds want to know:
– are only those in the American West "Greener, more sophisticated, and better informed than 30 years ago", or is this true across all developed and emerging economies?
– does "heightened environmental sensitivity" come with "wealth and education"? Or is such "heightened environmental sensitivity" simply a ploy by the educated wealthy to use the tools of the state to restrict access by brave captains of the extractive industry to the public lands of the West (the better to go fly fishing)?
– outside of the struggle for control over "public lands" in the West, are there any other areas where voters oppose policies that "ignore links between ecology and economics"?
– if "heightened environmental sensitivity" does come with "wealth and education", what do we make of the concern that enviros, scientists, industry leaders, and politicians around the world all express concern about climate change and the pressure of economic activity on unowned commons like the atmosphere, oceans and tropical forests/wildlife? More uninformed nonsense, led by evil man-haters?
By not stridently demanding privatization of public lands, John Baden sounds like an "incrementalist" rather than a pure libertarian, and by urging policies that favor recognition of the relatively higher values in environmental amenities than in extractive industries, he sounds very much like an environmentalist statist.
Does it help us to better understand him, or the problems that concern him, if we call him a misanthropic "watermelon"?
Warning: If you are an Austrian, you have just been gravely polluted by reading this. Seek help immediately, and recite the "Corrigan Creed" (or as some may have it, the "Reisman Rule") at least five times.
(If you missed it, the Corrigan Creed is here: http://mises.org/Community/blogs/tokyotom/archive/2007/12/17/holiday-joy-quot-watermelons-quot-roasting-on-an-open-pyre.aspx.)
Categories: Corrigan, Enviro Derangement Syndrome, enviros, John Baden, Kuznets, Mt. Pelerin, public land, Reisman Tags:
Mises on fixing externalities: progress along the Kuznets curve is not magic, but the result of institution-building
October 11th, 2007 TokyoTom No comments
"Not all externalities are crimes, and as long as CO2 does not make clear victims, it should be left as an externality for people to adapt to …."
In response to this statement on a recent thread (http://blog.mises.org/archives/007152.asp#comments), I observed, in the context of the impact of man's activities on the climate, that:
But Mises, Yandle and others speak of transition points, that are reached when demand pressure grows as a result of social changes (including new forms of organization) or technological advances (which might also enable greater protection), when open-access resources fall first under common property regimes and then later under private property rights.
I think we are at one of those points now. (emphasis added)
When another remarked that a transition might seem to involve "mob rule", I noted that Mises had expressly acknowledged the need for transitions and implied that the state could be used to address them, and briefly quoted Mises. I take this opportunity quote more extensively Mises' view on externalities, evolving property rights and the state (emphasis added):
"Property rights as they are circumscribed by laws and protected by courts and the police, are the outgrowth of an age-long evolution. … The legal concepts of property do not fully take account of the social function of private property. There are certain inadequacies and incongruities which are reflected in the determination of the market phenomena.
"Carried through consistently, the right of property would entitle the proprietor to claim all the advantages which the good's employment may generate on the one hand and would burden him with all the disadvantages resulting from its employment on the other hand. Then the proprietor alone would be fully responsible for the outcome. In dealing with his property he would take into account all the expected results of his action, those considered favorable as well as those considered unfavorable. But if some of the consequences of his action are outside of the sphere of the benefits he is entitled to reap and of the drawbacks that are put to his debit, he will not bother in his planning about all the effects of his action. He will disregard those benefits which do not increase his own satisfaction and those costs which do not burden him. His conduct will deviate from the line which it would have followed if the laws were better adjusted to the economic objectives of private ownership. He will embark upon certain projects only because the laws release him from responsibility for some of the costs incurred. He will abstain from other projects merely because the laws prevent him from harvesting all the advantages derivable.
"The laws concerning liability and indemnification for damages caused were and still are in some respects deficient. By and large the principle is accepted that everybody is liable to damages which his actions have inflicted upon other people. But there were loopholes left which the legislators were slow to fill. In some cases this tardiness was intentional because the imperfections agreed with the plans of the authorities. When in the past in many countries the owners of factories and railroads were not held liable for the damages which the conduct of their enterprises inflicted on the property and health of neighbors, patrons, employees, and other people through smoke, soot, noise, water pollution, and accidents caused by defective or inappropriate equipment, the idea was that one should not undermine the progress of industrialization and the development of transportation facilities. The same doctrines which prompted and still are prompting many governments to encourage investment in factories and railroads through subsidies, tax exemption, tariffs, and cheap credit were at work in the emergence of a legal state of affairs in which the liability of such enterprises was either formally or practically abated."
"Whether the proprietor's relief from responsibility for some of the disadvantages resulting from his conduct of affairs is the outcome of a deliberate policy on the part of governments and legislators or whether it is an unintentional effect of the traditional working of laws, it is at any rate a datum which the actors must take into account. They are faced with the problem of external costs. Then some people choose certain modes of want-satisfaction merely on account of the fact that a part of the costs incurred are debited not to them but to other people.
"The extreme instance is provided by the case of no-man's property referred to above. If land is not owned by anybody, although legal formalism may call it public property, it is utilized without any regard to the disadvantages resulting. Those who are in a position to appropriate to themselves the returns–lumber and game of the forests, fish of the water areas, and mineral deposits of the subsoil–do not bother about the later effects of their mode of exploitation. For them the erosion of the soil, the depletion of the exhaustible resources and other impairments of the future utilization are external costs not entering into their calculation of input and output. They cut down the trees without any regard for fresh shoots or reforestation. In hunting and fishing they do not shrink from methods preventing the repopulation of the hunting and fishing grounds. In the early days of human civilization, when soil of a quality not inferior to that of the utilized pieces was still abundant, people did not find any fault with such predatory methods. When their effects appeared in a decrease in the net returns, the ploughman abandoned his farm and moved to another place. It was only when a country was more densely settled and unoccupied first class land was no longer available for appropriation, that people began to consider such predatory methods wasteful. At that time they consolidated the institution of private property in land. They started with arable land and then, step by step, included pastures, forests, and fisheries. The newly settled colonial countries overseas, especially the vast spaces of the United States, whose marvelous agricultural potentialities were almost untouched when the first colonists from Europe arrived, passed through the same stages. Until the last decades of the nineteenth century there was always a geographic zone open to newcomers–the frontier. Neither the existence of the frontier nor its passing was peculiar to America. What characterizes American conditions is the fact that at the time the frontier disappeared ideological and institutional factors impeded the adjustment of the methods of land utilization to the change in the data. …
"It is true that where a considerable part of the costs incurred are external costs from the point of view of the acting individuals or firms, the economic calculation established by them is manifestly defective and their results deceptive. But this is not the outcome of alleged deficiencies inherent in the system of private ownership of the means of production. It is on the contrary a consequence of loopholes left in this system. It could be removed by a reform of the laws concerning liability for damages inflicted and by rescinding the institutional barriers preventing the full operation of private ownership."
http://mises.org/humanaction/chap23sec6.asp
Ludwig von Mises, Part IV (Das Handeln in der Marktwirtschaft), Chapter 10 (Kapitel: Die Daten der Marktlage), Sec. VI (Die Grenzen des Sondereigentums und das Problem der external costs und external economies), Nationalökonomie: Theorie des Handelns und Wirtschaftens (Geneva: Editions Union, 1940). The quote provided is from Mises's expanded English translation, Chapter XXIII: "The Data of the Market," Sec. 6: "The Limits of Property Rights and the Problems of External Costs and External Economies," Human Action: A Treatise on Economics (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1949).
By the way, it has has elsewhere been noted on LvMI that with this essay, Mises explained how environmental problems arise from the lack of clear, appropriate and enforceable property rights some decades before bioethicist Garrett Hardin in his famous 1968 essay, "The Tragedy of the Commons". http://mises.org/daily/1373. But we should not ignore that Mises pointed not only at the problem of externalities, but also at the transitions that societies make, deliberately or through changes in customs, to reduce externalities.
Categories: climate, environment, fisheries, Kuznets, mises, tragedy of commons, transition Tags:


Bob was the Director of Business Development, in full charge of all aspects of the pursuit of this project. As the largest non-casino hotel property between Chicago and the west coast, this project is 1,500 rooms and 2.2 million overall square feet. The pursuit included due diligence for the construction team in Denver, CO and Orlando, FL; the A&E team in Dallas; the development team in Florida. This pursuit resulted in a $26MM electrical contract due to be complete in Q-4, 2018.
Applying the skills learned on the "build" side of the business has made me an excellent Business Development Executive with strong ability to communicate and find consensus among a diverse group from the skilled tradespeople to the C-Suite.