Book Banquet 2012

Shai Coggins’ blog reminded me that I have read quite a pile of books this year that I should list, even if just for myself. If you have read any of these and have an opinion, please comment!

1. Nonfiction. Them and Us: Changing Britain – Why We Need a Fair Society Will Hutton. This book applies equally well to the Australian scene since the Global Financial Crisis and is a big influence on how I now view the political economy of public health.
2. Nonfiction. David Harvey. The Enigma of Capital: and the Crises of Capitalism. This book was the basis of a pre-conference workshop on the Political Economy of Health before the international Public Health Association meeting in Adelaide in September 2012. It convinced me that I’m on the right track with my lack of capitalism in its present form ever leading to fairness in the distribution of resources compatible with good health in a nation. All capitalism depends on gambling that the small amounts of money held by “lesser” people can be collected together by crooks on the stock market to increase the large amounts held by people who consider themselves “the bosses” of the rest of us. It can’t keep happening as eventually the poor run out of resources, get angry and disrupt the system, or the rich find there is little value in their cash because workers are not producing anything more for them to buy with it. They can then either stockpile wealth to absolutely no avail or start financing jobs for the unemployed so the economy can start moving again. Have I convinced you? Anyway, I could rave about this forever, knowing absolutely nothing about economics!
3. Jo Nesbo The Redbreast. A horrific Scandinavian thriller, as are the next four.
4. Jo Nesbo The Leopard
5. Jo Nesbo The Devil’s Star
6. Jo Nesbo The Snowman. These are so well-written I couldn’t put them down.
7. Henning Mankell The Troubled Man. Detective Kurt Wallander has turned sixty and thinks he is succumbing to the dementia that ended his own father’s life. Meanwhile he is struggling to help solve the mystery of a murdered naval officer.
8. Peter Hoeg The Quiet Girl. Odd but thrilling, with a young girl kept apart from others by an apparently obscure group of “nuns”, helped by a strange Bach-loving clown. There are touches of magical realism about the tale but it all hangs together in the end
9. Camilla Läckberg The Ice Princess: The body of crime writer Erica Falck’s childhood friend is discovered, wrists slashed, in an ice cold bath. Was it murder or suicide? The investigation leads her to a community on the brink of tragedy.
10. Camilla Läckberg The Preacher: Twenty years ago, two young women disappeared in Fjällbacka – now their remains are found, along with a new victim. As Patrik Hedström works to solve these murders, do the dark secrets of a local family hold the key?
11. Camilla Läckberg The Stonecutter: When a little girl is found in a fisherman’s net, the police realize it was no accidental drowning. Patrik Hedström investigates the death of a child both he and Erica knew well.
12. Hakan Nesser – but can’t remember the title- think it’s different in Australia than the USA. But it’s another crime thriller.
13. Yrsa Sigurdardottir Last Rituals Set in Reykjavík, this thriller concerns the murder of a student who appears to have odd symbols carved into his chest linked to ancient folk tales.
14. Martin Walker Black Diamond. Policeman “Bruno” Benoit Couregges is on the trail of truffle merchants who are rigging the price of their expensive finds in French provincial markets.
15. Martin Walker  The Crowded Grave. I loved the description of the French countryside in this mystery about a modern murder victim concealed at an archeological dig against the suspicion of local cross-border terrorism.
16. Non-fiction. Ted Nield Supercontinent: Ten Billion Years in the Life of Our Planet. About the history of the major tectonic plates that cover the earth and how we can see the ancient links between them by matching the minerals and landforms at the break-apart sites.
17. Non-fiction. Simon Winchester Atlantic: Great Sea Battles, Heroic Discoveries, Titanic Storms & a Vast Ocean of a Million Stories. I skipped most of the battles etc. & concentrated on the accounts of how the Atlantic is being widened by the upwelling of volcanoes along the mid-continental ridge and the currents that carry whole species to unusual destinations on its shores.
18. Nonfiction. Richard Dawkins. The Ancestors’ Tale. This gave me a really clear view of evolution by tracing the origins of all living species back to where they branched off from their closest genetic relative on the evolutionary tree. The explanations for the sometimes bizarre separations of different species or varieties of animals and plants from each other by geological changes, such as continental drift and tectonic plates and climate change are quite revelatory as well. One of the best books on genetic evolution I’ve ever read- much better than all the ones that start with a single cell and come from past to present!
19. Geraldine Brooks Caleb’s Crossing. The Pulitzer Prize Winner’s novel of early America- Caleb is the first Native American to attend Harvard University, after being brought up quite traditionally on the site of modern day Martha’s Vineyard.
20.  Lars Kepler The Nightmare. Detective Inspector Joona Linna investigates the recovery of a young woman’s body from an abandoned yacht drifting around the Stockholm archipelago. Her lungs are filled with brackish water, and the forensics team is sure that she drowned. Why, then, is the pleasure boat still afloat, and why are there no traces of water on her clothes or body? The story involves international conspiracy and crime on a horrific scale, not easily relatable to the original death.

You can see by this selection that I’m a great fan of modern Scandinavian crime fiction, the history of the planet and the relationship of economics to health- what a weird mix  eh?! What’s your mix look like?

 

China vs India: What & why

I’ve just started a new ScoopIt bulletin on this topic after seeing an article in The Australian newspaper. I wasn’t aware that India felt that China was gradually surrounding it with pro-China [and anti-India] nations by getting them into China’s nuclear expansion plans. India has always had border difficultis all along the north because of dubious lines drawn on maps, arbititray splitting of tribal and religious groups and clashes over arable, habitable land in extremely mountainous areas.

While I’ve been aware for some time that Pakistan is probably [knowingly or unwittingly] sheltering pro-Taliban groups, I wasn’t aware that China still had designs on India and was befriending more nations on the borders. Apparently there have been some agreements forged between China and others concerning supply and support of technology & weapons. I’m not sure of the details [who is?], but it seems India is quite paranoid about it. Indian newspapers abound with stories, especially about supposed Maoists who may have been recruited to the older-style communist philosophies of China on the north-east border.

If you’re interested, have a look at the articles gathered by my ScoopIt bulletin

If you are commentator or expert on the topic, please send me some links! I need to learn.

Day 14 Na BloPoMo: Running on low power

 

Here we are relaxing after dinner- I’m playing with the lappy and Spotrick is watching the old movie “Taxi Driver” on pay-tv.

 

Just as we switched the air conditioner on before dinner, there was an item on the news saying that the price of electricity would be going up 12% in the next 12 months. This made me put a one-hour timer on the aircon, as our power bills have been shocking during summer and winter quarters these last few years. That reminds me- I need to put up some blinds over our atrium windows to reduce heat conduction. The length of the windows is 2.3 metres, which is 10cm longer than the standard pre-made blinds, so we have to get a measure and make job done. This costs money, and that’s something that’s not going to be around because it’s Christmas. So- out comes the poor old credit card again, giving Spotrick another lump of credit to pay off. Never ending story. Imagine if we had even less income, plus some kids? This piece told me all about local problems- it’s shocking!

 

The cost of power (and emitting carbon, I suppose) has climbed astronomically since I haven’t had employment, amounting to 30% over the past three years. Pensioners and the unemployed are really starting to have a terrible time much as they always have, I gather from this article written in 1904!. With our climate, we find it very difficult to get by without cooling in the summer as the nights can be nearly as warm as the days, eg. 43 degree day followed by a 28 degree night. Phew! Similarly winters regularly go to 5 or less deg C and many days don’t get above 14, meaning some sort of heating is needed unless you’re doing vigorous housework.

 

The last couple of summers and winters I have tried to go without heating or cooling as much as possible while I’ve been home alone, but it can be misery-making. I’ve been very depressed for years so anything likely to make me more miserable was a bad idea and Spotrick encouraged me to stay warm in winter, at least. Also, in the heat of summer, if I don’t cool down somehow, I just become a zombie and sit in a heap all day, unable to find the energy or motivation for anything. I truly HATE the heat, although I can tolerate cold better. What’s going to happen when the electricity becomes too expensive to use for temperature regulation? We can’t afford to put in solar power and wind seems to be expensive to fit as well.

For about the last 6 or 7 years a good friend of ours has been trying to get finance for a new power station to serve the city. He has a place to build it, proper builders plans, approval from council and emissions permission from the Environment Council. He even made a down payment on some huge turbines in Hong Kong, but was gazumped by the major power provider in our state who had been informed of his intentions- they bought the turbines and have sat on them ever since to keep the price of power high. He’s located some more turbines but the finance has been upset by the Global Financial Crisis and the turbine manufacturers/distributors may have been embroiled in the EnRon thing in the USA. It’s been a rocky road and I think all the investment so far may be lost- sad all round.

Meanwhile, back at the ranch, we have fetched the portable fan from the bedroom and switched that on as it’s quite warm sitting here digesting dinner! We can’t open the back door for a breeze as the courtyard is still quite hot (it’s 8.30 pm) and there are lots of mosquitoes. Spotrick is allergic to mozzie bites and the repellant disk doesn’t work in the fan breeze! Life!

I wonder if electricity is so expensive compared with the cost of living in other parts of the world? Roger Valdez makes some good points in this article from the USA. I’ve always thought it must be very expensive to use heating oil all winter in the USA- whenever I’ve lived in houses here with heating oil, people always let the tank run to empty and don’t refill until the next year. It was certainly a lot more expensive than gas heating, but I’m not sure now. For a while the authorities were saying we should reduce reliance on oil and gas because they were running out, but now they seem to be almost limitless! I’m confused!

On the other hand, coal mining is supposed to be reduced to stop filling the atmosphere with carbon, so coal-fired power stations will have to give way to something else. I hope it’s nuclear, but a lot of people are against it in the community because of the old disasters like Silkwood and Chernobyl. I think that a few pebble-bed reactors, in the style used by the Chinese would be a great improvement on what we do now and my impression is they are safer than most alternatives when working at their optimal level. Politics will decide that one.

 

Day 12 NaBloPoMo: Wikileaks and life as we know it.

Today Spotrick and I missed out on our Social Media Adelaide Christmas Picnic to attend the local rally in support of Wikileaks on the steps of Parliament House, Adelaide. Spotrick took along is camera, so this is what it looked like:

There were around 300 people there in a very peaceful rally. Several Green politicians spoke, plus other representatives of various interests, such as the perennial Socialist Alliance. There were a few good slogans, eg. “Wikileaks and the Chamber of Secrets”, and the Quakers were there as usual with their wicker broom and placards promoting Peace and Free Speech.

Everyone agreed that Wikileaks is a good thing and Julian Assange, as a facilitator of open information, should not be hunted down and pilloried for any reason. The issue of sexual assault or other charges against him in Sweden seem an annoyance and nothing to do with Wikileaks the organisation. There is speculation about Swedish deals to allow the USA to extradite Assange to face charges of goodness knows what, but there are many possibilities about bringing charges of any sort against him- conspiracy? creating a diversion? trying to malign him in the eyes of the public? stopping him from speaking out because he’s locked up? He doesn’t generally speak much himself about anything, so it’s difficult to narrow down the motives that might exist.

We all agree that the accusations of Sarah Palin are the rantings of an underpowered intellect and that there ought to be a law preventing her from inciting intercultural conflict by calling for his capture or assassination like Osama bin Laden. Imagine if people said this about Bill Gates because he released a pile of information someone didn’t like? Sheesh!

Australia’s Labor Prime Minister [Labor is similar to Democrats in the USA], has made herself very unpopular with members of her own party by saying that Julian Assange has broken the law in leaking internationally sensitive information. However, it’s unclear whose laws and which particular laws may have been broken- none, we guess. Our new Attorney General has also put his foot in it by declaring that he IS NOT impartial about the correct administration of justice in our country after all! He wants the Federal Police to take 18 months out of their valuable public service time to hunt down crimes of which Julian Assange could be considered guilty- although he can’t think of any right this minute. I want a NEW NEW Attorney General- one who stays out of any particular dispute and only looks at the way in which justice is administered- not doling it out himself!

The business about Wikileaks releasing the list of sites in Australia that might be strategically important to the USA is a terrible Furphy- who doesn’t know where the trans-ocean cable comes ashore in Sydney? It’s pretty obvious to anyone except the blind and I’m sure someone would tell them if they asked nicely. But who cares if there is an open-cut bauxite mine in northern Australia? Is a terrorist going to blow it up the same way the miners blow it up every day? Huh?? Where’s the problem? Bauxite is the commonest substance mined from the earth’s crust and costs a small fortune to smelt, making rich profits for suppliers of electricity and virtually no one else! As for where Midazolam is manufactured, eg. a Fauldings laboratory in Victoria- it’s made all over the place- I’m sure the US could get plenty from other places to make Australians forget stuff they didn’t want them to remember if they really wanted to! We might be grateful to forget if it’s really that bad!

The business with Visa, PayPal, Mastercard etc is pretty smelly. We have let these monster private companies take over governance of the world’s monetary transactions. We should have kept a publicly operable back-up system so they didn’t grab the power inherent in the role. Silly humans- it actually worries me quite a bit now. We don’t want companies to hold onto OUR money instead of paying people they don’t like! Maybe it’s a good thing that these companies showed their hand, giving us a chance to get a reserve cash system in place for a real global emergency. How would it be if my bank decided it wouldn’t pay my phone company’s bill because that company was making a takeover bid for my bank?? Whose money is it then? Very dodgy state of affairs for the world.

When we had a scratch dinner with friends tonight it felt like the old student days- we sat there drinking wine (not me), eating and talking politics and ethics for hours!We are in a real quandary about how to get good government. We’ve just re-elected our Labor government by the slimmest of margins, against a Liberal Party [like Republicans, Conservatives] that appeared to have no policies of its own, except to reverse the policies changed during the old Labor regime. They have NOTHING new to offer and basically believe “user pays”. They want to cut down social services, cut taxes to the rich, make health as private as they can and make economic conditions favourable for big companies who give most of their profits to their CEOs. The Greens seem committed to doing something about Climate Change, but their other policies are non-existent or too simplistic to work in the current complex social environment- so we can’t have a parliament dominated by them. So who are we going to elect?

Anyone for yet another new political party in Australia? What will we call it- how about the Australian Democrats? Hmmm… now that sounds familiar, and NOT very promising.

Any ideas?

PS. What would our Aboriginal Australians say is our best national option? Anything new on that front?