As If

*



IN READING THE HISTORY OF NATIONS, we find that, like individuals, they have their whims and their peculiarities; their seasons of excitement and recklessness, when they care not what they do. We find that whole communities suddenly fix their minds upon one object, and go mad in its pursuit; that millions of people become simultaneously impressed with one delusion, and run after it, till their attention is caught by some new folly more captivating than the first. We see one nation suddenly seized, from its highest to its lowest members, with a fierce desire of military glory; another as suddenly becoming crazed upon a religious scruple; and neither of them recovering its senses until it has shed rivers of blood and sowed a harvest of groans and tears, to be reaped by its posterity. At an early age in the annals of Europe its population lost their wits about the sepulchre of Jesus, and crowded in frenzied multitudes to the Holy Land; another age went mad for fear of the devil, and offered up hundreds of thousands of victims to the delusion of witchcraft. At another time, the many became crazed on the subject of the philosopher's stone, and committed follies till then unheard of in the pursuit. It was once thought a venial offence, in very many countries of Europe, to destroy an enemy by slow poison. Persons who would have revolted at the idea of stabbing a man to the heart, drugged his pottage without scruple. Ladies of gentle birth and manners caught the contagion of murder, until poisoning, under their auspices, became quite fashionable. Some delusions, though notorious to all the world, have subsisted for ages, flourishing as widely among civilised and polished nations as among the early barbarians with whom they originated,—that of duelling, for instance, and the belief in omens and divination of the future, which seem to defy the progress of knowledge to eradicate them entirely from the popular mind. Money, again, has often been a cause of the delusion of multitudes. Sober nations have all at once become desperate gamblers, and risked almost their existence upon the turn of a piece of paper. To trace the history of the most prominent of these delusions is the object of the present pages. Men, it has been well said, think in herds; it will be seen that they go mad in herds, while they only recover their senses slowly, and one by one.

Charles Mackay Extraordinary Popular Delusions and the Madness of Crowds.



There were times when he was a different person. When, rather than being the hapless victim to whatever circumstance had overwhelmed him, he was confident and bold, angry in narrow focus, the thrower of bricks. There had always been strings of discontent to lead to these peak points, peak experiences, deadline after deadline met, crowds and chaos, multiple unfairnesses, injustices which niggled away at him, stoked his outrage, forced strong measures. The world was so damn unfair. We're coming to get you. Nothing will be solved. All out, we're going to make this a better world, we're going to fix the things that are wrong, we're going to eliminate injustice.

As if. There were too many memories crowding in. The points that he remembered were so obscure. Was there any narrative thread? When he worked, briefly, as the music writer for a gay magazine, thirty years ago, he attended a press conference for Roy Orbison, the American singer of great fame, whether his songs had any special appeal for gay people. Only The Lonely. He had his dark glasses and he was from a different, more historic world. Here, on the outskirts of civilisation, anything American seemed to have more authenticity, because we had grown up with American landscapes on our televisions, American stories, American accents. Walking through Ameican redwood forests seemed more real than walking through the gum trees of Australia, the eucalypt forests towering above.

My songs appeal to everyone, I hope, he said, what else could he say, and there was a prickling shock and uncomfortability that spread around the room at the oddness of the question. He was all bold, all social pioneer, all furious in his determination. He let everything wash over him. As luck would have it he found himself standing next to a very uncomfortable Orbison at the urinal, men going about their business, determined not to look. He wore his dark shades, even in that dimly lit room.

There was that day; there were press releases and records and a tour to promote, and he mixed as if he belonged with all the other music writers from the major papers, and he made a trickle of a living writing for obscure little magazines who were always desperate for copy, who basically would publish anything. It hadn't started well, this music writing thing. He basically knew nothing about it, had no natural aptitude, didn't understand rock. He was awed by everyone around him. He lived with Stuart Coupe, the music writer for the Sun Herald for a while, the walls lined with records, hundreds, thousands of records; and he was perpetually in awe of his knowledge, his talent, his taste, everything about him. He was just a pretender on the outskirts.

He rented the room at the front of Stuart's house; and was amazed by everything about him. The value of that massive record collection; an astonishingly full collection of the history of rock and roll. His impeccable taste. The astonishing number of people he knew. His fame. Everything. Drunk one night, huh, drunk most nights, he told a taxi driver he was living with the music writer for the Sun Herald, boasting. It was his connection to a different world, a real world, where people made money out of writing, where their opinions were respected, where fame was the source of all the bubbles of credibility, the authenticity, the reality. How strong were these things; how strong were these things; after all his years on the fringe.

There was no going forward. He had lived too long in the shallows. No one believed he was going anywhere. He was too drug fucked and alcohol pickled to ever succeed. His occasional moments of notoriety were no substitute for a genuine career path. He clung to others, as if their presence would give him some form of solidity, some substance. Everything was shadows, unreal. Nothing he did was anything but pretence. He didn't know anything more about rock music than he did about nuclear science; all he could do was watch others and mimic their actions. He fed off real people, their force, their substance, their grip on the planet surface filling in his own blank spaces. There was never going to be a good ending, not to this.

Strange things were always happening, he thought, as he stood there pissing next to a very uncomfortable Roy Orbison. As if he could care. Not every gay person was a slut. Was that even real; when the Sydney nights were full of wild presentations of the flesh, orgies involving hundreds stretching from one dark room to the other, music that was going to change everything. There had been so many failures. He had been beaten so badly as a child. He had been so dissolute, so hopeless in his presentations. Already it had begun, nice guy, pity he drinks so much. And the nice guy routine, it was all just part of the pretence, pretending to be a real person, an ordinary customer, when in his head there was only one wish: to be scattered to the four winds, to disintegrate under the weight of a thousand drinks, to find the perfect state of oblivion.

Nice day, if you like that sort of thing. He shrugged, he shook, he buttoned himself up, and they emerged into the light of the hotel ballroom as if nothing had ever gone wrong. As if he had every right to be there. As if he was a normal person. Huh, you have no idea, he thought, lifting a glass of white wine off a passing tray. You have no idea. I'll be shivering on the roof tops watching the hallucinatory dawn break across the city; while everyone else will be comfortably in bed, rolling over to kiss their loved one, getting ready for work. And one day his disease wracked body would be found in an alcove of those rooftops he loved so much, overdosed, his heart just stopped. And no one would know why he was where he was: on the rooftop of an apartment block in Elizabeth Bay; that place where he was more himself than anywhere else; where he could see the light picking up every detail of the harbour, every grand house, every inlet. Let us pass in peace, he thought, and downed the glass in a single gulp.




THE BIGGER STORY:

http://edition.cnn.com/2008/POLITICS/10/17/campaign.wrap/?iref=mpstoryview

(CNN) -- Democratic vice presidential candidate Joe Biden ripped into recent comments by his Republican counterpart that suggested that some places in the U.S. are more "pro-America" than others.
Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin holds a rally Friday in West Chester, Ohio.

"We believe that the best of America is in the small towns that we get to visit, and in the wonderful little pockets of what I call the real America, being here with all of you hard-working, very patriotic, very pro-America areas of this great nation," she said.

"This is where we find the kindness and the goodness and the courage of everyday Americans," Palin added.

On Friday, Palin clarified her comments.

"It's all pro-America. I was just reinforcing the fact that there, where I was, there's good patriotic people there in these rallies, so excited about positive change and reform of government that's coming that they are so appreciative of hearing our message, hearing our plan. Not any one area of America is more pro-America patriotically than others," she said.

At a rally in Mesilla, New Mexico, on Friday, Biden responded to those comments in a vociferous tone.

"I hope it was just a slip on her part and she doesn't really mean it. But she said, it was reported she said, that she likes to visit, 'pro-American' parts of the country," he said to loud boos.

"It doesn't matter where you live, we all love this country, and I hope it gets through. We all love this country," he said. "We are one nation, under God, indivisible. We are all patriotic. We all love our country in every part of this nation! And I'm tired. I am tired, tired, tired, tired of the implications about patriotism."

http://www.news.com.au/heraldsun/story/0,21985,24513276-661,00.html

HUNDREDS of millions of dollars will be slashed from health and other key programs as the Rudd Government takes the axe to Budget spending.

Faced with the worst economic crisis in decades, the Government is eyeing billions of dollars in additional savings to bolster a falling Budget surplus.

Among a list of potential targets is $234 million in medical and health research funding slotted for next year.

This would put the Government on a collision course with some of Australia's most respected researchers, including Ian Frazer -- awarded the Prime Minister's $300,000 Science Prize on Thursday.

Finance Minister Lindsay Tanner admitted the Government faced a torrid time as it tried to free funds to pay for pension increases and other core promises.

"Next year's Budget will be a very tough one to frame because of the uncertain economic circumstances," he said.

The minister confirmed his department was listing potential savings.

"It is never possible to tackle every problem at once in government," he said. "You always have to make choices about spending and timing."

http://www.abc.net.au/news/stories/2008/10/18/2394707.htm

News Corporation chief executive Rupert Murdoch says his company is being hurt by the slowing US economy and the global financial crisis.

Mr Murdoch has told a shareholder meeting these are testing times for News Corporation, expressing his fears that the US is about to enter a prolonged economic downturn.

He said advertising revenue had fallen and the News Corporation share price had been beaten down.

"It's tempting of course to stand here and boast about our past year's success," he said.

"I cannot however do that, not while we're in the midst of an unprecedented credit crisis that has weakened the advertising market and beaten down our share price."

Mr Murdoch insisted News Corporation had enough cash reserves to whether what he said could be a prolonged economic downturn.

He said News Corporation had a $5 billion war chest that could be used to fund more media acquisitions in the wake of his company's takeover last year of the Dow Jones group, that left him in control of the prestigious Wall Street Journal.

Mr Murdoch also rejected suggestions media companies should join the big banks in receiving financial help from the US Government.