anyone read this book? I just read J G Ballard's review of it, and it sound very interesting.
here's the Review

It's vintage Davis - brilliant in spots, but wildly uneven.

The "Dance of Shiva" section rocked my socks, tho'.

"City of Quartz" is a far more coherent read.

As much as I appreciate Mike Davis, I wouldn't say anything of his was ever coherent - I always feel like I'm reading a thesis paper written in "acadamese" - the language that only makes sense when one is in or teaching at college.

And for the first time ever I believe I read something of J.G. Ballard's that I disagree with (even his wild generalizations make perfect sense to me). In the review he states "Only in the past 10 years, as in the deeply paranoid X Files and Independence Day, have Americans begun to accept the notion of their own extinction."

Myself being a Cold War baby, I will attest to the fact that part of the national psyche seems to be a sort of rushing along to Armageddon. As a child in the 80s I lived in relentless terror amid dreams of nuclear destruction.

Does he mean death? I'm not familiar with the quotation, so I can't say this definitively, but I don't feel that what he's talking about. I think we're looking at the extinction of the idea of america, the end of america as superpower, world player, and trendsetter for the world. of course, i don't think most americans congnitively recognize this image, don't really grasp what it means to be american on the world stage. i had so many people around me blinking away tears during 9/11 saying 'but why, why would anyone have done this to us?' while i was asking 'why didn't they do it ten years ago?'

truth is, there have been attacks on americans and american assets every year since the wtc bombing of 93 (today's the anniversary, btw). we just failed to recognize it for what it was.

i didn't start this post to talk about terrorism though. i started it to say, hey, let's talk about the extinction of america. what does it mean to you? why? discuss.

Qoute:"i had so many people around me blinking away tears during 9/11 saying 'but why, why would anyone have done this to us?' while i was asking 'why didn't they do it ten years ago?'...

In my part of the world the 9/11 date has evoked very sad memories since 1973. About the same number of people (3000) never made it out of that stadium that night.

Maybe Americans should move away from their Nomenklatura, like the Russians did.

Extinction? I doubt it. Maybe transformation into something else, better for all (including americans), hopefully.

Extinction is probably the wrong word. Part of me is thinking of it as the end of Empire, in the british sense. But it won't be like that at all, I think. The nature of our empire is different, more ephemeral, than any empire that has come before. We don't do a great deal of colonization (some, I know, and maybe more in the days ahead), it's more of an empire of influence/coersion. anyway, i think that the current administration is just the thing for the job. it'll shock most americans out of their sense of complacency, at least ideologically.

anyway, i hope it works out. it's a nice country, i think.

Nice country indeed, is not the people but the policies of their rulers.
Is just that 2003 seems like 1898.
"You provide the pictures, I provide the war"

Yeah, I think you'll find that many americans aren't too keen on this bush fella. I mean, it's not like he was *elected* or anything.

After reading Mr. Buk's Window I was thinking heavily on this idea of Sept. 11th ushering in the end of a certain type of America.

I wonder if anyone can point out to me a large nation / state that ever won a "war" on terrorism. 9/11 seemed to be rigged for maximal media impact. As callous as that statement may seem to my fellow Americans, even in sheer numbers the Red Cross have noted that more died in Afghanistan following.

The mathematics of survival and/or casualties.

Linguistically the use of the phrase "just like a movie" in the days after was the most surreal aspect to me.

But generally I believe that Ballard's referring to fixation in popular culture with visions of Apocalypse, noting the British with their Blitz / island mentality are more familiar with such. I feel the exact opposite. If anything, America's the nation that on one hand has celebrated and hurtled towards Armageddon more than any other with total glee and abandon. Extremists from isolated mountain men survivalists to fundamentalist Christians all seem to jonesing for the end times. At the same time, our utopian streak is what I still love about this country more than anything else, the desire on the part of some individuals to try a better way.

I was away from London during the fuel strikes but when I got back my Limey pals all seemed to have had a blast, such is the siege mentality. But one of my other first experiences in London was being told by a policeman to leave my McDonald's wrapper on the floor of the train station, as there were no rubbish bins because of terrorism.

As for the idea of the British Empire not being Colonial, I know a few Indians and Chinese and even some out there Canadians (though I don't think they want to be Canadian) who would feel otherwise.

"As a child in the 80s I lived in relentless terror amid dreams of nuclear destruction."

Gawd how to make this clear to anyone under 30?! I remember back then, clipping out the article in the newspaper. It was the day after the Tv Movie called The Day After. Itw as a map of my city and the impact of a 1 megaton bomb on it. I knew that from where my house is, my flesh would be burnt off my bones instantly. This with Reagan in the White House.

Now this was in a small Canadian city north of North Dakota. North Dakota we were told back then, if it left the union would instantly become the third superpower, they has so many silos.
Teenage angst indeed!

Not only that, but were America and the USSR to enter a nuclear war at that time, you can be sure that most of the nukes would blow up over Canada, anti-nuclear missles doing what they do best. The threat to Canada was much more real than it was to most places in America i'm sure.

Anti-Nuclear missiles? Uh, no lad, there's no such thing. We've tried developing the technology, but intercepting a supersonic rocket screaming in from outside the earth's atmosphere...that's just not going to happen with today's technology, much less the reel to reel world of the 80s.

secondly, when I was talking about the empire being non colonial, I was talking about the american empire, not the british. sorry for the confusion. when I was last in london, i was watching a talk show about the current iraq crisis. this guy gets up and says 'england has never started a war of aggression. we have never invaded or threatened the sovereignty of another nation, and we have never imposed our ideas of government on anyone else.'

oh, i about laughed my ass off. what was even better was that everyone on the set seemed to agree with him. how easily we forget.

http://www.geocities.com/the_coldwar/1960.html
this refers to the '60s, but it was the first thing I found about ABM's
"Mutually assured destruction (MAD) was proposed to prevent a nuclear war, but the Soviets continued to develop anti-nuclear defense by means of anti-ballistic missiles (ABMs)."

Yeah, they were developed and researched, but I don't think anyone got them to function. That's part of the current argument. Bush is proposing developing a missile shield, and Australia has joined the fray. Hey, to the Ozzies on the board...what's the opinion of this in the streets?

quote:

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shadoth: Extinction is probably the wrong word. Part of me is thinking of it as the end of Empire, in the british sense. But it won't be like that at all, I think.

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"It's the end of the world as we know it and I feel fine." REM/Document

I agree. G.W. "Got War" Bush has awakened a sleeping giant. Most Americans have been shocked into the reality that their government isn't always right, always truthful, always fair and really doesn't represent the wants and needs of the average US citizen.

IMO, several things have changed:

1. How the US (government)is perceived by the rest of the planet has changed. We're no longer seen as the "good guys". Russia, France and Germany are looking very much like the new bearers of true democratic principles. (The citizens of the UK are making Americans look like pikers with their anti-war protests.)

2. Most US citizens are aware of this new perception and will set about to "fix" it, make it right. Adios to GW in '04. Adios to the Republican majority in the US Congress. Adios to being the planetary "democratic regime builder".

quote:

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shadoth: Anti-Nuclear missiles? Uh, no lad, there's no such thing. We've tried developing the technology, but intercepting a supersonic rocket screaming in from outside the earth's atmosphere...that's just not going to happen with today's technology, much less the reel to reel world of the 80s.

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Pardon me if you're Canadian but the US "probably" would have launched a barrage of nuclear missles towards the USSR, over Canada and had them expolde (over Canada) within the atmosphere, hoping that the EMP would disrupt the guidance systems and at least some of the incoming warheads would miss their intended targets.

Would we warn Canada ? What do you think ?

Oh i'm sure the Canadians would have found out soon....probably not soon enough though.