Britain

A Profoundly Depressing Book

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I enjoy perusing bookstores and recently saw this book that caught my eye – The “SAS Urban Survival Handbook”. Readers of the blog know that the SAS are the British equivalent of the US special forces military units.

Since the book’s theme is intentionally downcast and “worst case” (i.e., urban survival) I was prepared for a list of disasters and potential bad things that could happen to you. The book spares no situations, focusing on getting attacked and what to do when everything goes awry.

Through the book they also offer “sensible” solutions to avoid getting in harms way in the first place, such as not frequenting dangerous areas and particularly for women and the elderly, who are likely to lose in a typical encounter with an angry urban male, to practically stay at home or only go out in groups. And why is this? Because no one is armed, so in Britain if something goes wrong and you are smaller or outnumbered you are in big trouble. There are certainly clubs (the mayor of London recently went after someone with an iron bar) and knives and similar-type weapons but no firearms.

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Management Advice From George Eliot

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Fancy what a game of chess would be if all the chessman had passions and intellects, more or less small and cunning; if you were not only uncertain about your adversary’s men, but a little uncertain also about your own . . . You would be especially likely to be beaten if you depended arrogantly on your mathematical imagination, and regarded your passionate pieces with contempt. Yet this imaginary chess is easy compared with a game man has to play against his fellow-men with other fellow-men for instruments.

–George Eliot, in Felix Holt, the Radical (1866)

Lots of political leaders and their academic advisors, and also more than a few business executives, fail to understand this point about the kind of “chess” that they are playing.

See also investing advice from George Eliot.

Power: Mechanical, National, and Personal

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James Boswell is of course best known as the great biographer of Samuel Johnson. But Boswell didn’t spend all his time in Dr Johnson’s company. In 1776, he visited the Boulton & Watt steam engine factory. Showing Boswell around, Matthew Boulton summed up his business one simple phrase:

I sell here, sir, what all the world desires to have–POWER.

Fast forward to 2009. In the United States as in Western Europe, politicians are conducting a vendetta against the energy industry. See for example this, which describes the closure of an aluminum smelter in Montana–because it can no longer obtain affordable electricity–and the probable exit of much of the nonferrous metals industry from Western Europe, for the same reason. (Link via MaxedOutMama)

So, was Matthew Boulton wrong? Have we finally found a group of humans–our present-day political leaders–who are NOT interested in power?

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Lest We Forget

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Kansas City Star - Staff photo by Tammy Ljungblad
Kansas City Star - Staff photo by Tammy Ljungblad

See also my own Liberty Memorial slideshow.

Mayor Saves Damsel in Distress From Violent Femmes by Waving His Iron Bar Around

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Think I’m pulling your leg? Think again! Put this down as solid proof to the saying “Truth is stranger than fiction”.

A climate change filmmaker and lobbyist is accosted by a gang of ne’er-do-well girls, one of which is carrying an iron bar. The victim is physically handled, shoved up against a car, and threatened. Then Boris Johnson, the Mayor of old London town, just happens to pedal on by. He stops to lend a hand, even going so far as picking up the iron bar and using it to help convince the gang to clear off.

I’m a fully accredited self defense instructor with close to two decades experience in the trade. What do you think would happen to me if I had been the one to stop and help? Johnson is damn lucky that he is the Mayor!

The old saying would have you believe that a Conservative is a Liberal who has been mugged by reality. The filmmaker certainly would fit the bill, but don’t expect her to change her political stripe any time soon.

(Hat top to Milo, and cross posted at Hell in a Handbasket.)