The Cedar Lounge Revolution

Independent Left: Socialism in Ireland, Everything you ever wanted to know August 31, 2020

This from Independent Left is useful, a sort of run-through of Irish socialism from its beginnings to the contemporary period, almost a primer for those recent to the area, but it is always important to consider and reconsider the overall area.

Dealing with a ‘left’ Government in the future in Ireland: what is the role of the radical left? August 30, 2020

This came up in the course of conversation here and ColmB noted that it would be a good topic for further discussion. ColmB suggests that:

…a “left” gov, which of course would be dominated by SF and include Lab and SDs, would be better than a gov dominated by right parties.

However it would be disastrous for radical left to enter such a gov. as opposed to keep pressure on them from the outside. You can’t simultaneously administer a capitalist state and dismantle capitalism. The reality is that the being in gov is not the same as being in power – the job of radical left parties is to bring about a transformation of society based on the establishment of democratic control of workplace’s and communities and you can’t do that from above. It’s also very unlikely that you can do it unless there is a major political/ economic crisis. Revolutionary or radical socialist who enter coalition govs automatically become social democrats, not because they are sell-outs etc. but because they have to govern in a capitalist society – the gov has changed but not the ruling class. They therefore become responsible for all the inequities of capitalist society by virtue of their gov positions.

The job of the radical left IMO is to:
Prepare for that crisis situation by building popular capacity so that the mass of people can create organs of participatory democratic control from below.
Keep pressure in any ‘left’ gov’ to force them to deliver immediate reforms – this will largely arise from popular pressure at ground level.

That is indeed a changed environment and how to engage with it?

Tech question August 30, 2020

Anyone installed a Windows partition on their Mac? I’m working through the idea of using Bootcamp and having a partition for Windows to run various apps including games. What’s the minimum size of such a partition and conversely what would be optimal for such a partition?

Statements in the media… good, bad and indifferent August 30, 2020

A business columnist in the IT bemoans the fact that:

Through regulations and de facto-obligatory “guidelines”, Government and wider society now decides where we can travel; where we eat and drink; whether we even drink at all; how many people visit our homes; how long we should spend in company; who we meet; where we work; how we watch sport; how many people with whom we go for a meal; how far apart we stand; what we wear on our faces; how many people can come to see us get married; how many can come to see us get buried; how we comfort each other; when it is appropriate to sing; and the form of transport we use.

Has this not always – in most of those examples – been the case to some degree?

Most reasonable citizens accept that the danger posed by the virus and our responsibility to keep each other safe justifies a lot of the rules, much of the time. But that doesn’t change the fact that everyday life in a free society was never meant to be regulated to this degree of granularity. It is not normal and it explains why so many people are so stressed and the public mood is so volatile.

‘Everyday life’ in a global pandemic is different to everyday life when there’s no global pandemic. It is indeed not normal. Because there’s a global pandemic. Presumably said business columnist understand that in a time of crisis certain constraints and regulations will likely be increased. Or perhaps not given the questionable expertise that underpins this statement from the same piece…

The Government must come up with a more sustainable, long-term set of rules for foreign travel than the fear-driven regime we are enduring now. It may mean we have to accept a few things that are scientifically sub-optimal.

But socially and economically, it would be worth the risk and manageable.

Meanwhile a famed epidemiological expert writes:

“I call on my fellow singers, musicians, writers, producers, promoters and others in the industry to [save live music &] fight with me on this. Come forward, stand up, fight the pseudo-science and speak up,”

Thanks Van but think it best to stay out of venues for the moment.

Speaking of music…

Pop duo Jedward have slammed Jim Corr over his attendance of an anti-lockdown rally in Dublin on Saturday.

The exchange on Twitter sparked a back and forth between the The Corrs band member and the pop duo, during which they traded put-downs.

The pair commented using one of The Corrs’ song titles: “G’wan leave the whole country “breathless” from Covid because of your idiotic behaviour.”

Speaking of idiotic, how about the following, a piece by Conor Pope in the IT which is headlined ‘What science got wrong on Covid-19: Masks, warning signs and transmission without symptoms’. But read the article and it argues something quite different: “Our understanding and response to the disease has been evolving almost as fast as it has been spreading with the certainties of winter turning into the canards of spring as the entirely novel virus shifted and shaped our world like nothing before it”.

Meanwhile during an apologia for a certain Commissioner and ‘lynch mobs’ who hounded him out of office there’s the following:

The first issue facing the Government is whether the current Covid restrictions can be continued without destroying a whole swathe of the economy – and after that it will have to face up to serious choices in how to scale back the enormous extra borrowing necessitated by the emergency.

This is actually a good overview of economic and business issues in the face of the pandemic. But… Will Goodbody perhaps draws is net a little tightly in the following:

Many business owners got no break, working through the summer months simply to try to keep their firms afloat.

Others couldn’t afford to take a staycation, because their incomes had plummeted so much over the previous months or disappeared altogether.

There seems to be a trope abroad in the Irish media that everyone had staycations and in some quarters that’s seen an almost heinous step down from international holidays. But many many people were unable to take any sort of a holiday, particularly those who have lost jobs or are in precarious employment. Worth keeping in mind.

Then there’s this:

Protesters [in Paris], some waving placards stating “Stop the lies”, were quickly surrounded by police who handed out €135 fines to those not wearing masks.

“There is no scientific proof of the usefulness of wearing a mask outside,” said Anais, a Paris sociology student. “Covid-19 is not so dangerous, it mainly kills people over the age of 60.”

Gregory Porter August 29, 2020

Interview in the Mirror with Gregory Porter by Jason O’Toole. Whether one is a big fan of his music or not there’s a point that really resonated with me for some reason.

As if it wasn’t hard enough growing up without a father, Gregory found himself being subjected to the type of racism you wouldn’t ever dream to find happening in a so-called civilized state like California – such as being woken up in the middle of the night to find a KKK-style burning cross in his family’s front garden.

“I was vexed by that, in that the most intriguing thing about it was that it was so well constructed, which I couldn’t understand. It looked like people had really taken their time to do this, ” he recalled.

And he continues:

“The wood joinery was still intact after it had burnt and you could see where the wood was joined together –not tied together, not hammered together. It was pieces of wood grooved out and materials soaked in gasoline wrapped around it, and wire.

“And I was like, ‘You guys took so long to do this, to build this instrument of visual hatred. And you came at three in the morning, you dug a hole and you put it in the ground and you tapped the dirt down around the cross, you lit it on fire –and in the danger of being seen or arrested’. It’s a lot of work.

“So, that made me say, ‘Wow! People are really… serious about doing something hurtful and painful’. So, yeah, it was really something.”

There’s a real strangeness to that attention to detail he so vividly describes, something almost inhuman in the almost obsessive focus on those symbols and the complete lack of fellow human feeling with those they are directed at.

One other point, that dovetails with the post earlier about when is so much music too much, following his mother’s death Porter outlines his depression and how:

…he couldn’t find it in his heart to sing for about a year after his mother’s death.

“The depression that I had, I was like, ‘When is this going to get better?’ Music snatched me by the collar and pulled me up out of the depression. There’s no question about that.

“Also, listening to music. I was going around collecting vinyl at charity shops, and I thought I had collected all the Nat King Cole’s music and I still found more to lift me up.”

When is this much music too much music? August 29, 2020

Here’s a question for some of you, those who like music. At what point does an interest in music, and I guess the ‘collection’ of music, become too much? Talking to someone recently they noted another person they knew had hundreds, possibly thousands, of albums from bandcamp. And this in addition to many many more collected across decades previous to that. It’s not simply about where one finds the time to listen to all these, plus the ones one had previously, but at what point does this become more than an interest and perhaps something closer to a psychological problem. I’ve followed music since my mid-teens. By the time vinyl was in its last days I had hundreds of LPs – mostly second hand from BaseX/Comet, Freebird, Macs and so on, and a lot of cassette tapes. Then there were CDs. A couple of hundred. Easily. Then there was digital. I climbed aboard eMusic early on and am still hanging on (barely given its much reduced state). Now there’s bandcamp. Cue many hundreds more…actually thousands. At this point, I just checked, I’ve over 5,000 albums on iTunes – that would be albums ripped from CDs (but not all of them, not by a long way), long deleted ones I have on vinyl that were ripped by others, eMusic/iTunes acquired ones, and so on. I guess I could be appalled by the expense but so much of it, well over 80% was acquired either second hand or discounted that I’m not. It’s been worth it. Back in the day I’d sooner spend my money on an album than that fifth pint. Still would.

In total it’s 131.8 days. If I devoted eight hours a day to listening to the lot it would take about 395 days, or just over a year. But of course I wouldn’t. And I’m still adding to that pile.

Why? Is there a lost chord out there, an unknown chord progression, a tricky and unique key change I’ve never heard before, some sound that is entirely novel? And I think there is and there isn’t. I’m still hearing a lot of new music that makes me – for want of a better term – happy. And of course listening to a lot of old music that has much the same effect on me. What I find myself amazed at is how little music I find I completely played out back in the day. There are some albums that I can’t listen to with fresh ears or new appreciation, but they tend to be in a distinct minority. And there are new albums that have an effect on me near enough the same as albums that really impacted on me back whenever.

Which still raises the question why? And at what point does one stop aquiring new music.

This Weekend I’ll Mostly Be Listening To… Justin Townes Earle, an addendum in remembrance August 29, 2020

When Son of Stan posted that Justin Townes Earle had passed it kicked me in the gut. More so than say Kenny Rogers or maybe even John Prine, because it was so unexpected. I was never a huge fan of Steve Earle (JTE’s father) although Elijah’s Church gets a very honorable mention. But I really enjoyed JTE’s music and I’ve been listening all week since I heard the news. A talented musician gone well before his time.