Earlier today, Noam Chomsky came to UMass Lowell to talk about "War and Democracy." I took some notes and this is my attempt to report on his lecture.#

The structure was as follows: Noam talked for about 30 minutes and then the floor was opened to the audience to ask questions, and it turned into a conversation between Noam and the group.#

The primary topic discussed by Noam during his initial introduction was the War in Iraq, the War on Terror, and how they relate to the suppression of democracy in America and their place in the great strategy of the rich and powerful.#

Quoting the Wall Street Journal, Chomsky said that the Presidential campaign of 2004 started on May 1st, 2003 on the deck of U.S.S. Lincoln with Bush's "victory" speech. It set the stage for the poltergeist of "National Security" to be the prime discussion point of the campaign. Noam points out that "National Security" is in fact just propaganda and doesn't have much to do with real security.#

One element of the "National Security" Issue will be the "Battle" of Iraq, as opposed to the War in Iraq. Chomsky defines this "Battle" as the battle surrounding "rousing" the troops, both foreign and domestic, and the issues that Iraq has brought up. And Noam notes that this battle will be never ending, and that is its purpose (a weapon of mass DISTRACTION.)

Chomsky segues for a bit to talk about how many of the "evidence" and reason for going to Iraq is in fact unfounded. There was no connection to Al Qaeda, this is admitted by advisors and in reports by leaders in the intelligence community. And the conquering of Iraq does not decrease terror, but it has predictably (predicted by the intelligence community and analysts) increased the risk of terror to Americans, both at home and on foreign soil. Similarly, the war has increased the risk of nuclear proliferation by scattering military officers and supporting the need of nuclear capability in other "rogue states."

"National Security", Chomsky says, effects security, just not in the way that is supposedly desired. It in fact, decreases authentic security. (We will return to this later.)

Chomsky asks, "How do they get away with it?" (They referring to those in power.) He points out that they have a great deal of experience, around 12 years of it, because many of those in power were in similar positions in the Reagan and Bush I regimes. They are now carrying out the same script but with, perhaps, more ambition and drive.

Why do they want "National Security" to be such a large "issue" in this campaign? As Karl Rove said publicly in the midterm election, if the Republicans can get attention away from where they are weak (issues regarding Socio-Economic status and conditions) then they may be able to "squeak through" the election. A similar plan is in effect at the presidential level.

Chomsky started to talk about how the rest of world didn't support Saddam and didn't like him, BUT they did not see him as a threat. Only the United States and it's "compelled" populace thought this. On the "compelling" note, Chomsky says that the statistics for supporters of the war correlates to those who believed the false proposition that there was an Iraq/9-11 link, using this observation to say that the American public was misled on purpose. (Note: In this section Chomsky lets some humour show and refers to Israel as an "off-site US military base", heh.)

Returning to the idea of Republicans "squeaking through" the election. Chomsky notes that from exit polls, that ask for ranking of issues, people who voted for Republicans did not change their values (other than "National Security" and "Defense", their priorities lists were unchanged) but instead changed their priorities of a few items that were forced down their throats. Interesting. (ed--Do we trust polls? Chomsky is always referring to polls and that we are a heavily polled society.)

Returning to the Iraq victory speech, Chomsky notes that the Wall Street Journal called the speech "Reagan-esque." And he wonders what the author thought that meant? Did it mean when Reagan said the US was "standing tall" after crushing the menace of the "nutmeg capital of the world" (How Chomsky refers to Grenada)? Chomsky says that this may not be what was intended but the Iraq victory speech is "Reagan-esque" for this reason. The War on Iraq is a step in the ever continuing campaign to construct a perfect fear campaign. Chomsky supports this with the above "Iraq as a Threat" points and compares it the series of fears generated by Reagan and Bush I: Nicaraguan hitmen, Hispanic drug dealers, Black rapists, etc.

So now Chomsky has referred to what is going on, talked about how "they" are doing it, and he begins to talk about the why. What is is the goal of this strategy of fear and coercion?#

The current administration and those supporting it, Chomsky says, are not stupid - they have far reaching goals. Chomsky says that the foreign aspect of those goals are obvious for recent behaviour.

The US will dominate the globe by force and will ensure that there will be no military challenger ever. This creates fear of US abuse in the world and is made possible by instilling fear of competitions in Americans. The international community recognizes this and thinks of Iraq as a demonstration of this motive. This is the prime reason that the unilateral action against Iraq was opposed, because it opens the flood gates of US troops. Chomsky notes that as far back as the 1940s oil was recognized as an essential "lever" (euphemism for "weapon") in the world and the action in the Middle East is one way of getting it. (Later Noam will say that it's unlikely the US will directly use the oil reserves, but instead use them a coercive force.)

On the other hand, the domestic goals of this group is to reverse the progressive actions of the last century - the New Deal, the Great Society actions, food stamps, Medicare, etc. This is to protect the free market. Sadly, for the politicians and businessman behind it, you can't run on this. So this must be achieved by "starving the beast", ensuring that there is no money for them by increasing budgets and lowering taxes.

The floor was then opened for questions. I will paraphrase the questions by eliminating introductions and trying to extract the essence of the question.#

'Was the risk of genocide in Iraq a valid reason to go, even if that was not the stated reason of the administration?'#

Chomsky is quick to point out that we shouldn't talk about a "risk" because the genocide actually happened, and those in power now supported it when it was going on under past regimes. So that's definitely not a reason why the administration did go.

Furthermore, Chomsky points out that as Thomas Freidman said, 'The best rule for Iraq is an iron-fisted military junta that ruled exactly like Saddam but had a different name.' The only reason the administration wanted Saddam out was because he didn't follow US orders and that was dangerous. Chomsky also points out that when Saddam does fall in line, he's the second-best choice for Iraq with regards to stability and control, all the US cares about.

Noam also points out that perhaps the biggest executer of genocide in Iraq is the US itself, with its repressive sanctions and infrastructure destroying attacks. Why the Iraqis put up with Saddam, and didn't start their own uprisings, was because they needed him to efficiently distribute the food. Chomsky points out the old motto of the European powers that 'Iraqis can't control Iraq' and that obviously the polls will show that Iraqis are happy because Saddam is gone, but more so because the sanctions are gone. That is what they really want, but Chomsky says this is not mentioned in the "free press."

'Does the UN submit the US?' and 'Does the extent of US freedom decrease the application of that freedom and activism?'#

On the UN issue, Chomsky points out that in the beginning of the UN it had to support the US unquestioningly because it was so dependent on its good will. As the forces of economics evened the scales a bit, the prime vetoer shifted from Russia to the United States (with the UK close behind) because the rest of the world was able to assert influence and the UN was no longer the US' lapdog. Because of this veto power the UN can't go AGAINST the US, but it can disagree. Chomsky says the motto is, "The Guys with the guns tell everyone what to do, if they can get away with it" and that this situation cannot be changed from the outside of the US, only by internal dissent and activism.

On US freedom, Chomsky says that the Constitution and Bill of Rights say very little about freedom and that freedoms, the most prominent being Freedom of Speech, are won through courts. He says that the must be held on to or we will lose them because they were not given as a gift - but won in a struggle. He says that the current group is dangerous for freedom, look at the PATRIOT act and Guantanamo Bay, for example.

The father of a marine asks, 'Does the amount of military dissent affect the War in Iraq?'#

The morale of the armed forces is certainly a major factor in war waging abilities and the current situations make many soldiers not reenlist. However, the poor economy makes the military an attractive employer. He also notes that this was a major issue in the Vietnam War and there's no reason to think that it won't be a major issue soon, once it grows into something more powerful.

'What does Noam Chomsky think of the 87 billion dollar request by Bush for Iraq?'#

Chomsky thinks that if we were honest we would get that money, and more, and pay it to Iraq as reparations for all the horrible things committed by the United States and encourage other powers to do so as well. However, we are not honest and Noam doesn't think using the money to turn Iraq into a colony is a very good idea.

'Should the UN send troops to Iraq? Does the colour of helmets matter?'#

Noam says that most UN countries don't want this except for "real" US colonies like Ecuador, whose foreign ambassador said that sometimes you just have to stand up and say 'Yes, Sir!' Noam's opinion on handing over control of Iraq corresponds with the rest of the world and the United States, that it should. However, Chomsky is a bit different in the details, he thinks the General Assembly should control it as opposed to the Security Council, something that is in its power but is rarely used.

'How can teachers make new nationalists understand the Middle East?'#

Chomsky says this is an eternal question but it really just takes education and constant effort. He says it takes a Vietnam War to do it, he notes that for the first 5 or 6 years of that war there was little protesting and then an explosion. Now however, there is a lot of protesting for where we are in the cycle. Noam says we just need to keep talking about it to new people and rouse interest and to help free them from the propaganda of the government. This propaganda creates contradictions in the minds of the citizenship as a weapon. (He gives an example regarding Israel.)

'After 9/11 did Bush overdo security concerns and if so, can we go back?'#

Noam points out that what was done did not actually authentic security, instead just "National Security." So he thinks that more security is needed, and says that it takes amazing talent to fail at recognizing something like 9/11, that was attempted earlier that decade.

Noam talked about how security SHOULD be addressed, and he calls on the advice of many retired intelligence officers. Look at who supports terrorists, and they often have real grievances. Responding with violence is a recipe for unending war. We need to respect peoples' real problems and think about how to make more people happy.

Noam rails a bit on the way that the world "Terror" is used in a very ideological way. It is always the terror that "they" give "us", never the terror that "we" give "them." As examples he points to the Nazis, they were protecting the Aryans from the terrorist actions of the Jews and other groups. And he also points out that the world court condemned the United States for international terrorism with regards to Nicaragua and other countries.

The best way to stop terrorism is to stop participating in it.

'Under what conditions with the US leave Iraq?'#

The bottom line here is that the US wants control of Iraq, they would prefer a puppet regime like were previously in place by European powers or could settle for a colony like in Central America, and could make due if needed with military occupation.

'Can the master plan be stopped? Is there hope?'#

Noam says that if you are hopeless now then you should've seen the 1930s and 1950s. As with then, it is inevitable that something will help soften the triumphalism of the high class and improve the world again. Noam notes that we are far better off now than then and it can only get better, but we need to force issues and vote. There is a big problem with voting: people don't think it matters, and when they do there are problems with issue awareness. Politicians purposely attempt to play down and ignore issues so they don't create a stir. Chomsky notes that 1/6 of the economy revolves around marketing, aka controlling people. This is a indicator of the greater struggle against control and the fight for true democracy.

'Does American Demand War? How is support roused?'#

Fear. The answer to this and much else is simply fear. On war and other issue there needs to be some sort of fear artificially created to get people to think they "need" something whether it be a war in Iraq, a drug war, a crime war, or a new pair of shoes. Look back at Reagan and the perfected strategy of this group, the question is always, 'How much fear can we wrangle?'

'Why do people vote on policies that hurt them?'#

This is essentially the same answer as the last question, and Chomsky adds a bit that was alluded to in the second to last question. "Business parties, whoops, political parties" attempt to ignore all important issues, instead focusing on issue that irrelevant to profit: gun control, religiousity, etc. This is to distract from being put on the spot of whether certain policies will hurt "constituents."

'Who is to blame for US ignorance of the world's opinion?'#

Referring to the fact that many Americans don't know where France is, Chomsky says that many Americans are just ignorant and that the failings of mass media and education contribute to this problem. He also hypothesizes that the intense work constraints of populace give them little time to worry about politics and the world between raising a family and keeping a job. He refers to Alan Greenspan's gold nugget of America's "flexible labor market" aka not knowing if you'll have a job tomorrow.

Last question, 'What will be the effect of Israel assassinating Arafat?'#

Israel will always be constrained by what the US ('The Bossman we call Partner' - an Israeli administrator) will allow them to do. And in this regard they really don't care about Arafat. He was useful at one time as a police man, to be corrupt and make sure there was order. He was much like the black leaders of the South African "Homelands", where the oppressive police forces were black as well.

Chomsky considers the fence as a way of measuring if Israel really cares about security. If they cared about security they would put in partly into Israel so they could patrol both sides of it and make sure that no Palestinians got into Israel, but they are not doing this. By not doing this they are instigating terrorism and purposely putting a burden on the Palestinians rather than the Israelis.

This report is not perfect and if I find another I will try to point it out but hopefully this will be a useful starting point for learning more about current issues and perhaps about the point of view Noam Chomsky represents.#

Dave Winer wonders how WBUR uses the money he donated to them...#

I paid them $120 in April, a generous amount according to the station. So I listen to the pledge drive guilt-free. They say we get both sides of the story on WBUR, but then I just realized, we don't, they don't explain how they spend our money. This morning Jane Christo, the general manager of the station, is pitching us. How do I call in and ask questions on the air? How much salary does Ms Christo draw? How many execs are there at WBUR and what are their salaries? And how about the talent, how much of my money do they get? I suspect that public radio in the US is like most other industries, execs control the money, and get most of it, and don't do very much for it.

Joi Ito links to a weird image that makes you feel drunk.#

This pic certainly hurts my eyes. I know that it is a trick image, but my brain tries to adjust the focal length of my retina to see what it thinks is the right image.

Joi Ito links to Seth Godin who links to http://www.whowillbeatbush.com/...#

The question isn't whether or not George W. will be re-elected.

The question is, "who's going to beat him?"

Now, in the first ever Internet-wide political market for 2004, we're going to ask you to make a free bet. Pick our next President, pick the margin of victory and you could win up to $30,000 for your favorite charity.

Charles Miller writes something HILARIOUS. About a new programming paradigm called Dysfunctional Programming...#

While no dedicated Dysfunctional Programming language currently exists, Larry Wall was recently caught wandering down a corridor rubbing his hands together and muttering "I'll get them! I'll get them all!"

Ryan McGee is funny times ten.#

Ryan, what if I can't tell if we're really flirting or just faux flirting?

If you're at wit's end on how to tell the two types of flirting apart, you can always interrupt him mid-flirt and say, "Look, either lick me right now or let's put this crap behind us." Licking is an underrated solution to most problems.

"What are the top 5 signs we have gone from simply platonic to perhaps tongue-wrestling compatriots?"

Right, the incredibly awkward, difficult-to-navigate middle ground between friendship and lust buddies. It's a bit like playing chicken, only in this case, you only wish you were moments from a fiery death.

He develops a sudden interest that you two previously did not share. (And no, he doesn't really like it. That's a teen romantic comedy movie myth. He under no circumstances likes the Lifetime Network.)

Why to girls like taken men?

Women want guys who are taken for two reasons. One, most women can't stand to see another woman happy. Plain and simple. I can't figure it out, but there you have it. Women who are lucky enough to find a good guy protect them like gold in Ft. Knox. In my dating days, I knew when I would be going to place that had hot women before I even got there, because my girlfriend would suddenly wear a smoking outfit. She was establishing territory. 2,000 years ago, she would have flat out peed on me before we left. Evolution has only changed the methods, not the rules.

Tony Pierce writes "nads" in the same post that addresses a babe. This is what we call "balls" in the industry.#

half are saying no more politics because it makes you feel so very dirty and ignorant for sticking with our president, the other half are saying please tony please there are no other strong liberal voices out there in the blogosphere please write more about the president and his ridiculous rule since nobody else has the nads to call an idiot an idiot.

Tom Coates explains the strange British people.#

The British don't have a "healthy disrespect" for celebrity and if you've been told that, then you've basically been lied to by a professional Englishman-abroad or by some weird kind of Dick Van Dyke cod-Anglo-faker. The British don't have a healthy disrespect for anything at all, they're just grumpy old sods who don't really like anyone who sets themselves above the rest of the herd. Basically if we don't fancy them and if we don't want to be them, then we pretty much hate their guts. While they're funny or cool or interesting - well that's great - but a chink in the armour and we strike. That's why British celebrities after a while have to either treat the whole thing as a bit of a job or as a bit of a joke. The most successful take the piss a bit. They go, "It's Ok! I understand! I get it too! They give me lots of money and I sing songs and have lots of sex, but I'm just like you lot! I think it's all dumb too!" That's why people get a bit bored when Robbie Williams writes songs about his inner pain. Whatever you do, you mustn't believe the hype. Or you mustn't show that you believe the hype or the cry of 'wanker' will resound from hill and dale, from weir to West Wittering...

Joel Spolsky has created the most beautiful office ever. Oh my god. I am so jealous. I have 1 power outlet and a bunch of strips. I have no privacy and gross windows behind me that I can't look at because my desk is too awkwardly shaped to point it at them. Ugh!#

Most software managers know what good office space would be like, and they know they don't have it, and can't have it. Office space seems to be the one thing that nobody can get right and nobody can do anything about. There's a ten year lease, and whenever the company moves the last person anybody asks about how to design the space is the manager of the software team, who finds out what his new veal-fattening pens, uh, cubicle farm is going to be like for the first time on the Monday after the move-in.

The Innovator's Dilemma by Clayton M. Christensen is a fine book. It is about a problem that faces the giants of industry and innovation, and talks about how to over come this problem.#

The thesis of the book is that the practices of "good" managers- listening to customers, aggressively pursuing larger markets, and investing in new technology-that cause the initial success of a company are the same practices that bring the downfall of a company faced with competition from disruptive technologies. This is called "the innovator's dilemma."#

The author defines two types of technologies, sustaining and disruptive.

A sustaining technology is a technology change, whether incremental or radical, that sustains a business' current market and customers.

A disruptive technology is a technology change, whether incremental or radical, that is initial useless to a particular market but has an improvement trajectory that will eventually supplant the sustaining technologies of another market.

The author takes this idea and applies it to many case studies (disk drives, mechanical excavators, steel mills, insulin shots, etc) and builds a set of rules and one coherent theorem. (By the end of the book the ideas are very intuitive in that 20/20 hindsight way.) After defining the theories and rules, the author talks about how to run a hypothetical company facing disruptive technological change. He compares the current situation to early aeronauts, they wanted to fly but didn't understand the rules. Once you understand the rules you can do what you need to get off the ground.#

In the beginning of the book Christensen sets the stage for the results of the research,#

The research reported in this book [...] shows that in the cases of well-managed firms such as those cited above, good management was the most powerful reason they failed to stay atop their industries. Precisely because these firms listened to their customers, invested aggressively in new technologies that would provide their customers more and better products of the sort they wanted, and because they carefully studied market trends and systematically allocated investment capital to innovations that promised the best returns, they lost their positions of leadership. [pg. xv]

Similarly, the crux of the problem with disruptive products is spelled out early as well.#

[D]isruptive products are simpler and cheaper; they generally promise lower margins, not greater profits. Second, disruptive technologies typically are first commercialized in emerging or insignificant markets. And third, leading firms' most profitable customers generally don't want, and indeed initially can't use, products based on disruptive technologies. By and large, a disruptive technology is initially embraced by the least profitable customers in a market. Hence, most companies with a practiced discipline of listening to their best customers and growth are rarely able to build a case for investing in disruptive technologies until it is too late. [pg. xx]

Christensen makes an interesting point about resource allocation. The only group that controls how you can allocate your resources is your customers. Even though executives decide what gets funded, out of what gets to their level, middle managers will never bring up things that will not succeed in the market the company is alright in.#

Hene, middle managers-acting in both their own and the company's interest-tend to back those projects for which market demand seems most assured. They then work to package the proposals for their chosen projects in ways geared to win senior management approval. As such, while senior managers may think they're making the resource allocation decision, many of the really critical resource allocation decision have actually been made long before senior management gets involved: Middle managers have made their decisions about which projects they'll back and carry to senior management-and which they will allow to languish. [And these middle managers are influenced by the values of the firm with relation to its market and the customers of the firm.] [pg. 95]

Later Christensen notes that the idea that customers control resource allocation policies of company really mean that managers are merely symbolic...

It is forces outside the organization, rather than the managers within it, that dictate the company's course. Resource dependence theorists conclude that the real role of managers in companies whose people and systems are well-adapted to survival is, therefore, only a symbolic one. [pg. 118]

In defining some of the qualities of disruptive technological change, the author writes something that is right up the alley of software developers,#

The ultimate uses or applications for disruptive technologies are unknowable in advance. Failure is an intrinsic step toward success. [pg. 113]

This point is drilled in throughout the book...

Markets that do not exist cannot be analyzed. Suppliers and customers must discover them together. Not only are the market applications for disruptive technologies unknown at the time of their development, they are unknowable. The strategies and plans that managers formulate for confronting disruptive technological changes, therefore, should be plans for learning and discovery rather than plans for execution. [pg. 165]

And...

Guessing the right strategy at the outset isn't nearly as important to success as conserving enough resources (or having the relationships with trusting backers or investors) so that new business initiatives get a second or third stab at getting it right. [pg. 179]

This is something that Peter tries to apply to many situations. The importance of exploration rather than execution.

The finale of the book contains this gem:#

One of the most gratifying outcomes of the research reported in this book is the finding that managing better, working harder, and not making so many dumb mistakes is not the answer to the innovator's dilemma. This discovery is gratifying because I have never met a group of people who are smarter or work harder or are as right so often as the managers I know. If finding better people than these were the answer to the problems posed by disruptive technologies, the dilemma would indeed be intractable. [pg. 257]

This essay in The Culture We Deserve is about how the funding for art has come to be a cause of the problems surrounding the purity and sensibility of art.#

Jacques points out that art was not a special "thing", it was just something inherent in everything that was produced by the only organizations there were: the church and the state.#

For more than two thousand years, then, church and state-often indistinguishable from each other-were for the arts both impresario and purchaser. They were at times seconded by the wealthy who wanted pieces of art for private use, whether religious or secular, this demand being fulfilled by their social inferiors. To put it another way, all the arts were regarded as practical arts, produced for purposes universally understood. A new style of architecture was not so much an aesthetic innovation as a new feat of engineering.

A notable feature of this outlook and this mode of subsidy is that nobody was likely to enter protests. No middle-class Egyptian trader in figs was heard to say, "To my mind, the pyramid of Cheops is much too squat for beauty." When one of the spires of Chartres cathedral was rebuilt after a fire, its being made in a totally different style from the remaining spire elicited no editorial in the Chartres Evening Trumpet. There was no newspaper to assail the decision of the ecclesiastical authorities, no public opinion gathering to petition the mayor. The townsmen had few if any conscious aesthetic ideas; rather, they were proud to have a spire in the latest fashion, with a graceful, fretted outline. [pg. 25]

Another point of the past is when the artist as we know it finally emerged, with the emergence of nation-states and the decaying of old institutions.#

[...] Ad the decay of serfdom and of guilds, and you set the stage for the solitary artist, a new social species, who becomes an egotistical wanderer in search of a patron.

[...] The artists attach themselves to princes, to popes, to wealthy bourgeois patrons no longer bound by old ideas of just price. We begin to know artists by name, and learn of their tribulations, as we do not-or rarely-know the names and lives of medieval artists. [pg. 26]

The conflict between art and society "that has characterized the last 150 years" was rooted in the early days of egotistical art and artists.#

Two contrary movements made this conflict inevitable and permanent. One was the glorification of art as the highest spiritual expression of man's life on earth. The artist-genius thereby became a seer and a prophet. He knew and proclaimed the ultimate truths that condemned the materialism of everyday life; he denounced the world, flouted it rules of behavior, and also foretold the march of culture, because he was leading it-whence the term avant-garde. This view of society was confirmed by the hostile response of his contemporaries. They were the philistines, born enemies of everything fine and noble; for they were part of the opposite movement of the century, utilitarian, bent on material progress and social stability. War between the two was declared by the very act of creating unconventional art; no peace was possible, because the aims of the two sides were irreconcilable. It was the prophet and the saint against the compact majority of sinners. The contempt automatically attached today to the term bourgeois has its sources and its expression in the arts of the nineteenth century. [pg. 31]

Jacques writes that after World War I, art became the universal escape from the horrors of the world, and with this growth of observers it responded in a strange way.#

By 1920 art as such was the concern or pastime of a wider public than ever before, and, no matter how weird its latest forms, was accepted without protest. The past had shown that the public was always wrong, so wisdom and snobbery alike dictated humble submission to whatever came. For these philistines in reverse gear everything in a gallery or a book or on the stage was "interesting." It was experimental, and who would dare to challenge an experiment? Authority had passed from the customer-patron to the supplier-artist. [pg. 32]

In essence, the expansion of the audience of art turned it into a de facto religion...#

Colleges and universities created art departments, built theatres, captured revolving poets, stationary stage directors, and composers-in-residence; they turned the glee club into a chorus and orchestra, set up film units, attached a string quartet to the faculty-in short, became recruits of the world-wide sect of art-as-religion. Its influences after one generation could be read in the manifesto of the rioting students of Chicago in 1968; two of their demands were: the abolition of money and every man or woman an artist. [pg. 33]

Jacques concludes with the point that the "golden age" of art support never really was and that the "curse" of art is intrinsic..#

No earlier scheme, as we saw, has proved satisfactory either. And to redesign ours would mean a series of impossibilities that can summed up as deliberate discouragement: of the young artistic impulse, of the mature desire for a public career, of the competitive scramble t the great centers. It seems as if high art were from the beginning under a curse that grows more bitter as civilization spreads ever wide the demand for a good that it produces all too abundantly. [pg. 36]