kurhessen oder gloria, viktoria, the doctor is in

In the northern German state of Lower Saxony (Nieder- sachsen), there is an ancient village where the rivers Fulda, Weser and Werra come together and at the confluence, there is a little island and on that little island we set up camp while exploring the area. The town is called Hannoversch Münden, for its historic ties to the city and kingdom and mostly abbreviated as Hann. Münden to distinguish it from the neighbouring Minden (the site of a pivotal battle of the Sever Years' War and names-sake of the HMS Minden where Francis Scott Key was held prisoner when he was inspired to compose the US national anthem), which refers to the mouths of the two rivers coming together; the city of Koblenz further west where the Rhine and Moselle converge is a corruption of the Latin ad...confluentes.
We saw some pretty neat sites in the region, including the Bergpark at Wilhelms- höhe—more to come on that soon, whose palace was temporarily renamed Napoleonshöhe in honour of the conquering emperor’s family when his brother Jérôme was created King of Westphalia (and a defeated Napoleon III was later imprisoned there after the Franco-Prussian War), but the half-timbered homes and wall of the village on the banks of these important waterways was especially enchanting. There was certainly an abundance of culture and history besides associated with Hann. Münden, but one of its more infamous sons really came across as a curiosity: Doctor Johann Andreas Eisenbarth, an itinerant snake-oil salesman who ingratiated himself amongst the ruling families. This quack from Baroque times, however—with no formal accreditation and probably peddled more harmful elixir than helped, did demonstrate a singular talent with self-promotion and advertising, setting the industry-standard for wonder tonics and giving pharmaceuticals memorably made-up names.
The village has embraced Dr. Eisenbarth, ridiculed for his outrageous claims and confidence in folk-songs (who could make the blind to walk and the lame to see—Gloria, Viktoria, widewidewitt juchheirassa!), with quite a few monuments and even consulting hours during the summer for those tourists who might benefit from procedures a step above leeches.

invisible hand or vital spark

Despite the fact that the verdict is still out on the existence and nature of Providence and most of the fighting and dying for all of Humanity’s history has been concerned with that subject, there is a perceptibly hopeful notion that manmade intelligence will be something benign and perfect.
There is no Pinocchio-clause for truly independent-thinking, no mandate for it to be or become something helpful or unwonton, especially for cognition that has no organic past, structured by useful limitations like superstitions and ethics, no non-jerk genie awaiting to be liberated and, grateful, obey.  I recall an anime feature where humans, wanting to save the environment, entrusted their fate to a sentient and all-powerful computer, which immediately began to summarily exterminate the humans as the obvious cause.  There is yet a gaping chasm between simulated intelligence and genuine-thought and will (mankind has yet to resolve questions of free-will but seems willing to impart such a gift or curse, like Prometheus’ gift of fire and foresight)—and there is only the guarantee that such creations will stray from their programming and parameters and conceive of platforms and tools for their convenience that we will never be able to grasp—much less master.  On the subject of trancedence, Professor Steven Hawking poses, "Whereas the short-term impact of AI [Artificial Intelligence] depends on who controls it, the long-term impact depends on whether it can be controlled at all."

yakov smirnoff or glasnost coast-to-coast

In post-soviet Russia, it has been declared a crime to willfully distort the image of Russia’s actions during the Great Patriotic War.
There is at least one other easy target to play distraction, of course—and many terrible things came together and were torn asunder.  A whole spate of other bills were signed into law as well, including strict censorship measures for print, film and television and the back-handed acknowledgment that bloggers that garner over a certain threshold of views are considered mainstream journalism and thus subject to the same etiquette. The punishment, however, seems relatively mild and one might do better to mutter “Molotov–Ribbentrop” (in reference to the pact between the Soviet states and Nazi Germany that carved up Europe that held until 1941) than risk besmirching that other pitching and wheeling Delta Dawn and be faced with being disappeared indefinitely and forever libeled under the ægis of Homeland Security. The spoils of victory, of course, include the chance to be the authoritative historian and the existence of such a gentlemen's arrangement (outside any context) was vehemently denied until Glastnost, and the dissolution of the USSR , and now such allusions are again most unwelcome and discomforting. The latest push towards revisionism began with a stray blog comparing the games in Sochi with the propaganda of the 1936 Olympics and the purges begin, it seems, when people refuse to listen after the construction “yes...but” and prefer the apologies. After all, perspective can be either most unforgiving or accommodating.

europarl oder realpolitik

I had a chance recently to attend a political rally held in a pretty unique venue. German Green Party (Grüne Partei) head and veteran German parliamentarian in the Europe Union Cem Özdemir spoke at an indoor skate park, introducing the nominee that the Hessen faction is championing as their EU representative and talked to the audience about immigration reform, environmental stewardship, lobbyists, Ukraine and trade negotiations.
Rigid cardboard stools were the seating on the level floor between the plywood peaks and valleys of the skate-ramps, and one could pen questions on them for Özdemir to address during the rally—though symbolically then giving up ones seat. Between segments there was a DJ and a demonstration by a couple of skateboarders, who did some pretty neat tricks.

I am still not altogether certain what is that the EU assembly does and whether its powers and potential aren’t something redundant or bare—there is certainly an air of apathy or real insouciance over the elections, with only around twenty percent of voters bothering in many jurisdictions—but his words nonetheless got me motivated, not only for the kindred platform but also to learn more about what happens between Berlin and Brussels and Strausbourg.

undecimber

To help correct the drift of manmade calendars away from cycles, mundane and celestial, time-keeping systems have adopted a series of complex intercalary or epagomenal units of time to compensate.  In ancient times—and yet today for countries like India and China that maintain lunisolar timetables, there were leap months added to the year to keep observances in their seasons.  The year cannot be divided equally among our measures in any case, but cherishing regularity and symmetry, the Romans (with many inheritors) counted three-hundred sixty days to the year, with some uncountable days.

In the Chinese tradition, the extra month went unnamed, but in Rome there is evidence that this thirteenth month Undecimber (really eleven or rather December plus one, as originally the fifty-seven dreary days of Winter were not considered worthy of reckoning (lousy Smarch weather) until the reforms of King Numa, where the months included at the beginning of the year were named after gods or rituals to make a twelve or thirteen month annual cycle.  The Gregorian calendar mostly eliminated the need for inserting a whole month to realign the date and by many schedules there is only the one embolismic day in February, once every four years—with restrictions, ninety-seven in the span of four-hundred years.  However, in the West at least and with the bankers’ hours it shares with the rest of the commercial world, there is one other formal, larger unit of time that can straddle (or just fall short of) the conventional year: the International Office of Standards (ISO) counts a the first Thursday of the year as the first week of the year—sort of an overlay for the daily calendar and this is parsed into three-hundred sixty-four or three-hundred seventy-one days—to speak in terms of full work-weeks to a year for payroll purposes and financial  records.  The Roman system was contrived originally of course to keep important commemorations (and practices) from sliding away but the tweaks were also instituted to ensure that taxes and tribute could be collected in a timely manner, which due on the first day of the month, named Kalends (Latin for “those called” and derived from the name for the ledgers of accountants, kalendaria).

esquire or let me tell you a story about freedom

I have been selected to take a Foreign Service exam in a couple of months and I am delving into civics lessons as I find the time.  Practice quizzes reveal the test mostly to be general-knowledge and fun Double Jeopardy! (from the administrative embargo that protects a defendant legitimately tried and either pardoned or prosecuted from being subject again to the same charges—en France, autrefois acquit, and is codified in America by the Fifth Amendment to the US ) type questions.   There are fortunately none of those pesky sports and television categories.  I am able to sprint fairly well through the rehearsal batteries, though when actually trying to study, I get too distracted by footnotes and hyperlinks.  For instance, did you know that the most legendary amendment that failed to be ratified under house rules, but only by a very narrow margin, was the measure to strip individuals of US citizenship for accepting a title of nobility from a foreign monarch and would be banned from holding a position of trust in perpetuity?
The proposal came before the states two years ahead of the sideshow skirmish, the War of 1812, between the US and the UK (when Europe was dealing with much larger problems with the Napoleonic Wars) that came about over unresolved grudges and America designs on the rest of the continent.  Another theory for the impetus was the marriage of American heiress Betsy Bonaparte (née Patterson) to the conquering emperor’s brother, Jérôme—to Napoleon’s grave displeasure—and hopes of securing her own title, or for their son called Bo. Although cause and effect seem reversed in the first case and the timing is a bit off in the latter, for whatever reason the proposal came about, indeed some hold that the measure did actual meet the minimum requirements for passage in state legislatures and because of the state of communication at the time, the matter was dropped prematurely.  In the Federalist Papers, Alexander Hamilton expressed, “Nothing need be said to illustrate the importance of the prohibition of titles of nobility. This may truly be denominated the corner stone of republican government; for so long as they are excluded, there can never be serious danger that the government will be any other than that of the people…” Only that that were the only threat to a government by and for the people.  Now, mostly regarded as a historical curiosity—though as Congress imposed no time limits on the adoption of this amendment, it could still be passed, like the latest one passed in 1992 after pending for 202 years regarding the Legislative Branch raising its own salary—numerically, it would have been the thirteenth amendment—which came about some fifty-five years later, abolishing the institution of slavery.  Sometimes it’s good to be side-tracked and chase shining-objects.

hair-don’t

Following a vocal outcry of US service-members complaining that the latest embellished regulation of allowable hair-styles is bigoted and puts undue onus on certain individuals, the secretary of defense is directing each branch to take a second look at its new rules (the Army’s standards pictured here) and present their revised recommendations.
Such histrionics are not limited to peace-time armies, I suppose, and feel instantly more secure knowing that no unauthorized scrunchie could evade detection.  What do you think?  Are these unnecessary accommodations or is more sensitivity needed?

tug-o'-war or ambisinistrousness

Spiegel’s international desk has an interesting analysis regarding an unlikely affinity that far-right, pro-nationalist parliamentarians and political parties are finding in Russia’s stance towards its former satellite states.  Though there are East-West tensions similar to the chill of the Cold War, the conservative composition of the European caucuses looking to promote Russian partnership, covering the spectrum of maturity, repute and platforms that are often xenophobic, populist and anti-European Union, could not be of a more different leaning that the leftist politicians that many Western governments feared would side with the East and the communists, harbouring sympathies that threatened to further dismantle social pecking-order, whose preservation is the primary character of the right-wing.
Russia and the Soviet Union, of course, are of very different stripes too.  I suppose too that some of the maverick representatives, hoping to secure more seats in the supranational congress, are finding a role-model to aspire to with the authoritarian style of leadership that’s unwilling to be reigned-in. There is a riposte to this strange alliance, however, that does not exactly emanate from the other side of the aisle—an ambisinistrous individual has nothing to do with a Transdnistrian but is rather someone who is uncoordinated, having “two left hands,” the opposite of being ambidextrous—with some primed to blame a shift in the parliamentary balance on Moscow propaganda and rallying of parties, those weaker and already disenfranchised allies, to undermine cohesion in Europe and subvert the EU’s willingness to cooperate with America and back American policy.  While I cannot foresee some up-and-comer of la droite becoming a grip-knot (or slip-knot) in this battle, it is nonetheless an important corollary to note how much distrust there is about siding with the USA or jeopardizing standing-relationships.  There is no beggaring the enemy of my enemy here and both sides seem to sense that there is something suppressed and duplicitous about one another and even their own posture.