Denial Anger Bargaining Depression...

It's not easy watching a country commit suicide.  It's kind of like a car wreck: everyone slows down to look at the carnage before speeding off happy to still be breathing.

Usually, when folks kill themselves, they seek a little privacy and try to do things as quickly and painlessly as possible.  Occasionally though, you get the jumpers.  They get out on the ledge and wait for big crowds to gather and media to show up.  These big public shows are rarely serious, though.  What they are looking for is some attention - someone to save them.

The United States of America seems to be one of those exceptions.  Not only has it crawled out on a particularly precarious ledge, but it is absolutely defying anyone to help it.  Convinced of its own immortality and what David Byrne called "special-NESS",  Not only has it edged itself out in a very public space, it is tap-dancing on the ledge singing the Star-Spangled Banner and yelling to the gaping mobs below about how privileged it is.

It's a special kind of insanity, really.

There's an additional problem.  This gross display of self-delusion is compounded by the fact that the nation has crawled out on the ledge carrying a lot of weapons and seems hell-bent on taking out a few million folks before swan-diving to a spectacular end.

A lot of countries and individuals around the world are trying to distance themselves from the coming carnage.  The number of people giving up their citizenship or permanent resident status has reached record highs.  Legislation has been introduced in Russia to ban possession and trade in dollars.  A dozen countries have demanded their gold back from the Federal Researve (good luck - getting smack off a junkie is easier).  Many other countries are establishing trade agreements in their own currencies to by-pass the dollar.

All of this is going on fairly quietly so as not to agitate the loony on the ledge, but he's getting wise and starting to get that wild, haunted look in his eyes.  He's spying on everyone, friends included, out of sheer paranoia.  He's got weapons pointed in every which direction.  He's insisting that everyone sign his Trans-Pacific Pact or he'll by-God jump.  In fact, he's showing all the same signs the USSR did a while back before slipping and falling to its death in a rather spectacular way with a vodka-swilling Jew riding a tank into Red Square.

The world is pretty much resigned to the inevitable, and since the loony gets ever more belligerent with every passing moment, it seems a good idea to stand back and let the guy rush head-long to his demise, while making back-up plans for the inevitable time when the rest of us don't have to worry about his destructive behavior.

Americans, being for the most part provincial and self-centered, don't realize how their country squats on top of the world and, in spoiled child fashion, issues demands and decrees that are completely oblivious to the rest of the world or the harm that it does.

Having been so steeped in "exceptionalism", Americans are blind to the destructive tendency of their culture.  Raised on diets of pro-Cowboy/anti-Indian, the US continues the single-minded conquest of the world in the belief that there is no other way but the Anglo way, and the world must conform or die.

Civilization is something that is grown, not pounded.  It also recognizes that there are many paths to the same destination.  Americans, and America, must reform or face extinction.  No man is an island entire to himself.

The decline of the US is now well into the paranoia phase, in which it is lashing out to blame anyone and anything for its misfortunes.  In fact, the whole problem is as simple as a point of view, but one that is extremely hard to take, because it requires seeing the errors of the current situation.

Slowly but inexorably the American people are waking up and realizing what is and has been done in their name.  This is causing increasing dissatisfaction and distancing from government institutions.  Once the people have been lost, governments crumble  Like marital infidelity, it is extremely hard to regain trust, especially that which was built on complete faith in the goodness and morality of the system.

American paranoia says that the rest of the world is plotting against it, but out here on the Far Side, we know the end is near and it is prudent to prepare.

Immigration Reform? Hahahahaha!

The ongoing debate over immigration in the States and Europe is cause for some introspection on being an expat now well-past five years.

In my life, I have been an expat for roughly a decade, with the longest stretch being the current Indonesian adventure.  One assumes that the term 'expat' refers primarily to folks who go about it in a legal manner, with all the appropriate stamps and permits to carry on the daily routine of life, since one rarely hears the term applied to those who do not.

Currently in the US, there is a tremendous amount of hand-wringing over 'immigration reform', which involves granting amnesty to illegals, forgiving back taxes and offering various incentives to help them on their way up the social ladder.  The US immigration system is a farce by any measure and laughable to those of us who endure the rigors of other nations' policies.

Let's take Indonesia as an example of what most of the world considers immigration policy.

Here, a 30-day tourist visa costs $25 on arrival.  You can get a 60-day visa outside the country for around $45, plus any agent fees and such.  The 30-day visa is extendable up to 90 days at $25 per month.  The 60-day visa is extendable up to 180 days with the same $25 per month.

Beyond that, you can obtain a 6-month and one-year visa, called a KITAS, that is concomitant with an IMTA work permit.  You must have the KITAS to get the IMTA, but the former does not guarantee the latter.  For one year, it runs about $2,000, all in.  If you get the one-year visa, then you must get the NPWP, or taxpayer number.

You are liable for tax on all income from whatever source anywhere in the world until the NPWP is cancelled - even if you leave Indonesia.  To cancel the NPWP is a 6-month process with a guaranteed tax audit for all the years you have been in-country.

In all cases, you must either maintain a valid ticket out of the country, or your employer is required to pay your ticket out at the end of the contract.  This is to ensure that if you are deported, you pay your own way.

Furthermore, foreigners can not own any property outright.  You can co-own it with a spouse, but if your spouse dies or divorces you, you have one year to divest the property or face confiscation.  The best you can hope for otherwise is hak bangunan, which gives you full rights to property for up to 30 years, and is renewable one time.

The biggest reform to Indonesian immigration laws in the past two decades was the creation of a 10-year KITAP, or permanent resident visa.  This is only available to expats married to locals and so far does not come with the IMTA - that's extra.  It costs $5,000, and because there are yet no controlling regulations issued for them, it is nothing but a big shaft.  One story I heard was that an expat got one after months of strenuous effort, only to have it cancelled when his employer applied for a work permit.  It was replaced with the standard one-year KITAS.

If you want to become an Indonesian citizen, the you must hold a KITAP for some mysterious amount of time.  Then your application will go through a Kafka-esque process until it reaches the president's desk, where he must sign it and publicly declare you a citizen.

Given this background, when I hear of 'immigration reform' in the US, or Europeans wailing and gnashing their teeth over immigrant workers taking over the place, I laugh.  By comparison, the US immigration system is a joke, and the reform is hardly worth the effort since no one pays the least bit of attention to it in the first place.  I personally know two Indonesians who have lived and worked in a major city for more than 25 years with hardly a bead of sweat to show for their dealings with immigration laws.

The word 'farce' comes to mind.

To call the debate in the US "reform" is a bit disingenuous.  It's more like deciding whether to keep the patient on life-support or pull the plug.

A number of writers have speculated that the true demise of Rome was due to the overwhelming number of former slaves who eventually took over the daily operations of the empire.  Most of the real Romans had long since bugged out or left the drudge work to the under classes.  By the time the Visigoths overran the city, there were few folks left to worry or care.

Most people who think the current immigration 'reform' is compassionate have never lived, much less traveled, outside the US.  They have no clue what real immigration policy is, nor do they have any notion of history to inform their thinking.

The Big BO invited a group of illegal immigrants to the White House, a place where few citizens are allowed in the name of 'security'.  There are currently little or no repercussions for employers or illegals alike when they flaunt what little regulation exists.  If the media really had the intention to debate the story, they would interview US expats in other countries about what it means to be an immigrant.  But that might risk introducing a bit of reality into the discussion.

Immigration reform does not mean giving away the store or spending a bit more time groping people at the airport.  Reform means enforcing the visa expirations, disallowing 'anchor babies' and withholding social benefits paid for by productive taxpayers.

Personally, I think all national borders should be done away with because the whole thing is nothing more than a revenue scam, and has little or nothing to do with national security.  But public discourse on the topic of immigration should at least be honest and complete.  Don't call it immigration reform when what is really on the table is creating a class of specially privileged people based on the fact that they have no history or investment in a country.

In every case where I have lived overseas, I have gone out of my way to learn the languages and customs of my host country.  I have done all I could to assimilate, even when I stand out like a galleon among row boats.

If an immigrant begins his tenure in another country by refusing to follow the common law, what does that say about his long-term intentions?  And to reward that behavior with blanket amnesty and special treatment that offers enhanced status over current citizens is nothing less than insane.

Whether we are discussing the US, UK or EU, the current immigration debate smacks of either a concerted effort to undermine the long-term viability of those nations involved, or a depth of stupidity rarely matched in history.

I opt for the former.

The Meaning Of Life?

For some reason, I woke up this morning with Cindy Lauper's "She Bop" running rampant through my brain.  Why in the hell THAT would be assaulting my morning mind, I can't say.  I couldn't shake it.  I immediately set about playing Handel's Water Music to drown out the inane pop anthem.

But it did set me to thinking, which should terrify anyone regularly reading this space.

The 70s and 80s in America were a time of great banality.  The arts had become vast wastelands of mediocrity that served only greed and narcissism.  True, there were stand outs like Elton John and Bruce Springsteen, alond with a handful of superior movies, but they serve as the exceptions that prove the rule.

The era produced such banal fads as Pet Rocks, glam rock and Michael J. Fox.  It was a period that all great societies seem to go through just before they implode and crumble into the dust from which they came.

In pondering how this inevitable trend operates, I came to the conclusion that at some point, major societies reach a point of such affluence and decadence that two things happen: creativity devolves into hacks for hire, and ultimately, no one wants to do the work.

Many (many) moons ago, there was a cartoon in Penthouse magazine that has been etched into my mind, even deeper than Miss June 1984.  It was a six-panel in which an artist starts out making his paintings in a bare single-room flat while wearing rags.  By the final frame, he is surrounded with admirers, wearing the finest togs and his paintings are now nothing more than his signature.

This was a profound commentary on society in general, and the arts in particular.  The rise of self-indulgent art, combined with the complete lack of discerning taste on the part of the public, is the final phase before the crash and burn.  It is as if the culture has reached the point where it has exploited everything it can get its hands on, and has turned on itself in a final desperate attempt to buy up the last dregs of esthetics.

The other side of this is the fact that some amount of wealth and affluence has reached pretty much every level of society.  At this point, everyone wants to be in the leisure class and no one wants to do the work necessary to build and maintain the mundane foundation of the society.

I mentioned Michael J. Fox earlier, and he is a perfect example.  He made a film called "The Secret of My Success," in which he is the proverbial man-on-the-make.  He slick-talks his way into opportunities and ultimately lands in a pile of money.  Now image an entire society of people just like that.  Everyone buys a cheap Armani knock-off and prints up some cards and becomes an entrepreneur without going through the prerequisite steps of becoming an expert in something.

It's at this stage that the entire culture is run by middlemen and brokers.  The problem with that is no one is producing, and eventually, no one is buying, since no one has money from the Big Deals they didn't make.

In the midst of this orgy of lopsided capitalism, folks forget about things like education and manufacturing and producing.  Instead, all creativity is focused and expended on facadism: it all looks like Town and Country magazine on the outside, but on closer inspection one finds that it's all just pirated copies and cheap reproductions.

At some point, all of this leads to an entire generation without prospects or hope.  There is no real business left, and the scraps that remain have so many barriers to entry that they can't possibly surmount them.  They are the seeds of destruction, the impoverished and forgotten that are the by-products of over-hyped lifestyle chasers.  Education has devolved into little more than puffed-up babysitting.  There are no savings or inheritances from the older generations to fertilize them.  There is nothing left that hasn't already been exploited to exhaustion.

What's worse is that they are stuck with the tab for the high living decades that preceded them, and they never even got a taste of the wine and roses.  All that's left of the bowl of cherries are the stems and pits.

And so the inevitable happens.  The decadence turns to decay, and ultimately the entire thing collapses.  What's worse is that the older generations try to cling to the old ways through the use of brute force.  Dictators spring up by popular will or apathy, who try to maintain the illusion of prosperity at the point of a gun.  Finally, basic human instinct kicks in with the overwhelming desire to be left the hell alone.

At this point, the immovable object meets the irresistible force.  In the clash, the remaining infrastructure of society is utterly destroyed, and from these ashes come opportunity and creativity, as people rebuild and rethink.

For ancient Rome, this process took the better part of 1,000 years.  For America, it was only a quarter of that.  China seems hell-bent on achieving it in a single life-time.  The cycle is speeding up at an alarming rate with seemingly no one learning anything new to remediate the problem.  At the same time, it's becoming a global, rather than regional phenomenon.

It's exactly like bacteria in a Petri dish.  The colony expands until the limits of the environment are reached, and then the entire system collapses.

The only solutions anyone seems to come up with are strict rationing and controls, but that simply implies that someone is in charge of the doling out and measuring.  Inevitably, all that happens in this case is that the watchers become mired in corruption and ultimately they start carving off bigger chunks for themselves until they are lamp-posted by the rabble.

It seems like an impossible dream that we, as a species, will learn to restrain ourselves, rather than always looking to a parental authoritarian system to force us into compliance.  We don't appear to have learned a single lesson from the past 20,000 years of experience.  No matter how civil and genteel the society, at some point someone notices others getting a fairer share of the goodies than they are, and it quickly becomes a greedy free-for-all, as soon everyone is scrambling to snatch up a bigger pile of goodies than the next guy.

Sometimes I wonder if our species wasn't exiled to this planet until such time as we had learned to behave ourselves.  If that's the case, then it seems that we are failing miserably, since we are not only not improving, we seem to be back-sliding into the muck.

Perhaps it will take a global collapse of unprecedented proportions for everyone to learn all at once that we are going the wrong way.  In the past, there was always an escape valve; folks could pick up and move somewhere else and start over.  With a global collapse, though, there will be no life unaffected.

Perhaps that is the subconscious origin of the current slavering rush to apocalypse.  Somewhere deep in the collective id, folks are pushing to see the final Big Poop, so that we can start anew, hopefully a bit wiser for the wear.

It does seem, though, that at the end of every Age, there is a massive upheaval that fertilizes the future.  Let's hope that someone is taking really good notes, though, so we can all copy off them before the exam.