Satillo Mexico by Edward Hopper. Copied from a reproduction of an oil painting

The Pesident's Speech on the Occupy Movement

The Occupy movements across the country have received the attention of every adult American by breaking the law. One of the sparks for their action is the failure of colleges in American to provide useful educations to their students, coupled with the overhanging debt from loans for education that cannot be eliminated by legal bankruptcy in front of a judge. These loans are too often done under Federal programs, and it was a Federal law that, by exempting students loans from bankruptcy laws, encouraged the banks to make unrealistically high loans.

The Federal government shares the blame for this situation together with that of the student who took advantage of this opportunity for larger loans than they could reasonably hope to repay, along with their parents, and the schools, which took advantage of this easy money with skyrocketing tuition rates.

As President I propose several laws which I am sending to Congress as soon as one action is taken by the rioters.

First, I will propose legislation to allow student debt to be discharged in bankruptcy by the court in those cases where it is reasonable to do so under laws guiding similar debt problems.

Second, I will propose legislation to congress to eliminate all Federal lending programs for higher education.

Third, I will propose legislation to provide relief to those same Wall Street institutions that that the rioters vilify which, encouraged by the loan guarantee programs, made the existing student loans. More details on that legislation will be provided in the next few days.

But now I go back to that “one action”. These occupy riots around the country stop. They stop today. If the rioters go home I will present these proposed laws to congress. If they do not, I will not.

When they go home the students and their parents should approach their congressional representatives to support the legislation I will propose. At the same time they should apologize to their younger brothers and sisters because they will not have the same educational opportunity they had through educational loans, and for their bad behavior in taking on excessive debt even if it that action was encouraged by the government. You students and your parents have hurt future generations of Americans.

In closing I repeat, these “occupy” riots must stop. They stop today. You have made a case for yourselves in an illegal manner which everyone in the country is going to be punished for financially. You won and everyone lost. It is over. If you do not disperse immediately, which will lead to you being rewarded for illegal actions, I will call the US military to clear the streets if local governments do not.

Pencil Copy of a Paintings by Edward Hopper

Copies of a paintings of a lighthouse by Edward Hopper done about 1927

The Long Divergence: How Islamic Law Held Back the Middle East by Tumur Kuran

I have read many books on Islam. I read them to understand why Islam conquered so much so quickly, and why it failed both politically and economically over the last 500 years. The relative economic decline is of interest because around 1000 CE, the Muslim world was as wealthy as Europe. This is the first book that provided understanding that I could use. Not on conquest directly, but on the economics.

In "The Long Divergence", the author emphasizes two themes around Muslim law of inheritance. Islamic law mandated distribution of wealth after death amongst multiple heirs. This had two results. First, it forced partnerships to be short lived: Death followed by demands for their part of the inheritance by heirs required liquidation of a partnership. Knowing that any death would end the partnership, Muslims tended to favor two person partnerships of short duration. In contrast, after 1000 CE Europeans developed forms of partnership and corporations that could survive the death of a single participant. Partly this was adoption of primogeniture, under which a single descendant could inherit the whole on one person's assets in a property, business or partnership. At the same time Europeans were becoming innovative about the types of business arrangements used to accumulate wealth. Something like modern corporations developed to manage guilds, monasteries, and even cities. European rulers, desperate for money, and often only weakly in power, were willing to allow independent groups take local power, in exchange for stability and the right to tax revenues or profits. These independent institutions were allowed to change their internal rules and general goals as circumstances changes.

Copied from an Edward Hopper oil painting. The isolation of a lighthouse and the keepers cabin somewhere on the coast of New England.

Tree looming over house and fence going off into the distance. Again, correct proportions were hard but necessary. Also doing the foliage used a technique the teacher suggested since I could not do it the way the original artist did it with the tools and time I had to work.

Exploiting Ethnic Divisions in the Middle East

Recent photograph of Berber fighters in Libya

On,August 9. 2011, The NY Times had an online article on how the Berbers of Libya are using the civil war in that country to seize local power in their homelands of western Libya. They are now in conflict with local Arabs. This is a good thing. Where the Times sees trouble, I see opportunity.

A Review of "A Moment in the Sun" by John Sayles

I am less than one fourth the way though this book set starting in 1897 and continuing through the the end of the Spanish American war. Already the author, through his charters, has taken me to Alaska for the Yukon gold rush, to Havana to witness the sinking of the USS Maine, to Manila to witness the brutal execution of a Filipino rebel against Spanish rule, and somewhere in the American South to a prison camp where convicts are being used to tap resin from trees. Later he takes the reader back to Manila to see the American fleet destroy the Spanish fleet in Manila Bay. I am confused.

S-day a Memoir of the Invasion of England

This is an alternative history novel with novel twist to it. It addresses an important issue of social and geopolitical importance, which is not what happens in most counterfactual history books.

The most widely read counterfactual histories wander off into an unrecognizable future which no thinking person can believe, given the contingent nature of historical events.

The more common variety stop short to give a new ending to a historical event, without exploring the extended ramifications.

Think Turtledove's series of book on an alternative outcome to the American Civil War for an example of the first option, where the whole history of the world is explored though the end of World War II with a divided United States taking different sides in both World War I and World War II.

But as I said, S-Day is different. It starts by imagining that Nazi Germany had avoided war with the Soviet Union in 1941 The reason is not given, is not important, and is within the range of possibility. Simply imagine some new arrangement between Hitler and Stalin that keeps the Nazi-peace in Europe

Drawing Based on an Oil Painting of a Muslim Man

Done today in 3 hours. First time I did arms, hands and fingers seriously.

As usual I had difficulty with the eyes. Teacher had me turn the painting and the drawing upside down so I would concentrate on what was really there, instead on drawing what I wanted to see.

Still the teacher had to help me with the eyes starting with the eyes brows, which are angular rather than nicely curved like I want to draw then.

Also, more practice with geometry to get the proportions correct. Note that the man with his book forms a triangle. I am getting better at seeing geometry in art.