It’s a five minute walk from my house to the pub
It’s a 35 minute walk from the pub to my house
The difference is staggering.
American executions
US Attorney General Merrick Garland recently ordered a moratorium on federal executions and a Justice Department review of the death penalty.
The move followed a decision by the Trump administration Justice Department to revive federal executions by lethal injection in 2019, using a one-drug protocol. The federal government then carried out 13 executions from July 2020 to January 2021. During his confirmation hearing, Garland said that exonerations of people wrongly convicted have given him “pause.” He also noted that President Biden is strongly opposed to capital punishment. “A most terrible thing happens when someone is executed for a crime that they did not commit,” Garland said.
My comment: An eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth may have been normal in primitive society, but it is totally wrong for a normal, civilized modern State. The death penalty should be banned – everywhere. It is obscene and immoral to see the Federal government involved in killing individuals, no matter what they are accused of, and especially if the victim is mentally ill and the evidence against him is contested. I believe that Epicurus would agree.
Life expectancy
In 1921 men in England and Wales had a life expectancy of 56 years,women 60 years. Ninety years on the figures are 79 and 83 years respectively. Simply living longer is a bit meaningless in itself, but it is a pointer to better health. The Western world has shared in this greater longevity, thank to national health systems.
But things are changing. In the borough we stay in in London life expectancy in the poor north of the borough (where the disastrous fire was a year ago) life expectancy is 14 years less than parts of the borough just walking distance away. The people burned to death last year’s fire were minorities or migrants.
Instead of a steady improvement in life expectancy of 0.25 years every year, the rate has recently declined to 0.07 per year for men and 0.02 for women. This change is 80% down on that of the last 90 years. In continental Europe lengthening lives are still on track , but in the UK are they stalling and in America nationwide life expectancy has declined two years in a row, with those with poor education doing worst.
The pattern seems to be pretty obvious: the lower the position on the social hierarchy, the worse the health. We know that inequality is having bad effects in America, but what is worrying is that Britain’ changes are regional – the south east is doing well but the North is suffering. The greater the economic distress and unemployment (or casual employment and short- term contracts). the higher the mortality, with alcohol being an important factor. Infant mortality has risen two years in a row.
One reason given is the funding of the National Health Service, an increase in the number of old people and a decline in the increase in spending by the Tory government . Expenditure , once reliably 4% annually , has dropped to 0.3%, and going down. Along with this there has been a drop in spending on social care of 25%.
Meanwhile, back to the borough I am living in. Also within walking distance there are 6 Russian oligarchs and a host of kleptocrats and crooks with London boltholes, some lured with a promise of British passports, few of them, I imagine, paying any tax. Those of us with an Epicurean outlook have to reject this way of running a society. It is stupid,
and short-sighted.
Ironic event
I have had several occasions where my right leg has caved under me, causing me to fall. My GP referred me to the National Health Service Falls Centre, which trains people to avoid falls and breakages.
After a session I started on home with my wife, armed with a list of exercises. Running for a bus ( dumb thing to do!), I tripped over the edge of a paving stone and crashed, face down, on the sidewalk., my arms and elbows taking the hit.
The rest of the day was effectively spent at the hospital, being examined, patched up and X- rayed. I felt such an idiot. Still, I suppose that’s why they have a Falls Centre.
P.S: I am o.k , just laughing at my own stupidity.
Boredom
| ‘“The idea that boredom is good for us – particularly in childhood, because it encourages imagination and creativity – is well established,” writes Jemima Lewis in The Daily Telegraph. She recounts the “massive afternoon longeurs” of her own infancy, during which she would “finally peel myself off the dusty-smelling carpet to read a book… or feed mystery liquids from the medicine cabinet to my little sister”.
Now, though, she says, boredom is harder to come by. “If I want my children to be properly bored – not just fed up and listless, but laid out flat by the certain knowledge that there is nothing to do – I must hide all the screens. In doing so, I create the first of the day’s entertainments: hide and seek.” My comment: I can’t remember when I was last bored. As my late father-in-law said, “No one gets bored but a bore himself”. I don’t in the least believe boredom encourages imagination and creativity. Where did that come from? Educate me. |