Interesting day.  It's the feast of Our Lady of the Rosary, which seems at first glance to be a devotion of Italian origin centered on some healing miracles, and placed roughly opposite in the calendar to the rosary feast instituted after Lepanto.  But there's a much older feast as well, one that I encountered when looking at some of the history in this part of the world -- the apparition of St. Michael the Archangel on the mountaintop.  The pilgrimage to the mountaintop on this day was apparently a very important event at points in the medieval calendar.  (Though if memory serves, one of the local observances moved it to the day before.)  

The angelic cults and feasts are generally of eastern origin, and very broadly speaking, the Marian and rosary devotions are closer to the developed, established hierarchy of the Latin church.  And, of course, Leo XIII is closely associated with St. Michael, with the prayer after Mass very popular in certain areas of the American Midwest (and occasionally sneaking into the Mass itself, before the dismissal).  He was also a bit wary of Kantianism and Americanism, so I might have had difficult time making light talk, if I had found myself alongside the sede gestoria in the late 19th c.

Beyond doubt, one of the historic events of the age.  The American mind will apparently have to sort through a few things in the coming years.  The shining city on the hill might yet prove the litmus, one way or another.  So those of us with some acquaintance with it have some thinking, reading and writing to do.  Even if no one's listening quite yet.

 Prejudice, it is true, is mighty, and so is the greed of money; but if the sense of what is just and rightful be not deliberately stifled, their fellow citizens are sure to be won over to a kindly feeling towards men whom they see to be in earnest as regards their work and who prefer so unmistakably right dealing to mere lucre, and the sacredness of duty to every other consideration.

https://www.vatican.va/content/leo-xiii/en/encyclicals/documents/hf_l-xiii_enc_15051891_rerum-novarum.html 

 https://www.vatican.va/content/vatican/it/special/habemus-papam.html

 Chicago.

 

 Peculiar image just after the "extra omnes."  All of the electors were in the sanctuary, but one fellow with a monastic habit and a cardinalate zucchetto was on the near side of the chancel.  Lay elector?

If you compare the number of scientific studies refining various industrial processes with the number of studies looking to determine how to brew the healthiest cup of coffee (brewed by billions each day), you do get some sense of the nature of the mechanism. Even having built the mechanism of utopia, you do have to decide to realize utopia.

If the Cardinal Electors manage it in fewer ballots than were required to elect the German Chancellor, the Reformation might just have come full circle.

 The anthem of the (Hegelian) beautiful soul:

 

If your engagement is with the things beneath appearances, the world of appearances can prove problematic.  The quesiton is--speaking not in abstract terms but of the specific and discrete things presently in view--one of belief.

 To the city's national theatre for a farce by the 19th c. national playwright.  ($6, balcony)  I've seen this playwright's work in three cities, and it's very different in each of them.  Shades of Hoffmann's short story Donna Anna at points.  The standard line is that this playwright isn't political at all, but that received idea was developed during the dictatorship; this is clearly a very interesting allegory of 19th c. constitutionalism, along with an authorial type (the playwright was a newspaperman and politically influential) who gets a bit roughed up in the course of things.  It's not unreasonable to think that the 19th c. political fights here had an element of physical menace to them; perhaps there was some back-story there.  

The style is much broader here than in the capital or at the university festivals, but the reason that it's broad is that generations of audience memebers have imprinted themselves upon it appreciatively, and perhaps even gratefully.  Watch a national playwright's work in his or her home country carefully, and you will have before you a small group of people trying to tell you absolutely everything (and quite possibly succeeding in the attempt).

Must stop using sleep as a weapon against the slings & arrows of outrageous fortune.  It was a difficult winter.  But still -- sleep is, empirically speaking, a poor means of defense against arrows. 

 Historically, this part of the world has been at times a place of refuge for scholars from the northern wars; in early modern times, they were often of an alchemical bent, writing treatises under the patronage of the local nobility, and sending them off to the German book fairs.  There's also a strong impulse to a vivification of life by the mythic and the ancient; the fantasy sections of the bookstores seem comparatively well-stocked, relative to other parts of the region.  (Though it is common to the region; in Belgrade at night these days, a colossal LED image of a (14th c?) king lours over the river bridges.)  And with the tech boom, like the American Pacific Northwest, the costs of living in this area have significantly outpaced both what the underlying non-tech economy could support, and the country's historical balance of income allocation.  While there are certainly a good number of penurious folks, the standard of living in this part of the world is very high, even relative to countries with higher income levels; second homes in the country appear to be quite common, and housing is generally very liveable. (This part of the world sees it as a social obligation to build a sufficient number of homes for the population.)  

But with the surging rents locally, it's clear that some sort of Camelot is being conceived.  According to the old (Norman) legends, Camelot was created by Merlin's tracing of a circle in the earth.  When value outpaces worth, look carefully at the sources of irrational desire.

The blue suit, and worse, the national flag in the lapel.  The walking on the carpet.  Possible mistakes.  Especially odd, as there's a chance the host upended a centuries-old global diplomatic protocol to give him a better seat.  The AI photo...  Well.  Imagine the next head of the church did the same with a threadbare Uncle Sam costume and a banjo.  You get the idea.  

Possible anger at decreased popularity among Catholics after several key appointments in the first term.  But this was clearly (a) a sop to evangelicals; and (b) an attempt to spread an image, like the royalty-based ones, that unconsciously influences a public guided by the constant stream of images on the wires. 

The image of the head of state had a peculiar effect in early modern times.  It created a direct notion of power -- we use the word state as an extension of the physical presence of the sovereign, and this started at around that time.  Although the facts are on point, this isn't like an embarrassing doodle in a royal sketchbook -- this image was AI on two levels -- first, on the technical rendering, but second, more important, a thought placed in people's heads.  For some reason, I remember a newspaper article, many years ago, with an interview with a graffiti artist.  He proudly pointed to his work and said: "See that?  I just made you think that."

Fascinating outcome in the local elections.  Unless I'm missing the story, the narratives in the press are a bit puzzling.  But the prime directive counsels silence for the traveller, so back to the philosophers of a century or two (or three) ago.

 #sundaynightradio #goonshow 

https://www.bbc.co.uk/sounds/play/b007jtqc 

 #dimanchedemarche

 Procedural legitimacy is justified in two dimensions.  The first is that a stable society follows from everyone inhabing their role, or playing within their understanding of the game.  The second, perhaps unique to liberal democracy (or perhaps more general), is that in the determinations of the several roles and the game-playing, a sufficient number of ideas is created to give people an understanding of the event.  There must be sufficient freedom and understanding constituting the exercise of power so that the objects of the power can identify the freedom of the lawgiver with the freedom of the subject.  In a free and equal society, this provides the basis for the lawgiver's freedom.  One must exercise power to preserve sufficient freedom for the exercise of power.

When the ways of thinking about power change, they don't so much augur political change, as make it a logical necessity.  The building falls because the nature of gravity has changed.

To attempt to explain to people that their words mean less to them than these same words used to mean to others would, for obvious reasons, be a fool's errand.  The only remaining task, then, would be to build the eternal forms in the present time, using only the shadows of the tools.

Or at least that's the sort of thing that I might say if I were trying to seem sententious and old-fashioned.

Apparently, the Executive is thinking about revoking the begging license granted to the clerics gathered around Rev. Harvard's old library.  Difficult times for the crimson piping.  Since the academic lawyers defending the Executive appear to be writing from schools with football teams playing with blue uniforms, based entirely on a pseudo-Goethean theory of political colors, my guess is that Old Eli can rest easy.  

L'Etas Unis ne fait pas la guerre contre la science...

 The quintessence of Baudrillard's hyperreality.  Anticipated, perhaps, in the painted reality of the chapel.

 

 All of these countries are very hospitable, both officially and personally, and this country has the added breathing room of being rather firmly in the Western side of the ledger books of the moment.  (Though I see the national swerve of the present executive yesterday had an enormous effect, as the much-anticipated and celebrated visa-free program appears to have been derailed.  This might land more strongly than might be in evidence in the western-facing discourse.  There are countries here in which the citizens likely would never even be allowed to visit London, and there is even one country which prohibits its own citizens from leaving unless they have a sufficient amount of money, in complicance with a treaty agreement with its neighbors. Outside Schengen and the rich West, visas matter.)

The arts are much stronger than in many much wealthier and more-systematized countries.  And the ticket prices for classical music and theatre are almost precisely a tenth of prices in the American cities.  (The American theatre is based on a production model that maintains these high ticket prices; the number of strong professional actors in the cities who are out of work at any given moment exceeds by far the number working--the guild publishes these numbers regularly.)  That said, there are peculiar assymetries.  There are countries in which it is hard to buy a cheap, decent computer, countries where the prices are basically the same as in the West, and there are places where the tarriffs are low enough that you could use the Western websites for supply.  The same obtains for things like cheap jeans, decent shirts, travel sundries, etc.  Some cities keep coffee at a reasonable price, some don't; the more Westernized cities are generally in the latter category--a tall americano in sbux in this city would be (note the subjunctive) twice the cost (>$4) of the cost in the last country.  Objects of irrational desire.  The more Westernized malls are basically desire machines, enormous adveritsing images of beautiful people on video screens, and those in the less Westernized areas more of places of quiet prosperity and rest (play areas for the children, areas set aside for womens' luxury clothing) though there's generally considerably fewer goods on offer, and what is on offer is generally more expensive. 

 From time to time, I catch things in the corner of my eye which serve to remind me that I'm not in Kansas anymore.  (Full disclosure, I can't recall if I've ever actually been in Kansas, and from the news stateside, it's entirely possible that even Kansas isn't Kansas anymore.  Sic transit gloria mundi -- possibly ad astra.)  At any rate, I was walking to the German hypermarket for groceries, when a constabulary car drove past with its siren sounding and lights flashing. Apparently, they were dealing with a fellow at the bus stop who was shouting.  I walked quickly past, but about 15 yards away, past an intersection, I turned to look at the event.  And one of the constables turned and looked at me -- entirely unthreatening, just as much dispassion and curiosity as I suppose I was showing.  Fair enough, I thought, and then walked another 15 yards or so, crossed another street, and then turned to take in the long view.  And the fellow turned again and stood there looking at me--totally neutral, not threatening, just as curious as I was.  I suppose I stick out a bit, clearly a foreign tourist, so perhaps it was just curiosity about the fellow who looked a bit out of place.  Quite a few people about; busy area.

Later that evening I saw the aftermath of a car accident from a distance.  After about 10 minutes, the constabulary arrived, and within a minute or so, the small crowd that had gathered to watch was completely gone.

Anodyne events, nothing objectionable, but it does serve to remind that this is a strange world, perhaps with unpredictable social mores and lessons.  I'll stick to the officers mess (the desk in the rooms is sufficient mess), the coffeehouses, and the balconies of the theatres.