[WITI No. 79]What are your intersecting skill sets? Predicting the end of Canada, not smarter than a high schooler, all anyone needs is a hug sometimes
Hallo mein lieblingsleser! (my favorite readers) Welcome to edition No. 79 of What is the Information? The weekly newsletter where I share with you what I’m reading and thinking about this week. Usually, I’m writing about books I’m reading or other writing I’ve encountered online. I’ll also include a word I had to look up and something fun or interesting from my internet tubes.
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A real-life example of a Personal Monopoly
I first encountered the term “personal monopoly” when I took the Write of Passage course. It’s the course that started me on this journey of online writing - and caused me to be writing this newsletter - for 1.5 years now. I don’t think I’ve found my personal monopoly, my sliver of internet real estate where I can get people to pay a toll - not yet anyway.
The quote below is about another who found a real-life personal monopoly. The lesson here is that following your fascination and getting good at other stuff can qualify you (and only you) for once-in-a-lifetime work.
Claudio von Planta was a pain up until now. But he is an experienced cameraman, who also knows how to direct documentaries and can ride a motorcycle off-roads while additionally knows how to handle dangerous situations, because he used to be a war correspondent.
ALSO
AND
ADDITIONALLY
The three words that got Claudio the job, are also the ones that ensure that he keeps his job. There simply is nobody else with this combination of abilities.
https://www.immigrantspirit.com/ewan-mcgregor-makes-a-tough-choice/
I inhaled (via Audible) The Accidental Superpower by Peter Zeihan. While much of the material is similar to the explanations from his most recent book, The End of the World is the Beginning. Zeihan explains geopolitics, depopulation and world history in a way that is easy to comprehend.
He explains how Quebec basically extorted Ottawa (the capital of Canada) with secession. The Canadian Supreme Court formalized a process for secession. Ottawa offered Quebec a large bag of money to stay in Canada but that money is supplied by the productive provinces: Alberta and Ontario. Alberta is the Canadian province that is similar to the US in three important ways:
They have a vibrant petrochemical industry that pays above average wages
The petrochemical industry attracts young people who want to want to work and earn.
Alberta has productive farmland but because Canada is landlocked it cannot compete with the surplus grain the US produces.
Zeihan posits that the day may come when Albertans are tired of sending an ever larger chunk of their income to support Quebec. As of 2014, the figure was estimated to be $6,000 per Albertan resident. By 2030, that figure could be as high $20,000. If that happens, Alberta could not survive as separate nation but could be a valuable US territory/state if it were annexed by the US.
It would be self-sufficient with energy and food production. In the American system, the extra grain produced would be sold as American grain. This scenario would be the end of Canada - the annexation would cut the country in half, there are no roads that connect east and west Canada in the ultra rural Northern Territory. Ontario would look to be absorbed by the US as well since most trade is focused across the great lakes.
Word of the week - Banal
My son’s vocabulary is on overdrive as he starts his AP English class. He’s constantly testing my own vocabulary - and I am found lacking. I have an idea of what a word means and can likely suss it out - decoding from context. Since he hasn’t read as much as me, he hasn’t developed that skill yet.
I always think of this word as used in the Hannah Arendt’s essay, Eichmann in Jerusalem, Essay on the Banality of Evil. As my son quizzed me, my definition was closer to futile or pointless, but that would likely be tough to guess on a multiple choice test.
Find of the week
This clip is related to war in Ukraine. Zeihan predicted that Russia would invade Ukraine in 2021 in The Accidental Superpower. This is a very short video of a chimp that gets displaced due to the war.
No intersecting skills, just a super-power? Old Jiko (from The Tale for a Time Being by Ruth Ozeki) had suupaa-paa-wa. Just now realizing that 70 years of world peace is an historical anomaly? Wish someone had a hug and raincoat for you? Let me know here:
Would you share this modest publication with a friend, colleague or a neighbor ?
Not sure these words can be a hug but they might electrify some conversation!
Thanks for reading!
-George