Monday, April 30, 2012


Outer Limits Trading Cards are pretty great, and the very brief captions make the pictures even better.
And here is an interview with the circa 1964 editor of Topps who was responsible for releasing them.

Thursday, April 19, 2012

Paul Gravett interviews R. Crumb
It was only later that I discovered bit by bit first the world of old-time illustration, I am very interested in that. And only fringely interested in most fine art. I got to liking those German guys like Dix and Grosz and I liked Salvador DalĂ­ and other surrealist stuff like that. I like a lot of Outsider Art, primitive and strange stuff by crazy people. The thing about the fine art world is they have this pyramid, this hierarchy, and it’s very rigid. It’s breaking down a little bit but it’s according to how much money you can get for something. I don’t buy into that. I had zero interest in abstract expressionism, starting with the post-war American artists.
A Nation of Spoiled Brats (Foreign Policy Review)
Well, there are two types of decline. The first is relative economic decline, and I think this should be uncontroversial. Funnily enough, it isn't yet fully uncontroversial, but it should be: namely, that America's share of the global economy is diluting. In 2000, America had about 31 percent of the global economy, so just under a third. And by 2010 it was down to 23.5 percent, just under a quarter. That is a remarkable shift. So relative economic decline shouldn't be something we debate too much because it's happening and it's going to continue to happen. And I think the U.S. share would be likely to fall to a little more than a sixth in the next decade or so, unless there are dramatic changes in the pattern and distribution of global growth.

Wednesday, April 18, 2012

The US standard of Living has fallen more than 50% since 40 years ago. (the street)
"On several occasions, I have glibly referred to how it now takes two spouses working to equal the wages of a one-income family of 40 years ago. Unfortunately, that is now an understatement. In fact, Western wages have plummeted so low that a two-income family is now (on average) 15% poorer than a one-income family of 40 years ago."
World population density visualizer

Sunday, April 01, 2012

Great talk on Mutilated Urbanism by James Kunstler