The Second Law of Thermodynamics

The headlines today are glum. Kim Jong-un and Putin are meeting and Trump’s approval ratings continue to rise. Abortion rights will hurt the Republicans but what's to stop the autocratic juggernaut? Putin and Kim are a match made in heaven. North Korea desperately needs cash on the face of international sanctions. Needless to say Russia needs arms. You might say the balance of power will be maintained to no good effect since before it was leaning towards the West. It’s hard to fathom how the isolationism advocated by the right justifies itself. Chamberlain's famous “I have returned from Germany with peace for our time" appeasement speech is long forgotten. You even hear a smattering of reticence about the war effort amongst pacifists on the left. How history creates strange bedfellows! Hope springs eternal, though Putin’s desire for Imperial Russia will never be satisfied by one annexation anymore than a hungry lion would turn down a second feeding of meat. Cassandra like prophesies notwithstanding the world will sputter on with delusory periods of peace and prosperity—as if it were honing to the Second Law of Thermodynamics--"as one goes on in time the net entropy of any open or closed system will increase."

listen to "Dance With Me"by Peter Brown

read the latest review of The Kafka Studies Department by Francis Levy in Booklife