"What if capitalism is unsustainable, and socialism is impossible? We're fucked, that's what." – "The Falling Rate of Profit, Red Hordes and Green Sl… - Ken MacLeod

I take small interest in politics, he said. "The subject repels me."

It had long been established in the Civil Worlds that public business was to be transparent, and personal business opaque; but it was as well recognised that the two would always have a turbulent interface, and that the clique, the caucus, and the conspiracy were as ineradicable features of civility as the council or the committee.

Of all the sciences, astronomy was the one the superstitious liked least.