Many moons ago, when I came back to Malta after some years abroad, I discovered that among the shakers and movers of the country and its economic enterprises, the demand was growing for people who understood what was going on in the world at large and how best to run government departments and private firms. The view was strongly held that economists - that is people who had studied and comprehended how economies work - needed to be given greater recognition and a greater say in decision-making. Actually the belief seemed to be that the people best suited to run the "new" enterprises that the country needed to set up, were economists.
I used to consider this a rather curious viewpoint, for I used to think - and was trained to think - that economists specialise in the wide factors that affect national life: inflation, economic growth, taxation, incentives and subsidies, exchange rates. On the other hand, managers of enterprises and government departments although having a wide economic knowledge, needed to be trained in the aspects of enterprise management - like organizational behaviour, management control, marketing.
Today, what is called management has been given ever greater recongition, even if superficially at times. Still though it has changed, the old mentality is still alive among us.
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TRUMP 3
The rumours about how Donald Trump should candidate himself for the US Presidency and become President for a third time have not died down, even if the American constitution expressly prohibits a person from becoming President for three terms. So one way how this could be done would be for Trump to stand as vice President with a person standing for President who would be totally compliant with all that Trump would decide for him. Some are making this suggestion.
Indeed, it has already been adopted elsewhere. Russian President Putin when having to face a similar constitutional rule, arranged with a "friend" for both to work in tandem on this basis. The stratagem paid off, meaning that Putin spent a term as "shadow" President and when the time for another presidential election came up, he again stood for President in his own name - something allowed by the Russian constition - and he was elected again.
A rather strange convergence seems to be emerging between the political practices of Russia and the US.
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LONG TEXTS
Less and less people are interested in reading longish texts. Everything has to be laid out in short. This means that in literature for instance, classical novels of top value - like the texts of Dostoievski and Tolstoy - are being read less and less. Even students of literature find that they need too much commitment and time to be read through, never mind other people...
There always existed a demand for "short" reading material. For many decades, a most popular magazine was "Reader's Digest", which only featured shortened reports and literary texts. Today, even its articles are considered too long. Acceptable texts should be measured by the length of the items featured on X and other electronic platforms.
No doubt this development has rendered the social and cultural life of people rather arid.