Category Archives: Blogs

WWI Poster about Liberty Bonds

Biden’s 2024 Budget: 5 loaves and two fish

Blogs, ,

Annually, our national leaders repeat the ritual: The President presents a budget, Congress frets over it, after a lot of fretting the budget is adopted, and a couple of trillion dollars are added to the already unsustainable national debt.

Democrat President Joe Biden presented his generous $6.8 trillion spending plan on March 9, 2023. $4.7 trillion in taxes on corporations and high earners is also in the budget. As is a promise to cut deficits by $3 trillion over the next 10 years. Republicans controlling the House of Representatives immediately declared the budget dead on arrival.

Many articles have been written on how this budget would achieve its goal of reducing deficits (the shortfall between revenues and expenditures: $722.6 billion so far this fiscal year). Some have pointed that this budget will not reduce the national debt (the accumulation of years and years of deficits: $31.4 trillion as of 03/16/23).

Here, it will suffice to say that Jesus fed 5,000 people with 5 loaves and two fish (John 6:1-14), and perhaps President Biden truly believes he can accomplish something similar.

Barring miracles, can the U.S. sustain its current debt?

In its Financial Report posted on January 31, 2023, the U.S. Department of the Treasury, Bureau of the Fiscal Service, said the following,

The current fiscal path is unsustainable … The debt-to-GDP ratio was approximately 100 percent at the end of FY 2021, and under current policy and based on this report’s assumptions is projected to reach 701 percent in 2096.

The national debt is the nation’s credit card.

Just like an individual’s credit card, the national debt can avoid immediate full payment of obligations. Also, just like an individual’s creditor (the bank or credit union that issued the credit card), creditors that hold U.S. debt (China, for instance), will not lend indefinitely. At some point, creditors start worrying about losing their money and stop lending.

Credit card companies watch your credit balance in relation to the money you said you make. This will give them an idea whether you can pay down your balance or not. Creditors of the United States do the same. They watch the U.S. national debt as a percentage of the U.S. Gross National Product. By traditional metrics, when the Debt to GDP ratio reaches 77%, its time to worry. The U.S. Debt to GDP at the end of the 4th quarter 2022 was 120%. When there is not enough money in the kitty to pay creditors, “full faith and credit” does not mean much.

How about infrastructure and benefits?

The higher the national debt, the more revenue goes toward paying interest on the debt, and less revenue goes toward infrastructure or benefits like healthcare.

Lowering interest rates makes it easier to pay back debt but will unleash inflation. The current rising interest rates will suck money away from other government expenditures.

Why is it practically impossible to lower the national debt?

Politicians depend on donors and voters to keep their job. Dependence on government largess is widespread, and nobody likes to pay taxes.

The most a President and Congress can do is prepare a complex budget that promises to lower deficits over 8 or 10 years (which means nothing when a new President and new Congress comes into power), raise the debt limit each year, and hope that when the day of reckoning arrives they will be long dead.

Accepted economic theories

The current trajectory of the U.S. national debt could be attributed to Keynesian Economics or to Modern Monetary Theory. However, a more accurate description would be Kicking the Can Down the Road.

Clerics attending signing of Florida's anti-abortion law

Choosing life is admirable, but so is choosing mercy.

Blogs, ,

When an ailment is rare, it is placed way down in everyone’s awareness list – unless the ailment strikes home. That situation has appeared and will continue to appear as a result of the rash of state anti-abortion laws popping up since the overturning of Roe v Wade.

A recent case in the news serves as example. A Florida expectant mother carrying a baby with a rare and fatal abnormality referred to as Potter syndrome, has found herself with no other choice than giving birth then surely burying her dead infant. This tragic scenario comes in the wake of Florida’s new law, “Reducing Fetal and Infant Mortality Act,” HB 5, passed by Florida’s Legislators in 2022 and signed by Governor Ron DeSantis.

Potter syndrome, present in 1 per 2000-5000 births, is considered fatal at or shortly after birth. The U.S. National Library of Medicine describes it as follow,

Potter syndrome is a fatal congenital disorder characterized by the changes in physical appearances of neonate due to oligohydramnios caused by renal agenesis and impairment. It is incompatible with life as neonates with Potter syndrome have pulmonary hypoplasia that leads to respiratory distress within an hour of birth.

In other words, babies with Potter syndrome have abnormal kidneys or no kidneys at all (bilateral renal agenesis), which prevents production of the amniotic fluid that keeps them afloat in their mother’s uterus and helps organs, including lungs, develop. Underdeveloped lungs (pulmonary hypoplasia) mean babies cannot breathe outside the womb and die.

Suspicion of anomalies may arise during a standard first-trimester ultrasound performed around 4-12 weeks of pregnancy. In the case of the Florida mother in question, a standard ultrasound performed at 11 weeks and 6 days did not show any abnormality. Her second-trimester ultrasound (usually, these are high-resolution anatomy scans) at 23 weeks did show lack of amniotic fluid and several abnormalities. A third diagnostic scan at 24 weeks showed the baby had no kidneys, and the diagnosis of Potter syndrome was made.

Although this was a very much wanted baby, the mother, Deborah Dorbert, and her husband Lee Dorbert decided to end the pregnancy, since they were given no hope their baby would survive past a few hours after birth. They thought that although the pregnancy had gone past the 15-week limit imposed by HB 5 – note the heartbreaking diagnosis was done at 24 weeks of pregnancy — the law did provide for an exception in the case of “fatal fetal abnormality.”

However, the Dorbets’ doctors felt they needed to investigate the legal ramifications of HB 5. After doing so, they decided the wording of HB 5 was uncomfortably unclear, and refused to perform the abortion.

Indeed, unclear it is, whether by sloppiness or design. HB 5 says:

(1) … A physician may not perform a termination of pregnancy if the physician determines the gestational age of the fetus is more than 15 weeks, unless one of the following conditions is met …
(c) The fetus has not achieved viability under s. 390.01112 and two physicians certify in writing that, in reasonable medical judgement, the fetus has a fatal fetal abnormality.

Section 390.01112 of the Florida Statutes requires that a physician perform and record exhaustive examinations to determine fetus viability. Should the fetus be viable, the physician must exercise as much care and professional skill as he would delivering a baby not intended for abortion.

Abortion laws like HB 5 are more form than substance.

Laws like HB 5 have the buzzwords – life of the mother, fatal fetal abnormality – but not the intent of finding optimal medical outcomes.

Diagnostic tests that can accurately detect fetal abnormalities are usually done around 18-20 week of pregnancy; HB 5’s prohibits abortion after a fetus’ gestation age of 15 weeks. Such a situation is even more unsound in states that have adopted “heartbeat” laws, with limits around 6 weeks of gestation.

HB 5 requires exhaustive reporting that could prompt physicians to err on the side of not performing a medically necessary abortion: “The physician must document in the pregnant woman’s medical file the physician’s determination and the method, equipment, fetal measurements, and any other information used to determine the viability of the fetus.”

These laws are more Christian evangelical religion than medicine

The U.S. Constitution clearly separates secular laws from religious laws in the First Amendment. Yet, at the signing ceremony of HB 5 into law, Governor DeSantis said, “This will represent the most significant protections for life that have been enacted in this state in a generation.” Several religious leaders attended the ceremony and expressed delight at HB 5 becoming law.

“I see this as the beginning of what is yet to come. It is a step in the right direction..” Leidy Rivas, director of Catholic Charities of Central Florida’s Culture of Life office. April 21, 2022.

Not all religions interpret “life” as Governor DeSantis does, and several religious leaders have filed suit against HB 5.

The Rev. Tom Capo of the Unitarian Universalist Congregation of Miami, whose motion now rests with Florida’s 11th Judicial Circuit, has skillfully pointed out that HB 5 fails “to account for the diverse religious views of many Floridians. . . whose faith leads them to take a very different view of when life begins and to counsel abortion.” New legal challenges to Florida’s abortion law, MSNBC, October 18, 2022.

Respect for life, even unborn life in the view of evangelical Christianity, is admirable. But so is mercy.

Luke 6:36 “Be merciful, even as your Father is merciful.”

Leaving a mother no choice but to give birth to her baby only to bury him is far from merciful.

Song of the South

Who is more racist, Song of the South or Disney?

Blogs,

Disneyland and Disneyworld are dismantling Splash Mountain starting in 2023. Even though renovations continuously take place in the kingdoms with new themes and new technology, the demise of Splash Mountain carries an additional verdict – Splash Mountain is racist. Such verdict is good reminder of psychologist Abraham Maslow’s famous quote, “If the only tool you have is a hammer, it is tempting to treat everything as if it were a nail.”

Maslow used the hammer and nail example to explain the theory of reductionism as it applies to psychology. Complex situations can be overwhelming, so we reduce all the variables into one attribute, then we use an instrument we happen to have at hand to deal with that one attribute. If all we have is a hammer, the complex variables become a nail. If all we have is the word “racism” to describe the African American experience, a lot of things will become “racist.”

Thus, Splash Mountain’s complex history becomes racist

The story behind Splash Mountain is Walt Disney’s Song of the South, a 1946 musical film that combined live action and animation to present an idyllic Reconstruction Period American South and showcase the stories of Uncle Remus.

True, the post-Civil War Reconstruction Period was certainly not idyllic. Freed slaves had little or no education easily conducive to independent living, many plantation owners suddenly found themselves without labor, former slaves that stayed in plantations as sharecroppers were trapped in a new form of servitude.

So, do we succumb to reductionism, label Song of the South racist, and hammer it into oblivion? Or do we endeavor to understand the complexities of life during Reconstruction? Do we accept the film as a work of art that broke some racial ground in its day?

There is a litany of reasons why Song of the South should be remembered

Classic Walt Disney movies like Snow White, Pinocchio, and Sleeping Beauty are well remembered. So should Song of the South. Here are some interesting things about the film.

* Back in 1946, by releasing Song of the South, Walt Disney helped preserve 23 of the 185 Uncle Remus folktales recorded by historian and journalist Joel Chandler Harris.

As a young white newspaper apprentice, Harris lived in a Georgia plantation during the Civil War years of 1862 through 1866. There he heard many folk tales from slaves. Later he created the fictional character Uncle Remus as a vehicle for telling the stories, and in 1880 Harris published his first book, Uncle Remus: His Songs and Sayings, The Folklore of the Old Plantation. The book was a creative and financial success. Songs and Sayings was followed by many other Uncle Remus and Southern story books.

* Today, a 2019 Mcallister Editions The Complete Tales of Uncle Remus, a compilation from eight Harris Chandler books, is available of Amazon (1,768 ratings and 4-1/2 stars) for $12.96. An Appleton and Company 1881 edition of Uncle Remus: His Songs and Sayings can be purchased at Abe Books for $7,500 – $15,000, depending on condition of the book.

Given the availability and popularity of the books upon which Song of the South is based, the discomfort with the movie is difficult to understand. Perhaps it is best assumed that people who purchased and rated these books accepted them as good written art, at the same time understanding the stories’ time and place.

* In 1948 James Baskett was the first African American male actor to win an Oscar of any kind and the first to win for a leading role (Hattie McDaniel won in 1939 for her supporting role of Mammy in Gone with the Wind).

Although Baskett’s Oscar for his role as Uncle Remus in Song of the South was a “Special Award,” an Oscar presented for outstanding work that in the eyes of the Academy does not fit under any of the standard Oscar categories, it was still a significant “first.”

James Baskett’s pioneer work in Song of the South is at the level of other African American film pioneers, like Hattie McDaniel, Sidney Poitier (first Best Actor Oscar, Lilies of the Field, 1963), and Halle Berry (first Best Actress Oscar, Monster’s Ball, 2002).

* Unlike James Baskett, Zip-a-Dee-Doo-Dah, Song of the South’s theme song, did win a “real” Oscar in 1948 for Best Original Song. It’s a happy, beautiful tune worthy of remembrance.

* Replacing or updating theme rides – or any other product – is different from censoring.

The Disney Company has made numerous animated and live-action films since the 1940s, so of course the old needs to make room for the new. Song of the South has not been re-released since 1986 because supposedly it is “racist.” But, let’s look at the last time some other Disney classics were released in U.S. theaters: Snow White 1993, Bambi 1988, Dumbo 1976, and Cinderella 1987.

The American past, good and bad, is part of who we are today. Some of us focus on the good legacies of our human and therefore flawed past. Others focus on the flaws alone, thereby losing all sense of perspective or balance – in essence, seeing what is not there. Here are a coupe of examples.

* The Tar Baby in one of Uncle Remus stories is not a disrespectful representation of a Black baby, but a doll of sticky tar made by Br’er Fox to entrap Br’er Rabbit. Most people figured that out, as evidenced by the usage of “tar baby” as a sticky situation difficult to extricate oneself from.

* The “slaves” in the Joel Chandler Harris stories were no longer slaves, since the stories take place during the post-Civil War Reconstruction period. Although Walt Disney chose not to specify when exactly the stories in Song of the South take place, we can look at when Chandler Harris says they took place. We can also notice that when Miss Sally asks Uncle Remus not to tell any more stories to Johnny (because Johnny is too young and might get confused), Uncle Remus is so sad that he prepares to leave the plantation. Slaves didn’t usually walk away from plantations.

Seeing what is not there is one of the results of reductionisn.

Hopefully, the current practice of reducing complex situations into a matter of race will soon end. Other fads, like hula hoops and pet rocks, did eventually fade away. There’s hope.

Panel of Experts at COP27

Democracy is at risk from climate experts

Blogs, , ,

Three weeks ago, President Joe Biden declared that “in our bones we know democracy is at risk.” He attributed the threat to Trump acolytes “running for every level of office in America.” Well, no mayhem ensued after November 8.

However, a bigger threat that probably few heard of did arise soon after. On November 6, 2022, the world’s elite once again gathered at the 27th annual United Nations Conference of the Parties (COP27). This time, the conference’s focus was on methods by which the 197 participating countries, including the U.S., should implement the ambitious UN-prescribed climate action plan.

And therein lies the threat to U.S. democracy.

Delegates to the COP27 gathering implicitly agreed to accept the prescribed science behind the climate action plan, identify and remove barriers to implementation of the plan, require changes in corporate behavior to advance the plan, and compel changes in investment to finance the plan. Specific examples were given during the conference:

* Climate science is what the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) prescribes based on its research.

* Barriers to implementation of the climate action plan include oil and gas industry lobbying, dominant modes of transportation, and counties without sufficient capital.

* Corporate behavior in need of change include compensation based on production rather than climate action, lack of specific means of accountability for lack of climate action, resistance to a universal repository for listing specific corporate advances in climate action, and the mere existence of fossil fuel industries.

* Investment needs to move away from fossil fuels and into renewable energy. Developed nations need to pay into a fund designed to assist climate action by less developed nations. Financial institutions need to reduce barriers to financing climate action, such as interest rates or development plan characteristics.

Most of the action points above cannot be binding but are implicitly accepted by delegates. The more explicit point is the establishment of a fund to help poorer nations deal with the costs of climate-induced disasters. At COP27, there was agreement to establish the UN Loss and Damage Fund, details of which will be worked out next year.

Why is this seemingly intelligent climate action plan a threat to U.S. democracy?

The COP27, regardless of any sincere and worthy intentions of participants, is nevertheless a body not chosen by or even widely known to U.S. voters. The bedrock of democracy is the vote of the people. Through their vote on candidates and issues, voters express what they want their country to be.

Since the birth of the United Nations, concerned individuals have expressed uneasiness. We the people do not chose the delegates we send to UN conferences, we do not choose the issues the conferences discuss, we do not have any say on what our delegates commit us to do. We can vote on proposals on our ballots but may or may not readily associate them with UN pledges.

Concern in some circles extend even deeper.

A threat to our political structure – call it democracy or representative republic – for the sake of saving us from climate disaster is bad enough. However, a threat disguised as climate action for the sake of ideology is worse.

Here are a couple of interesting excerpts from recent publications:

* The Lew Rockwell blog on November 2, 2022, published a piece by Thomas DiLorenzo that well encapsulates some people’s concern about the relentless talk of climate action. DiLorenzo says,

Years ago my friend the late Murray Weidenbaum, the chairman of President Reagan’s Council of Economic Advisors, told a story of how he had a conversation with Barry Commoner, one of the founding fathers of the modern enviro-commie movement. (I believe they both taught at Washington University in St. Louis). Weidenbaum said to him (paraphrasing from memory): You guys are against oil, natural gas, coal, and nuclear power. Without energy, you cannot have a capitalist market economy.

Commoner’s response was to sit back and smile. Weidenbaum told me that he interpreted Commoner’s expression as saying “exactly right.“

* Greta Thunberg, the high-profile teen climate activist, attended a Southbank Center event to promote her new collection of essays, The Climate Book. During her speech and subsequent interview with journalist Samira Ahmed, Ms. Thunberg stated that it is too late for individual action, and saving the planet now requires system-wide transformation.

We need to change everything because right now our current system is on a collision course with the future of humanity and the future of our civilization.

[the current system is] “defined by colonialism, imperialism, oppression and genocide by the so-called global North to accumulate wealth that still shapes our current world order.

As an aside it is useful to note that Greta Thunberg is aware that changes are unlikely without people’s (supposedly including voters’) demand for such changes. She made that point several times during her interview with Samira Ahmed. Whether COP27 participants were equally cognizant, is not clear.

Additional concerns regarding ideology include a perception of bias.

Bias is an unavoidable feature of the human mind. Sometimes it is unintentional and unperceived, and at times it is intentionally baked into ideologies.

Right-leaning ideologues tend to dismiss the negative impacts of carbon dioxide and/or ignore the association between the rise of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere and the rise of industrialization. Left-leaning ideologues tend to blame climate change for events that could be ascribed to other causes (residential encroachment into fire zones during the last decade as contributors to forest fires, for example), and tend to limit themselves to prescribed remedies.

At present, left-leaning ideologies have the upper hand on matters of climate change.

Left-leaning bias focuses on elimination of fossil fuels. But the plan lacks sufficient focus on the thousands of products derived from fossil fuels. Lots of talk there is about wind turbines, solar panels, and electric vehicles; but not much talk about effectively replacing polyester clothing, PVC pipes, nylon ropes, plastic toys, or small appliance casings.

Also, left-leaning bias ignores the harm derived from disposal of the large energy-storage batteries required in renewable energies and electric vehicles. It is hard to tell percentage of components that are recycled, although some say 5%. The rest is buried and left to sip into soil and waterways.

Left-leaning bias against capitalism and its profit motive fails to acknowledge that government cannot produce capital. People (including those that work or invest in corporations) produce capital from the profits they make. Focusing on climate action instead of profits will reduce capital. That is fine, as long as we all agree that climate action is more important than the standard of living to which some of us have grown accustomed.

Faced with the conundrums listed above, do we simply do nothing?

Doing nothing about the documented acceleration in the level of global warming since the start of the industrial revolution is not a wise choice. However, neither is risking democracy – which we keep claiming is so important to us – for a promise of safety from anticipated climate disasters.

That is not to say that people who are willing to exchange democracy for a promise of safety should be prevented from seeking that option. They must be free to do so if democracy is to be upheld!

Those who prefer democracy need to be free to choose that preference as well, which is not something by which climate activists like Greta Thunberg abide, or which our “official” climate experts want to allow. And, by the way, who are these official experts?

The United Nations Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) was created in 1988 to provide policymakers with regular scientific risk assessment on climate change, formulate options for adaptation and mitigation, and determine the state of knowledge on climate change. In other words, the IPCC is the poo-bah of climate science. Suggest other scientific avenues, and risk accusation of spreading misinformation.

But there should be competition with the IPCC

Elon Musk, who seems to be rapidly catching up with former president Donald Trump as the Left’s most prominent thorn, on February of 2021 funded through his foundation a four-year global competition to award innovators that demonstrate ways to pull carbon dioxide from the atmosphere or oceans and sequester it durably and sustainably. The idea is not only to fund work on carbon sequestration, but also to incite other investors.

It took NASA only 10 years to figure how to put a man on the Moon and safely bring him back to Earth. It has been 57 years since the first climate conference in 1979 (Geneva, February 12-23, 1979), and according to COP27 participants, global warming is still taking place, disasters are increasing, and not much has been put in place to reverse the trend.

COP27 participants and experts are correct in their assertion it is time for structural changes. However, given the UN’s 57-year failure to bend the curve of global warming, perhaps such changes could include giving up on the UN and focusing more on hyping the work NASA has done on carbon conversion and sequestration, and the awards EPA has established for credible sustainable methods of reducing and sequestering carbon.

If U.S. voters wish to help poor regions with mitigation of disasters due to climate change, voters can choose candidates that promise to do so. Primary focus, however, should be on developing cost-effective technology that nations poorer or richer can use if they choose to do so to curb emissions and sequester carbon dioxide already present in the atmosphere.

Pictured: YouTube excerpt of COP27 Recommendations of Expert Group on Net-Zero Commitments of Non-state Entities. Non-state entities include private businesses, agencies and financial institutions. The panel of experts recommended guidelines for explicit, required, equitable and just actions. It also recommended transparency via a central repository where progress could be viewed and evaluated.

Paris Peace Conference

November 11, 1918

Blogs,

On November 11, the United States celebrates Veterans Day. This same day is called Remembrance Day in most of the British Commonwealth. New Zealand, Belgium and Serbia call the day by its original name, Armistice Day. On Veterans Day we honor the men and women who have served in the U.S. armed forces. Prior to 1954, before Congress changed the holiday’s name, we observed on November 11 the end of World War I. Or more specifically, we remembered the horrific carnage that killed 9 million soldiers and wounded 21 million.

We also remembered, or should have remembered, on Armistice Day the questionable excuses for the start of WWI. How did WWI start? There are probably as many answers to that question as there are historians. But here is a likely scenario offered by Dr Heather Jones, associate professor in international history, LSE.

Relatively common before 1914, assassinations of royal figures did not normally result in war. But Austria-Hungary’s military hawks – principal culprits for the conflict – saw the Sarajevo assassination of the Austro-Hungarian Archduke Franz Ferdinand and his wife by a Bosnian Serb as an excuse to conquer and destroy Serbia, an unstable neighbour which sought to expand beyond its borders into Austro-Hungarian territories. Serbia, exhausted by the two Balkan wars of 1912-13 in which it had played a major role, did not want war in 1914.

Broader European war ensued because German political and military figures egged on Austria-Hungary, Germany’s ally, to attack Serbia. This alarmed Russia, Serbia’s supporter, which put its armies on a war footing before all options for peace had been fully exhausted.

Ambitions did not stop with European expansion but extended into the Middle East. In the world of 1914, the Ottoman Empire ruled Arabia, Bedouin leaders wanted self-rule, and European leaders wanted to divide Arab territories among themselves.

Thus, the British offered self rule and control of Syria to Arab leaders, in exchange for their expelling the Ottomans. This arrangement was made in ten letters exchanged from 1915 to 1916 between Hussein bin Ali, Sharif of Mecca and Lieutenant Colonel Sir Henry McMahon, British High Commissioner to Egypt. Sharif Hussein took the letters seriously and defeated the Ottomans in 1918. Events after the end of WWI bring into question whether Lieutenant Colonel McMahon took the letters to heart as well.

At war’s end, nearly 30 nations gathered at the Paris Peace Conference, including a token Arab Delegation, supposedly to iron out terms of peace. However, three of the Big Four – Prime Ministers David Lloyd George of Great Britain, Georges Clemenceau of France, and Vittorio Emanuele Orlando of Italy – had already decided to divide territories in Europe and the Middle East between themselves.

They had already also decided, encouraged by Clemenceau, to dispense ruthless punishment on Germany.

As for the fourth of the Big Four, United States President Woodrow Wilson, who hoped for a new era of cooperation and self-rule, British economist and delegate to the Conference, John Maynard Keynes referred to him as “a blind and deaf Don Quixote.” True, Wilson was slow to understand that attendees of the Paris Peace Conference were not interested in his 14 Points for Peace, or for that matter, apparently not interested in peace at all.

Germany was almost completely disarmed and required to pay reparations on a scale calculated to beggar her population for a generation. She lost 10 per cent of her population, 15 per cent of her agricultural production and 20 per cent of her iron, coal and steel.

Thus, the Weimar Republic, born in 1919 in the throes of German defeat and resentment, gave rise to Adolph Hitler only 14 years later.

In the Middle East, mandates created spheres of influence under which Syria and Lebanon went to the French, and Palestine and three Ottoman provinces of Mesopotamia – transformed into Iraq – went to Great Britain. This arrangement unraveled by the end of WWII. France retreated from Syria and Lebanon in 1946 after uprisings by the local inhabitants. Britain withdrew from Palestine in 1948, after partition and creation of new states of Israel and Jordan.

The British protectorate of Iraq formed after WWI went through an interesting iteration. Concerned about unrest, Britain established a kingdom in Iraq in 1921 and placed Faisal I bin Al-Hussein as King. That strategy calmed the populace a bit and pacified Faisal. Although not welcomed with open arms, King Faisal I proved an effective and unifying leader.

Faisal was the son of the Sharif of Mecca Hussein bin Ali (mentioned earlier), the Hashemite leader who started the Arab Revolt against the Ottoman Empire. Emir Faisal and British Intelligence Officer Thomas Edward Lawrence waged relentless guerilla warfare against the Ottomans, defeating the colonizers in 1918. The Emir was confident Britain would keep its promises, he would be the recognized King of Syria, and soon the Arab-speaking world would be united under his leadership. Since Britain decided otherwise, Faisal had to be content with being King of Iraq, where he ruled until his death in 1933.

At war’s end, T. E. Lawrence was skeptical but hopeful. Sadly, his skepticism proved correct and his hopes futile. A passage from his memoir Seven Pillars of Wisdom, originally published in 1926, perfectly describes his and Emir Faisal’s struggles for naught.

We were fond together because of the sweep of open places, the taste of wide winds, the sunlight, and the hopes in which we worked. The morning freshness of the world-to-be intoxicated us. We were wrought up with ideas inexpressible and vaporous, but to be fought for. We lived many lives in those whirling campaigns, never sparing ourselves: yet when we achieved and the new world dawned, the old men came out again and took our victory to remake in the likeness of the former world they knew. Youth could win, but had not learned to keep, and was pitiably weak against age. We stammered that we had worked for a new heaven and a new earth, and they thanked us kindly and made their peace.

The Treaty of Versailles peace was forged by the old men, as were many other agreements and mandates during and in the wake of WWI. Much of the maladroit world these old men created in their own likeness is still here today.

T. E. Lawrence has another often quoted passage in Seven Pillars of Wisdom:

All men dream: but not equally. Those who dream by night in the dusty recesses of their minds wake up in the day to find it was vanity, but the dreamers of the day are dangerous men, for they may act their dreams with open eyes, to make it possible.

Perhaps this November 11, 2022, Armistice Day of remembrance, might inspire dreamers of the day throughout the world to challenge the bellicose world we have inherited, and ask a fundamental question, is war really necessary?

Pictured: Select delegates to the Paris Peace Conference of 1919

Tulsi Gabbard

No more “cowardly wokeness” for Tulsi Gabbard

Blogs, ,

On October 11, 2022, former Congresswoman Tulsi Gabbard announced she is leaving the Democratic Party. After 20 years in the party, Gabbard said,

I can no longer remain in today’s Democratic Party. It’s now under the complete control of an elitist cabal of warmongers driven by cowardly wokeness, who divide us by racializing every issue and stoking anti-white racism, who actively work to undermine our God-given freedoms enshrined in our Constitution.

Tulsi Gabbard’s exit does not come as a surprise, since she has often and emphatically pointed to the Democratic Party’s devolution. She made her unsurprising announcement during the first podcast of what Gabbard hopes will be The Tulsi Gabbard Show. She also summarized the features of the new Democratic Party that contributed to her decision.

Before the new left brands her “anti-government” or attaches other customary labels used on non-compliant individuals, Tulsi Gabbard reminded viewers of her podcast of the oath she took as a member of the U.S. Army Reserve (with deployments to the Middle East) and as a member of the U.S. Congress (U.S. representative for Hawaii’s 2nd congressional district from 2013 to 2021). The oath to defend the U.S. Constitution is an oath to defend the principles of individual liberty and God-given individual rights.

As Gabbard sees it, the features of the new Democratic Party are diametrically opposed to the principles enshrined in the Constitution, and she vigorously lists those features in her introductory podcast. Here is a brief summary of the most salient points.

* In the Republic the Founders envisioned, the people through their elected representatives governed for the benefit of the people. The new Democrats want a government by the elites for the benefit of the elites.

* The old Democratic Party was the liberal, live and let live party that stood in opposition to the more conservative Republican Party. The new Democratic Party leads the cancel culture, in which fear rules – conformity is accomplished by fear of losing one’s job, fear of our kids not getting into good schools, fear of being cancelled, fear of violence.

* The rule of law is essential to a peaceful society. The new Democratic Party calls for defunding the police, electing progressive District Attorneys, unduly protecting criminals, questioning the legitimacy of courts when they do not rule according to the new Democratic Party principles.

* The Constitution’s original ten Amendments, referred as the Bill of Rights, are intended to protect the people from government’s restrictions on speech, religion, self-defense, and assembly. It also protects people’s private property and personal affairs. Leaders of the new Democratic Party are comfortable calling for the abridgement of these rights. Prime example is President Joe Biden’s attempt to establish a Disinformation Governing Board. Another is Democrat-supported credit card tracking of purchases at gun shops.

* Title IX of the Civil Rights Act was signed into law on June 23, 1972. The purpose of this act was to give women equal opportunities to those of men in the fields of education and sports. The Biden Administration proposes changing Title IX’s aim from prohibiting sex discrimination to prohibiting gender identity discrimination. If passed, this proposal will settle current controversies. Whether women showering or competing in sports with biological males will benefit from this change in Tittle IX depends on one’s ideology – certainly not on objective truths.

* The denial of the existence of objective truth removes boundaries. Truth becomes whatever those in power say it is.

At the end of her podcast, Tulsi Gabbard suggests that those who are opposed to the ills she listed and opposed to government by and for the elites, act by leaving the Democratic Party.

Party knows no impulse but spirit, no prize but victory. It is blind to truth, and hardened against conviction. It seeks to justify error by perseverance, and denies to its own mind the operation of its own judgment. Thomas Paine, The Opposers of the Bank, 1787.

Perhaps it is better to vote for candidates who understand the value of the legacies of our Founders as well as the Founders’ shortcomings, than vote the Party line.

Elizabeth II

Elizabeth II leaves very big shoes to fill

Blogs

Elizabeth Windsor, better known to the world as Elizabeth II or Queen Elizabeth, died on September 8, 2022, at 96 years of age. Her eldest son Charles, 73, ascended the British throne as King Charles III. Elizabeth II leaves very, very big shoes to fill.

Elizabeth II was the longest reigning British monarch, becoming queen at only 25 years of age in 1952. Thus the 96 year old queen the world lost today had an opportunity to build an exemplary track record as a true stateswoman, as a pillar of stability and service.

She led by example, the highest form of leadership. This virtue she learned from her parents, Duke and Duchess of York, later King George VI and Queen Elizabeth (the Queen Mother).

During WWII, the young Elizabeth and her sister Margaret remained in Britain, instead being sent to Canada or other safer parts of the British Commonwealth. The King and Queen remained at Buckingham Palace, even as Germany bombed London. They often visited neighborhoods destroyed in the bombings. At age 19 Elizabeth joined the Auxiliary Territorial Service, a women’s branch of the British army, and trained as a driver and mechanic.

If anyone kept calm and carried on through turbulence since the Cold War, it was Elizabeth II. She met often with world heads of state, and regularly with her Prime Ministers. She missed only three Openings of Parliament during her long reign, two due to pregnancy and one at the end of her life. The respect she commanded, has been key to keeping the British Commonwealth intact.

King Charles III is now tasked with rising to the occasion. Hopefully, his grandparents and parents’ example of service to the people will guide his path.

Pictured: Princess Elizabeth (in uniform), Queen Elizabeth, Prime Minister Winston Churchill, King George VI, and Princess Margaret, in the balcony of Buckingham Palace at the end of WWII.

Biden addresses nation on Sep 1

Biden’s strange soul of nation speech

Blogs, ,

President Joe Biden delivered his fight for soul of the nation address on Thursday, September 1. The main networks did not carry the address. Republican leader Rep. Kevin McCarty (R CA) taped a very brief response before President Biden gave his speech. Googling for other responses yields little at present.

Maybe people’s preoccupation with soaring prices, their kids’ unfruitful education, crime in the streets, porous borders, and other mundane challenges detracts from rhetorical talk of souls.

President Biden tried hard to change the focus from the mess this country is in to a vision of a future where prosperity, peace of mind, and unity will reign. Abundance of riches, goodness, and harmony will come, apparently, when MAGA extremists, who ignore the Constitution, the rule of law, free and fair elections, and democracy go away.

In all fairness, this nation’s predicaments are not all President Biden’s fault. The national debt and its attendant evils have been growing since President Bill Clinton’s days, the mass of unskilled workers unable to make ends meet has been around since education collapsed and the robber barons of monopolies sucked up the nation’s wealth, divisiveness and name calling has been almost fashionable for a while now. But, the present administration policies, like the Inflation Reduction Act that won’t make a dent on inflation, have not helped.

And in equal fairness, debacles like January 6, when Trump supporters got themselves lumped in with violent unlawful trespassers, feed into the view that MAGA folks are extremists. Hecklers outside Independence Hall shouting “Let’s go Brandon” and “F—Joe Biden” while the President was giving his “soul of democracy” speech were fodder for the President’s calm response: “They’re entitled to be outrageous. This is a democracy.” “… good manners is nothing they’ve ever suffered from.”

So, will a repetitious 24-minute speech touting a nebulous vision of an even more nebulous democracy turn the tide of Republican’s expectation to flip the House and Senate in coming elections? Probably not. But the expected drumbeat of anti-MAGA vitriol in the coming months might.

By the way, one is to assume that the “democracy” to which President Joe Biden referred in his speech is not the same “democracy” that these folks describe:

Republics decline into democracies and democracies degenerate into despotisms. Aristotle – Greek philosopher during the Classical period of ancient Greece.

Democracy is the road to socialism. Karl Marx – German philosopher, critic of political economy, and socialist revolutionary.

Democracy is four wolves and a lamb voting on what to have for lunch. Ambrose Bierce short story writer, journalist, poet, and American Civil War veteran.

Jigsaw puzzle

Google’s Prebunking: Eyes that never close

Blogs, ,

Google has come up with a potent antidote to conspiracy theories, misinformation, and misleading statements. Yes, even more potent than ubiquitous algorithms unleashed upon poor souls who do not understand the need to conform and stay in one’s place.

The new fakery fighters are short videos, akin to public service ads, intended to inoculate (Google’s word) Internet users against various forms or fakery. These videos, now being tested in Eastern Europe, were developed by Jigsaw, a unit within Google that “explores threats to open societies, and builds technology that inspires scalable solutions.” Jigsaw calls the inoculation approach by the clever name of “prebunking.” Debunking occurs after a particular claim is made. Prebunking works to counter any and all falsehoods continuously.

Now, the videos are actually very useful at teaching basic critical thinking. They illustrate methods commonly used by fakes, like emotional language, scapegoating, and false dichotomies. Jigsaw’s objectives as delineated in its website have value: counter disinformation, toxicity, censorship, and violent extremism. No one wants to fall victim of a targeted well-organized disinformation campaign, or experience incivility in a toxic environment, or heavens forbid be prevented from expressing one’s ideas.

So enter prebunking. What could go wrong?

* It is difficult to imagine the existence of an untargeted ad. Should Facebook, for example, purchase a set of prebunking videos, one would imagine such videos might be placed in the vicinity of a targeted post. This would be a distraction from the information on the post. Google uses a similar approach with its Redirect Method.

Redirect Method placed ads next to search results for terms indicating interest in potentially harmful content, including queries related to joining extremist groups.

* The sample prebunking videos available on the Internet provide general information and look harmless per se. But some sneak in quick unobtrusive preaching. The friendly voice explaining “ad hominem” says sometimes attacking individuals as well as their claims is OK, such as in the case of cigarette manufacturers that claimed their product was safe. One would wonder what other preaching will show up in future examples.

* Although facilitating change to make the world better is a commendable endeavor, some pronouncements can be unnerving, like the title of Jigsaw’s “Issues” page: “Creating future‑defining technology.”

Technology has become our source of knowledge, avenue for social interaction, livelihood for work-from-home bread winners, and prolific provider of convenience gadgets. Whatever future technology decides to create, we will all be in it. We might only see what technology wants us to see – the rest will be relegated to the dustbin of misinformation.

* Clever workers and entrepreneurs that create remarkable systems are not the only source of technology’s power. There is also power that comes from corporatism. Corporatism is perhaps the most worrisome characteristic of gatekeeping tools like prebunking. Here is why.

Corporatism is today’s popular public-private partnership. Large corporations, non-profits, and government agencies mention their public-private partnerships with pride. Corporatism is called “stakeholder capitalism” in polite society; however, critics like Vivek Ramaswamy, author of Woke Inc., argue that corporatism, social capitalism, and stakeholder capitalism are all one and the same. Regardless of wording, it is a collectivist political and economic ideology intended to benefit government and corporations through shared power.

Teddy Roosevelt when campaigning for President in August 1912 spoke in general and hyperbolic terms about public-private alliances. When in office, he did not just talk about the subject, he did break up the big cartels of his day. His words:

Behind the ostensible government sits enthroned an invisible government owing no allegiance and acknowledging no responsibility to the people. To destroy this invisible government, to dissolve the unholy alliance between corrupt business and corrupt politics, is the first task of the statesmanship of the day. Theodore Roosevelt, His Life and Times, Library of Congress

Not all corporations are corrupt. But partners in the unholy alliance share not only power but also agenda, making them a questionable choice for gatekeepers of the public knowledge.

* Monopolies in advertising media, principally enabled by corporatism and armed with tools like “fact checking” and prebunking, can easily cripple any endeavor. Here is an example:

Hillsdale College, a private liberal arts college in Michigan founded in 1844, posted an ad on Facebook promoting its lecture series The Great Reset. Guest speakers in the series explain the origin and objectives of The Great Reset. They describe The Great Reset as an incubator of corporatism that encourages adoption of controlling tools like universal electronic payment systems (cashless societies) and elimination of private property (you will own nothing).

Facebook labeled the post “False Information.”

It should come to anyone’s mind that the First Amendment to the U.S. Constitution prevents the U.S. government from censoring Hillsdale’s ad. But it does not prevent a private entity like Facebook from doing so, limiting the ability of Hillsdale to share inconvenient opinions about The Great Reset.

Cute prebunking videos targeting any ad would have been equally effective.

Although the purpose of Jigsaw is not directly to shut people up, it would not be unreasonable to surmise that anyone who does not follow whatever prescribed agenda Google/Jigsaw need to follow would be served with a cute audience-distracting video.

Civil Rights march in Selma, Alabama

1619 Project: any equity yet?

Blogs, ,

When works with some merit are too forcefully publicized, they become hysterical rhetoric that require a set of illusory truths repeated ad infinitum. At that point they attract critics bent on stripping those works of all value. A good example of this phenomenon is The 1619 Project.

New York Times journalist Nikole Hannah-Jones assembled essays on America’s history and named the collection The 1619 Project, which was published by The New York Times in 2019 with great fanfare. The name refers to the year the first shipload of Black slaves landed in America.

According to the project, this seminal event in 1619 forever imprinted racism in the American psyche, causing foundational and expansion episodes to carry slavery’s imprint to this day. The project in its original publication contended that 1619 must be considered America’s founding date, not 1776.

Praises and Disdain

Immediately after its publication, The 1619 Project received accolades from liberals and searing criticism from conservatives. In 2020, Nikole Hannah-Jones received a Pulitzer Prize for her work. She also received denunciations of circulating junk history.

The great tragedy of the original 1619 Project was its missed opportunity to add detail, nuance, and reflection to our historical understanding of slavery and its legacy. That opportunity was lost not upon publication but in the aftermath, when The New York Times met its scholarly critics with insult and derision. The ensuing controversies, initially confined to Hannah-Jones’ and Desmond’s essays, came to overshadow the remainder of the project, including its other historical contributions as well as its literary and artistic sections. The 1619 Project Unrepentantly Pushes Junk History, Reason, March 29, 2022

The principal purpose of The 1619 Project is not to inform but to agitate and entice action. Hannah-Jones wants to see acknowledgement of the persistent consequences of slavery and the ubiquitous nature of racism, present in the judicial system, housing, employment, education, and all other institutions. Her premise is that without that acknowledgement, society cannot begin to erase the negative effects of prejudice. In this regard, her premise aligns with the principles of Critical Race Theory.

Action is often best achieved with focus, flexible statements, relentless publicity, and fascinating storytelling. Lest The New York Times version of the project starts losing media space, Hannah-Jones expanded it into a book, The 1619 Project: A New Origin Story, and a school curriculum, Reading Guide for The 1619 Project Essays.

Measures of early action enticed by The 1619 Project could be the level of sales of the book, how many school districts adopted the curriculum, and the backlash. The book is an Amazon best seller. The number of school districts that adopted the curriculum does not seem to be available; there are only article, mostly published in 2020, saying that “4,500 classrooms” are using the curriculum. As of February 2022, 38 states have introduced or passed legislation banning the teaching of race-based curricula.

Illusory Truths

Possibly because of its dependence on illusory truths and storytelling, the Project is an easy target for criticism and dismissal. Here are three of the Project’s most salient, most often repeated, assertions and the JVN Blog’s opinion of how these assertions missed opportunities to enrich American history.

  • The American Revolution was fought over slavery

Traditional history does not fully discuss the crucial role slavery played in colonial economy, principally in the Southern plantations, but also Northern commerce. A deeper discussion would serve better to understand the words of the Declaration of Independence, the Civil War, Reconstruction, and government-sponsored segregation.

However, other reasons for the Revolution abound: British soldiers quartered in America starting in 1763. Devastating taxation and regulation in 1765. The Boston Massacre in 1770. The long list of other grievances listed on the Declaration of Independence.

Also, the British were the middlemen who exported slaves to America. Calls for abolishing slavery in Britain did not occur until 1780, five years after the Revolutionary War began.

  • The Second Amendment to the Constitution was placed there to allow White men to defend themselves against Black slaves.

Indeed, history needs to speak more about slaves’ discontent and frequent rebellion, which no doubt caused White apprehension.

History also needs to be clear that the ten original Amendments that make up the Bill of Rights were the result of the Founders’ mistrust of a central government and particularly government’s standing armies. Those Amendments, including the Second, were intended to protect the People against government, not against each other.

What, Sir, is the use of a militia? It is to prevent the establishment of a standing army, the bane of liberty …. Whenever Governments mean to invade the rights and liberties of the people, they always attempt to destroy the militia, in order to raise an army upon their ruins. Rep. Elbridge Gerry of Massachusetts, Annals of Congress 750, August 17, 1789.

  • Slavery and racism were, and still are, root causes of unjust social, judicial, and educational systems.

There are events that could be better understood with more honest discussions of their relation to racism. For example, during the 1930s through the 1950s, the Federal Housing Administration guaranteed most private mortgages that helped build America’s suburbs. Only 2% of those mortgages went to non-white applicants. The FHA encouraged covenants that kept suburban neighborhoods “harmonious.”

Areas surrounding a location are investigated to determine whether incompatible racial and social groups are present, for the purpose of making a prediction regarding the probability of the location being invaded by such groups. If a neighborhood is to retain stability, it is necessary that properties shall continue to be occupied by the same social and racial classes. Federal Housing Administration 1936:233.

It is not difficult to determine what social and racial class was preferred when we consider what the American suburbs of the 1950s looked like.

Civil rights legislation of the 1960s removed housing discrimination, and many Black families did resettle to prosperous suburbs. But poverty kept more in the inner cities.

Poor Black neighborhoods share key characteristics that ensure poverty: Children living in one-parent families (64% vs. 24% of White children). Incarceration (in state prisons 5 times the rate of White incarceration). Gun violence, that results in high, mostly Black-on-Black, violent crime.

These self-inflicted wounds keep poor Black families poor and deluded by the cruel lie of victimhood.

Meanwhile, Black individuals and families that refuse to cling to victimhood prosper: Harriett Tubman, Frederick Douglass, Candace Owens, Clarence Thomas, the countless number of Black families who insist on discipline and have achieved economic well being.

Yes, slavery, government-sponsored segregation, and prejudice are the despicable triumvirate that shares a place in America’s identity. But they need not be the determining variables in anyone’s life. They need not be the relentless distraction from purposeful endeavors that Nikole Hannah-Jones and her fellow Critical Race Theorists want them to be.

A Great Experiment Goes Unnoticed

The 1619 Project’s plea to face history honestly makes sense, since nothing can be learned from an embellished version that ignores mistakes to be avoided. However, The Project’s version, stripped of understanding, has caused it to be dismissed in its entirely. Good understanding of history should include these three principles:

  • History is incremental. People develop knowledge of themselves and the world around them in bits and pieces.

Earth was once the center of the universe, until it was not. Slavery was once a fact of life going back to ancient times, until it was not.

  • America’s Declaration of Independence laid down a new concept of the rights to life, liberty, and pursuit of happiness: these rights are not granted by government, but by The Creator.

At the time the Declaration was written, the Founding Fathers’ attitude toward slavery and an economy dependent on slavery was evolving. As Hannah-Jones herself pointed out Thomas Jefferson included in the Declaration a passage condemning slavery, but the passage was removed prior to ratification. One would have to speculate that the Founders must have figured that if they were to have a country at all, they could not obliterate their economy by suddenly freeing the slaves.

  • America’s Constitution laid down a never-before tried system of government 1) of rule by the people through the peoples’ representatives in Congress, 2) of enumerated powers in the Articles clearly indicating what each of the three branches of government does, and 3) of restrictions in the first 10 Amendments indicating what government cannot do.

In other words, the Founders wrote the American Constitution as an experiment in self-government, something never before attempted. It turned the idea of government held since time immemorial on its head. Under this Constitution, government works for the people, not the other way around. That means the People, through their representatives, can change (amend) any part of that document if they so choose.

Baby Gone With the Bathwater

In conclusion, The 1619 Project throws away the baby with the bathwater. That is unfortunate. However, if the Project’s intent, along with that of brethren Critical Race Theory, is to agitate, distract, and solidify Black adherence to progressive politics, then rational thinking does not matter.