Category Archives: Society
Problems with technology and other idiocy.
Fathers Day
Celebrating the man who shaped myself and my siblings in so many, many ways. Here, I post a photo that I didn’t know existed until my niece sent it to me. I had never seem my father on a horse.
My mother rode I knew and got all of us to at least try it. I rode until allergies sent me to the tennis courts. But my father? So here he is on my mother’s favorite mare for all posterity. Do they celebrate in heaven? I hope so.
Where to?
Way back in 2016, before the election, I said something about American’s Common Sense. Somewhere between 2008 and 2016, we lost it, or at least, enough of us lost it to make Trump our President. Since then fear, anxiety and sadness battle for the front of my brain. The latest disaster in Quebec just makes things worse.
We have a madman for President who has turned on our closest friends with a viciousness that’s hard to endure. Trudeau didn’t deserve his Twitter lashing.
I worry about my sons and their families. What will be left of the United States when Trump finally leaves office? Will he give us away to Putin or China or even to Kim because of ignorance or fear or both? If he loses the next mational election, will he accept the results or say he was cheated and it was rigged? What then? How do we remove a President when Congress refuses to do its job? Whatever happened to the spines of those members who cower and refuse to see the destruction of our Rule of Law smacking them in the face?
If Trump can be cruel and vicious toward seekers of asylum and Prime Ministers both, it’s only a short step to cruelty and viciousness toward all of us. The memories of the rise of Hitler have grown too faded. There aren’t enough of us left who grew up dudring WWII and saw and heard all that was awful to sound the warning.
This is inexcusable:
It constitutes “cruel and unusual punishment” which I thought somehow was illegal. (See Ammendment 8 to the US Constitution.) How many of those babies is Sessions going to traumatize with his cruel and unusual “solution” to our immigration problems? The last count I saw was near 2,000 children forcibly separated from their parents. Tyranny has indeed reached American shores.
The North Korea Summit: Could it be that Trump did this made-for-TV-event to boost his approval ratings ahead of the November elections? Since it’s hard to see that anything was actually accomplished in the way of nuclear reductions or eliminations on the part of the North Koreans and they are now talking of promises of sanctions reductions, it looks like it might be a typical Trumpian short-term “deal” that does little but generate a small bit good publicity for him and a freebee for the other party. Speaking of “nothing burgers”!
On the Justice Department IG’s report: The lesson to be taken, in my small point of view is that people in civil service and government in general need to get a lot smarter about their use of email and text messaging. Rule No. 1: Don’t ever use private email for government communication. Rule No. 2: Don’t ever use your government issued phone to text personal messages to colleagues and friends. They will come back to haunt you and be used by your enemies to destroy your reputation if not your job prospects.
Republican selfish cruelty
It takes ones breath away. If what they did in the House ever becomes the law of the land, they will have much to reckon with. The crowd outside the House had it right with its “Shame, shame shame!” Democrats inside singing should also be shamed. It was not a party victory or defeat. It was a victory for the rich and infamous who have thoughts only for themselves and their wallets. Amazing that some can still call themselves “Christians”.
Let’s face it, anything Barack Obama did as President is anathema to those now in power because he is black. The hatred underpinning the latest Congressional and Presidential actions is barefaced and appalling. It’s even likely to bring on a backlash that will change the make up of the House of Representatives if the Democrats don’t throw away their advantage in their glee at opponent’s seemingly fatal mistakes. It’s much too soon to crow. There is still real danger that this white-men-supremacist measure could become law.
If anyone out there still reads, check this article in today’s Washington Post, and then take a good long look at all of those smug, self-satisfied faces in the Rose Garden as they celebrate taking away health care from those in society who need it most. This is America? Isn’t it time for the USA to join the rest of the civilized world and provide basic government healthcare for everyone?
(AP Photo/Evan Vucci)
Those guys turn my stomach.
How many people are aware that the Trump administration has been doing its best to pick apart the ACA even before the “replacement” by cutting funds for pass through payments to insurance companies and doctoring the healthcare.gov website just so they could say it was failing? All that for white supremacy?
If Peter Suderman is correct that this is not a health care bill at all, but a bald effort to cut taxes for the wealthy, then the House Republicans may well have snookered the “Deal Maker” himself (as well as the rest of us) since Trump apparently has little knowledge of what is actually in the bill.
Trump’s continued ignorance about the policy details should worry House Republicans, who are being pressured by the president and his team to support deeply unpopular legislation that the president doesn’t himself understand. (That problem will be compounded and repeated if the bill eventually manages to clear the House, because the Senate is all but certain to significantly alter the legislation, and because those alterations are likely to shatter whatever fragile consensus may exist in the House.)
In a way, Trump’s inability to understand the bill means that he cannot really be said to support it, or at least that his support is far from stable. Privately, Trump has questioned whether or not the bill is worthwhile. During the initial push to pass the bill, Trump sometimes expressed his anxiety about the bill’s merits, according to The Washington Post. He did not possess sufficient understanding of its particular to judge its quality for himself, so he repeatedly asked his aides, “Is this really a good bill?” If you have to ask, the answer is probably no.
My take on the latest uproar
The brat (my word) in the Whitehouse has decided that we need to be “protected” from terrorists native to countries that have never perpetrated a mass attack on anyone in the US. His ban on those from 7 countries in the Middle East and Africa (Iraq, Syria, Iran, Sudan, Libya, Somalia and Yemen) is the first step to a complete ban on all Muslims (unconstitutional). Just give him time. Along the way, he sows disrespect for our justice system on Twitter by attacking judges whose opinions or decisions cross him.
The Donald is always right, never wrong about anything he on which chooses to have an opinion. If only he had some real knowledge to back up those tweets! What does he know about those countries, their histories, their cultures? Does he really think that because a person is a Muslim, that person is “bad”? Does he understand that no one in the US has been killed by any person from those 7 countries?
More twitter tantrum on judge Robart’s original decision:
“Ridiculous” to try to protect the separation of Powers outlined in the Constitution? And why is Trump having fearful nightmares about “bad people” who do not, in fact, pose a threat? Women and children threatening? Our “President” has a bad case of paranoia based on little but scare mongering pushed by Breitbart, Fox News, and the Drudge Report. We do not make America GREAT by showing the extent of our fears to the world, and lashing out against anyone who disagrees with the man a few of us elected to the Presidency.
ETHICS?
What ethics? Trump’s “newsconference” proves, as if there were any doubt, that he has no idea of ethics. He’s the spoiled child who insists on having his cake and eating it too, both the Presidency and his business, all for the glory of Trump, and to the sorrow of all those Americans who thought he would be their savior. Seems to me that he would rather have his business than be President, and it may possibly happen that he will get his choice. How long will Americans put up with the kind of childish behavior he showed on Wednesday – piles of papers so we’d see how impossibly complicated divestiture would be for him, a baseless attack on a CNN reporter, and an imported audience of employees who cheered and applauded like those at his rallies. Not all of us are stupid enough to be fooled.
It wouldn’t hurt to remember the history lessons we once knew about state sponsored propaganda and the kinds of skepticism needed when approaching performances like Trump’s Wednesday news conference. I wonder if it will be as easy or easier even to stage such performances once in the Whitehouse. Common sense says we’d best be on our guard against manipulation by TV performance by a man who is something of an expert showman and manipulator.
Hillary
Popular vote or no, she didn’t win, and while I’m sorry she didn’t break the glass ceiling, I think she was her own worst enemy. The emails on the server in the basement and “the basket of deplorables” did enormous damage for the opportunities they gave her critics. One also got the sense that especially in the early appearances on TV with her nose in the air and body language seeming to see all the rest of us as beneath her – she entitled after all those years of hard work – to be elected President just because she felt she’d worked hard enough to earn it. The sense that she felt entitled to the office merely because of who she was I think turned off a lot of people.
There’s no such thing as a perfect candidate for President (or any other office), but perhaps there should have been more deep thought at the DNC and in the higher reaches of the party about the Clinton legacy and what that would mean to the millions of those who felt forgotten by Washington and voted for Trump. I voted for her, but I was never happy about it. The thought of both of them back in the White House curdled. What if there were more Libyas? Worse ones? What if there were more careless dismantling of protections put in place to free us from the vagaries of financial melt downs?
And if she and he were so darned intelligent, why did they think that using a private email server was such a great idea? Was it really so very “convenient”? Were they just playing with the new technology without knowing enough to realize the risks? After the experience of intense criticism about the emails, wouldn’t you think she’d warn others near her to beware of what they said in emails in case of hacking? It’s not as if hacking was unknown in 2015 – 16. Our own NSA was doing its share of it on foreign leaders and got caught in the act. The stupidity (ignorance) of intelligent people is sometimes appalling and inexcusable.
And now we’re stuck with Trump. What a tragedy!
Libya, the blunder
The Globalist today had an essay by Hardeep Puri who was President of the UN Security Council in August 2011 and November 2012. He pins responsibility for the present mess in Libya on feelings of guilt in the West over its inaction in Rwandan genocide in 1994 during Bill Clinton’s Presidency. The use of military force was supposed to rid the country of Libya of a terrible dictator and protect the people from his supposedly brutal treatment of his population. There was no government structure as the west might recognize such. Gaddifi was all there was. This was to be “humanitarian regime-change”, at least that was how it was sold. And the result?
The result is out there for the world to helplessly watch – a desperate migration crisis leaving hundreds of thousands of refugees either dead or deserted, and an unraveling country overrun by mercenaries, militia, and the world’s worst nightmare today – the ISIS – with a paralyzed government at the apex.
Whether the West likes it or not, there is a reason the Libyan “mad dog” managed to rule the country for 42 years. The articulation of pro-Gaddafi sentiment and demonstrations in what’s left of Libya testify exactly to that.
Our adventure in Iraq has taught us nothing, and sadly, it could still be true that we will sell ourselves on the idea humanitarian “rescue” of a country we do not understand.
Assad and Syria
An article in the Boston Globe dated yesterday expresses the Russian view that all of Syria must be “liberated” before there can be any move toward removing Assad from power. Regime change seems to have become a western knee-jerk reaction to dictators without much thought as to what, if anything, is to replace the hated present regime. Assad is definitely not a “nice” man. He’s directly responsible for the deaths of thousands and the destruction of some of his own country’s cities. He could have avoided much of the bloodshed by talking with the protesters back in 2011, but he chose to shoot them instead. The battles that followed have led to terrible destruction of once beautiful cities. We’ve all seen the photos many times over, and well as the pitiful ones of children caught in the battle.
Brutal though he may be, his is the only government there is in Syria since we can’t really claim that the so-called Caliphate in Raqqa is anything like a recognizable government, unless, of course, the West is looking to make sure they seize power over the whole country. The theory that there are “moderate” islamists that deserve support seems to be just that, a theory. While there may be individuals who embrace some western ideas, they have undoubtedly left by now, or are busy fighting over bits of territory among themselves.
From Josh Landis’ Syria Comment:
The sad truth is that those hoping for a quick resolution to this crisis are likely to be disappointed. Contrary to expectations, the US is unlikely to enter into war with Russia over Syria. The moral argument for intervention cannot out-weigh the immense risks that the US military would be taking were it to engage in a direct and costly war with Russia. Despite the hawkish rhetoric of Hillary Clinton on the campaign trail, chances are that once in the White House, she will come to the same conclusion about using American military force as President Obama. Real world constraints reduce the chance that US will deploy force in Syria. The Syrian opposition and their backers will be forced to rethink their current path.
Political Solution
Most policy makers involved in the Syria crisis insist that “there is only a political solution to the Syria crisis.” The unstated problem with this argument is timing. Can a political solution be arrived at before a clear military winner emerges on the battlefield? Mustn’t one side realize that it has no choice but to accept a settlement before both sides will come to the table? The answer to this question is clear. No political solution can take place before a clear winner emerges on the battlefield. The longer this process is delayed, the longer the crisis will drag on, and the greater will be the death count.
Based on our sad experience in Iraq, I find these arguments persuasive. Everyone who thinks should read Ehsani’s entire post, even though it’s unlikely now that we’ll try what failed so miserably in Iraq in Syria. For once, the Russians seem to be right.
There’s another interesting piece from Aaron David Miller at the Wall Street Journal Blogs well worth a careful read.
The “Debate”
Hillary outperformed The Donald. She will probably be the one to sit in the Oval Office for at least the next 4 years at least. In a way I’m glad of that, and in another way, it scares me. It’s long past the time when the US should have a woman President, so that makes me happy. This particular woman, however, was present for most of the poor decisions of Bill’s presidency that led to the economic crash – the loosening of regulations, repeal of the Glass-Steagel, and beyond that, her early support of the Iraq War (regardless of what she says now in hind sight) and the regime change in Libya. The main Republican “issues” like the email server and Benghazi to me seem bogus.
At the time when the Clintons were running the Apple Mac email server on a G4 machine in their basement, they had what could arguably be called the most secure system available for their purposes. Having run Mac servers in the same period myself, both for web sites and email, I had to study the security of the system vs the Microsoft server software run on PC’s which was never very secure from hacking.
It’s been my experience that most people don’t even know what a “server” is, or how it operates to send and receive emails and serve up web pages. Users just want to know that the system works for them to get their communications done. Most of us have come to take for granted that we can freely send and receive messages and web pages over the Internet, and we don’t bother ourselves with how it works, unless we have been stung by one of the many viruses that attack PC systems and even then we hand the “broken” box to an “expert” technician expecting it to be completely fixed in a day or two. Offices, commercial or government that do not spend for technical assistance, updates and firewalls suffer the consequences of “penny wise, pound foolish” spending. Recent scandals (Yahoo! and the GPO) prove my point.
What none of the reports, FBI or media, tell us is how reliable or easy to use the State Department servers were at the time. Were they “down” for lengths of time that made it inconvenient to use them for busy diplomats and their assistants for work that was time critical? Since Secretary Powell also had used another server during his time as Secretary, it’s quite possible that the government servers were not as reliable as they might have been in which case Clinton’s use of her Mac server would have been common sense.
In any case, Hillary and The Donald didn’t get into all that during the debate, thank goodness! That’s just me letting off steam. They didn’t touch on the Benghazi tragedy either. The person or persons who sold our government officials on the rosey possibilities of regime change from autocratic rule to democracy by force of arms from outside the countries involved are responsible for the many and continuing tragedies of Iraq, Syria and Libya. There was only a brief argument about leaving troops in Iraq where The Donald showed himself to be ignorant. George W. Bush signed the status of forces agreement with Maliki which required the withdrawal of all US troops between 2007 and 2011, not either President Obama or Secretary Clinton.
I’m afraid I’m not an gung-ho supporter of Hillary for President, but I do think she’s the best deal we’ve got as a country at the moment. Donald Trump brings on unpleasant and scary memories of Germany in the 1930’s and 40’s, and I’m not at all comfortable with the the prospect of him as a possible President of the USA. I can only hope that American common sense will prevail one more time and save us from a terrible fate.
Note: On the email controversy. please read this article: It says some of what I mention above and more.
Censorship?
I visited the website of Aljazeera English this morning, and discovered something that surprised me. The live videos I used to watch in order to learn a different point of view of what was happening in the Middle East are blocked and can’t be watched from America. Why? What for? By whom? If I go to america.aljazeera.com the videos I want to see aren’t there – at least I didn’t find them. I did find some reports on Iraq, though, that were infinitely better than anything I’ve seen at the New York Times or the Washington Post, both of seem to be just echoing the administration or the neocon lines.
I can still read the reports at Aljazeera English, so I guess maybe I shouldn’t panic, but it sure was odd and a bit creepy to have this box or something like it pop up with each video:
I have been so short of time to spend on this blog, or doing the research of Middle East happenings that I’ve been doing for so long that others may well have picked this up long before I ever found it. It makes me feel that the talk of the loss of our freedoms here in the US, is not at all just talk. What’s happened to freedom of information? What else are they trying to hide? What’s happened to the media in this country?
areesandeirene.com 