New ways

The phrase promote the general Welfare appears in the opening paragraph of the Constitution. This has been used to legalize all the many benefits the government has bequeathed to the public. Over the past few years presidents have used this and their emergency powers to add to the list of benefits. This power was used to demand that people get vaxed and schools and churches were closed. There were the new rules requiring toilets to use less water and getting rid of incandescent light bulbs. More recently the demand that gas stoves be replaced with electric. Let's carry this out to an extreme to illustrate a point. There should be a 100% tax on gasoline to cut usage. This would move people closer to where they work. Big taxes on meat to remove the climate threat of animal gas. Big tax on all sugar products like pastries, candy and cereal for health reasons. Big tax on alcohol and tobacco products. Health insurance companies to raise rates according to body mass index. Big tax on water usage to discourage lawn watering. Have one style of shoes for men and women with different sizes to reduce the cost of shoes for poor people. Same for pants and tops. One style different sizes sort of like China under Mao where everyone dressed alike. Special heavy duty real estate tax on larger homes and limit lot sizes. Make single family homes illegal and substitute with high rise condos and town homes. All of the tax revenue to be used to build and install windmills and solar panels. This requires sacrifice from some to promote the general welfare of the masses. It goes along way toward the goal of equity.

Money

The Afghanistan War cost the US $2.3 trillion. That is $300 million dollars per day everyday for 20 years. It is impossible to find out where all this money went but using the famous Eisenhower quote of beware of the military industrial complex we can make an intelligent guess. Here is one example. The CEO of Lockheed Martin, Robert Stephens a well known defense contractor, made $2 million in the year before the war started. By 2005 his income was $3 million and in 2006 it went up to $18 million and in 2007 he got $31 million. No need to go any further because the trend is clear. In less than two years the US has spent over $100 billion in Ukraine. Does anyone know where this money is going. Are any of our elite journalist looking into this.

Argentina

Argentina's new President Javier Milei is either a very confident man or a fool. The country is facing 140% inflation. Milei is pledging economic shock therapy. His plans include shutting the central bank, ditching the peso, and slashing spending, potentially painful reforms that resonated with voters angry at the economic malaise. He won a sizable victory with 56% of the vote. Getting rid of the central bank is one way to stop the printing of money but it will take a severe austerity program to bring down inflation. He plans to clean house in government. He is an outsider, a professor of economics with no political experience. He will be going from the Ivory Tower to the real world so it is worth while to watch. When the government starts cutting spending how will the people react. Once the Peso is gone and the dollar takes its place the government can no longer print money and so they no longer need the central bank. The cut in spending must precede the decline in the inflation rate so the people will have to take the medicine before they feel the cure. There will likely be a recession with high unemployment and not much money to hand out.

News

I am pulling for independent presidential candidates Kennedy and Cornel West and hope that Manchen jumps into the fire. These are people who are not considered a big threat to the establishment so they can stir up the pot. If by some miracle they started to gain traction the hidden files in the FBI would be used to destroy them so they are safe as long as they don't represent a serious challenge. I voted for John Anderson in 1980 and Ralph Nader in 2004. I voted for Nader because MN was sowed up for Kerry and I wanted to cause trouble for the establishment. Good Americans should follow the wisdom of the founding fathers and always be skeptical of big government. This is even more important today as the free press seems allied with government instead of exposing the secrets of government. The purpose of the press is to keep the government accountable to the citizens but many have lost faith in the press which today has the lowest approval rating ever. Republicans' (5%) and independents' (12%) confidence in newspapers is the lowest on record for these party groups, while Democrats' (35%) has been lower in the past.

Cover up

There are many ways that the un-elected officials (bureaucrats) present a danger to our democracy. One of the most common is the refusal to release information based on the claim of national security. Over the past years since the inception of the FBI in 1908 and its heading by J Edgar Hoover in 1935 many examples of the misuse of power have been revealed. There is good reason to believe that this misuse is still going on to this day. If certain individuals within the system feel they know better than the voters on how the country should be run this will present a danger to democracy. The only protection against such chicanery is transparency but this is blunted by the claim of national security. It is particularly threatening when bureaucrats refuse to give information to congress whose job it is to oversea the activities of these bureaucracies. When whistle blowers reveal uncomfortable secrets the bureaucrats leap into action do discredit those involved. Since the government is divided by parties there will almost always be enough crying disinformation to interfere with the release of information. The dissenting voices will say it is just politics and in time the issue will die. Thus it is years later when the truth comes out and no one cares. One of the most famous was a secret report about the Vietnam War. The report was prepared in 1971 in the thick of the war but it was discredited by the government when some information was leaked. The government declared that this information should not be published in the name of national security. The Supreme Court ruled against the government and the press asked for the report. It was released only in small sections with much information blacked out. In 2011, forty years later, the full un-redacted report was released and no one cared. The report showed that the lies began with Truman and carried right on through with Eisenhower, Nixon and Johnson. 30 years of cover ups over the most critical aspect of government which is war.

States rights

Abortion is one of the more controversial issues facing the country and will be debated widely in the upcoming presidential election. There are several important views on how this should be resolved but the most democratic is already underway. It will be decided on a state by state basis using the vote of the people in those states. The constitution clearly states in the tenth amendment that. The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people. This was further instilled in law when the Supreme Court prescribed this method. This will result in the old states rights argument that some people are too prejudice to decide important issues on their own and must be guided by the wiser hand of the federal government. The concept of moving power to the federal government because people are too uninformed to make wise decisions is prevalent in many areas today.

Lives

There is a public service ad on TV where it says don't hate and then different words are added like Jews, Blacks, Gays and so on. This makes sense since most people understand that hate is not a good thing. This, however, was not allowed in BLM. You could say Black Lives Matter but you could not say all lives matter even though most people understand that all lives matter.

Egg shells

In this day and age of cancel culture one group of people who must be extra careful are school teachers. They must walk on egg shells each day for fear that some comment may cause the students to walk out and thus embarrass the principal. This happen at Park High School where most of the classrooms have signs saying Black Lives Matter. One teacher made the fatal mistake of saying all lives matter and the students walked out. In the news this week a riot occurred at a high school when the students found out that one of the teachers attended a pro Israel rally over the weekend. It has now spread from inside the school to outside the school. Teachers activities away from school are now being watched and thus the egg shells are now in the non work part of their lives. There are people who do not like the phrase cancel culture so call it something else but the fact remains the effect is there.

Two State

All of the Middle East experts on TV are constantly referring to the Two State Solution wherein Palestine and Israel will each have their own country living side by side in peace. What they all seem to miss is that Hamas has explicitly stated they oppose any State of Israel. Simple stated this means that while everyone prefers a 2 State this will not be possible so long as Hamas exist. The obvious conclusion is that Hamas must be destroyed before the 2 State is possible.

Regulations

The term Deep State is controversial because it has become political. The Deep State is twofold. First and most easily recognized is the red tape needed to do anything. This is federal, state and local. It takes much too long to get things going. Former President Obama said, there is no such thing as a shovel ready job. He learned as president what Joe the plumber could have told him. As the push to move the infrastructure bill gets underway the problems with regulations will become the biggest obstacle. The bureaucrats in control of departments like commerce and EPA will determine how successful the transition to reshoring will take place. Second is the small cadre of top officials in the State Department who have become political. They are after Trump now but in time things may change and then people who are quiet now will wake up to the fact that once again bureaucrats are running the show. These people have access to secret FBI files on just about everyone and they can use that information. As long as the country is split along political lines these people can and will run the show.

Democrats

The democratic party has always has its share of coastal liberal elites but these were combined with a large group of blue collar working people so there was a kind of balance in the party. In recent years starting with Reagan the blue collar group has moved away from the democrats and the number of college educated mostly White people have moved into the democratic house. For many years the secret that democrats wanted to keep was that those in charge felt that the little guy could not take care of himself and needed the wisdom of the elites to guide and protect them, often times protecting them from themselves. It was imperative that this secret be kept for the elite did not want to seem as though they knew what was best, even though in their hearts that is exactly what they felt. This was particularly evident in the way minorities were seen, people needing the help of those who were wiser. Over the years the working class and minorities discovered that things were not really improving that much even though they were told that things were getting better. That is happening right today with Bidenomics. The elites feel that things are going well but people are just not smart enough to understand and that the big problem is in the messaging not in the policies.

Truth

There is a lot of talk in the news these days about misinformation or disinformation and how difficult it can be to discern the truth. Most people search around to find their version of the truth. Often times this means just finding sources that will reinforce what the viewer already believes. If you dislike Trump you are ready to believe most any derogatory information and have little incentive to verify using other sources. You get more convinced that you have found the truth and it becomes more difficult for you to see things differently even when evidence contrary to your view is presented. This is why the phrase cognitive dissonance has come into the vernacular. Don't believe your lying eyes. People watched the cities on fire during the 2020 summer riots as the announcer said it was a peaceful demonstration. People watch illegals crossing the border by the thousands and Homeland Security head Myorkas says the border is secure. Many people will deny what they see and believe Myorkas. This is not a new aspect of human nature but it has become more common with all of the various news outlets that people have access to. If you look deep enough into the Internet there is a good possibility that you can find what you are looking for. It is a take off on the old adage that figures don't lie but liars can figure. Many people would like to have a place where they could go to find truth but humans have been searching for truth since recorded history. It is up to the individual to determine what is their truth and if they are wise they will take into account their personal bias.

Trump

Here are some typical headlines from Trump attending the South Carolina football game. Trump visit South Carolina with bill boards taunting him. Trump greeted with boos at South Carolina. Trump greeted by you lost at South Carolina game. Trump gets mixed reactions at South Carolina. Then if you go to any of the several Youtube scenes you get uproarious cheers. Here is one example from local news station WLTX https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lqy2U6Xk4Rg

Education

Following the old adage that even a broken clock is right twice per day the schools have stumbled into an advancement that will help students find good jobs in the future. A knew type board with touch screens has replaced the smart boards which replaced overhead projectors and students quickly learned how to operate. This is very similar to what will be needed in the new manufacturing plants being built across the country. Engineers will be replaced by technicians who can quickly learn how to operate a production line using these new boards. Students coming to work right out of high school will feel comfortable with the new systems. College will no longer be necessary to obtain a good paying job with benefits. College will still be needed for professionals like physicians, lawyers, engineers, teachers and business degrees but others will be better off just going to work right out of high school. For those with money who lean toward liberal and fine arts, college will help a lot but careers that pay a decent wage may be hard to find. Learning how to read and write will be all that is needed for most.

Covid

This is new evidence and must be checked out but if true opens the door to a whole rats nest. Michael Shellenberger, Matt Taibbi, and Alex Gutentag report that multiple U.S. government officials have concluded that the first three people on Earth infected with SARS-CoV-2, the virus that causes Covid-19, were three scientists doing gain-of-function research on bat coronaviruses at the Wuhan Institute of Virology. Sources within the US government say that three of the earliest people to become infected with SARS-CoV-2 were Ben Hu, Yu Ping, and Yan Zhu. All were members of the Wuhan lab suspected to have leaked the pandemic virus. When a source was asked how certain they were that these were the identities of the three WIV scientists who developed symptoms consistent with COVID-19 in the fall of 2019, we were told, “100%.” Reports in the WSJ in May of 2020 said, Three researchers from China’s Wuhan Institute of Virology became sick enough in November 2019 that they sought hospital care, according to a previously undisclosed U.S. intelligence report.

China

Foreign companies are leaving China. They are fed up with China's insistence that they share their proprietary knowledge. This is information that they got by spending a lot of money on research and development and China wants that free. Wages in China have increased to where other countries are more competitive. This is especially true in Mexico. Average wage in China at $6.50 per hour and in Mexico $4.80 per hour. The supply chain from China is too far and unreliable. Shipping cost is too high. China uses child labor and slave labor. The whole of China's economy is unstable with big problems led by real estate

Moms

The unintended consequences of good intentions is an aptly named phrase that usually pops up when people try to help those in need. Here is one example of the results of the Great Society that was part of the civil rights movement of 1965. The single-mother revolution shouldn’t need much introduction. It started in the 1960s when the nation began to sever the historical connection between marriage and childbearing and to turn single motherhood and the fatherless family into a viable, even welcome, arrangement for children and for society. It shows less than 20 percent of black babies in the 1950s were born to single mothers and that rose to 72.3 percent in 2008. One of the reasons I voted for Bill Clinton was he said that welfare should be a helping hand and not a way of life. Any young single mom deserves a helping hand but when a girl has a baby at 16, and her mother had her when mom was 16 and grandma had mom when she was 16 it has become a way of life. This is not helping these young women. We can do better.

Leadership

The next president will be coming in at just the right time and if the right things are done the US will experience the greatest growth period in history and in the process improve the lives of millions around the world. A dozen policies can be implemented beginning immediately. Open the spigot on all forms of fossil energy. Stop all subsidies on Green Energy including wind, solar and EV's and use that money as incentives to bring business back home. Companies will build technical business in the US and other businesses like auto in Mexico. Begin sending illegal immigrants back to their country of origin which will allow the border agents to get back to patrolling the border and this will stop the flow of migrants. Offer incentives to local police to increase their staff and implement better training and better benefits. Stop putting up EV charging stations and start putting up natural gas at existing stations. Push auto companies to switch new cars to natural gas and move to natural gas for all transportation. Continue to build new liquid natural gas export facilities and send gas to Europe and other countries. Start the push for small thorium nuclear power plants using a warp speed program that provides low interest government loans. Put severe sanctions on Iran to cut the money from terror groups. Let it be known that if sanctions don't achieve the desired results then an oil blockade will be installed. Back Israel to remove Hamas from power. Lead the way with NATO to negotiate an end to the Ukraine War. Russia would get to keep the Crimean Peninsula and the Dumbas region and receive a promise that Ukraine would not join NATO and in return Russia would pull out. Encourage legal immigration using a merit based system with emphasis on speaking English. This could be done in the first 100 days with the proper leadership.

Speech

Words like hate speech and misinformation are threatening the first amendment. Government use of emergency is threatening our freedoms. The word misinformation is a signal that something is about to be censored. It is normally one group who does not want an opposing groups opinions expressed. For years liberal thinking people fought to force drug companies to list the side effects when they advertised but when people got a bad reaction from their Covid vaccine they were banned on social media from publishing. When Jay Bhattacharya, a professor of medicine at Stanford University said “Mass testing is an insidious form of lockdown by stealth,” he was black listed on Tweeter. The courts ruled that this went against free speech. This was a particularly important case since the Biden administration was involved. When Covid hit the government announced an emergency and decreed that churches had to close. Speakers invited to colleges are shouted down by students and teachers. Many people are afraid to speak their opinions. Some speech is illegal and is not allowed but other speech must be protected. This goes back hundreds of years when some French guy said, I Disapprove of What You Say, But I Will Defend to the Death Your Right to Say It. The solution is more speech.

Free speech

There is a new phrase that is gaining in popularity called censorship industrial complex. There are 50 large organizations including media, think tanks and universities who want to control what is acceptable speech. The roots of this idea have been around for many years and is today called cancel culture. This is the public shaming of those deemed moral transgressors. More recently this phenomenon has appeared in the Russian disinformation claim in the 2016 election. This was followed by the censoring of information about Covid and next claiming misinformation about climate change. The latest, just coming on the scene,is the idea that intolerance in the form of hate is on the increase. The acceptability of differences in sexual orientation, race and gender are more widely accepted today than any time in history. Just one example of which there are many is that in1950 only 4% of Americans approved of mixed marriage and today that number is 96%. The same is true of gay marriage and premarital sex. Non Christian religions are more acceptable today. Not too many years ago Jewish doctors were not allowed to practice in hospitals and Blacks had separate bathrooms and swimming pools. In 1958, 44% of Whites said they would move if a Black family moved in next door and today that figure is one percent. There has been an increase in the past few years but times are so much better than in the past and this should be reported and not just tell part of the story. That is what critical race theory does in schools. The tell part of the story.

Baker

The idea popularized in the 2016 election was that Russian disinformation allowed Trump to win the election. This theory was so strong that it resulted in a two year investigation by the FBI. It was used in the 2020 election to help defeat Trump. The story centered around the Hunter Biden laptop which was in the hands of the FBI in December of 2019. This was an offshoot of the Patriot Act which was started after 9-11 to protect the country from future outside invaders but it turned inward and was used to watch for internal terrorist and this morphed into watching radial right wing groups and that moved on to watching conservative groups in general. This laptop investigation took on new significance when a NY Post article was published just weeks before the 2020 election. James Baker was appointed FBI General Counsel in 2014. He left the FBI in 2018 and took a position as Asst. General Counsel for Twitter in the summer of 2020. When the laptop story broke government officials told Twitter it was Russian disinformation that they should carefully investigate before allowing it on their platform. The Twitter legal department felt it was OK to publish but after strong opposition by Baker they decided not to allow the story on their platform.

Nuclear

Nuclear power is making a comeback. In a recent poll 57% of respondents favor more nuclear up from 43% in 2020. When Newsom was running for governor in 2016 he said he would close California's last nuclear plant. Five years later he was spearheading an effort to extend the life of the plant. Nuclear is a clean source of electricity. The United States is attempting to launch a nuclear comeback, largely powered by new smaller modular rector designs, but it's success in attaining its previous dominance is up for grabs at this point, experts say.Aug 30, 2023 China has 21 nuclear reactors under construction. About 60 reactors are under construction across the world and a further 110 are planned mostly in Asia. The move toward nuclear power will be from two directions. First is that people will come to understand that wind and solar are not carbon free because the mining, procession and disposal of materials needed for windmills and solar panels are not carbon free and that both need a back up for when the wind doesn't blow and the sun doesn't shine. Second, nuclear is safe and new reactors can use up stored nuclear waste. It is unfortunate that valuable time is wasting while the world waits for people to come around.

NATO

NATO was founded in 1949 to protect communist countries in Europe from Soviet aggression. The Soviet Union collapsed in 1991 so why is NATO still around. Here are the contributions by different countries to NATO in thousands. United States — 811,140 1. United Kingdom — 72,765 2. Germany — 64,785 3. France — 58,729 4. Italy — 29,763 5. Canada — 26,523 6. Spain — 14,875 7. Netherlands — 14,378 8. Poland — 13,369 9. Turkey — 13,057 The US contributes $811 million while the next nine countries combined contribute $265 million which is 25% of the total. In addition the US contributes 1.3 million troops which is 85% of the total. European countries are thankful for this since they have to spend far less on their own defense which allows them to spend more on social programs. The US spends $800 billion on defense while all Europe combined spends $250 billion.

China

Buying a home in China using a bank mortgage is different than in the US. In China you take out the loan before the house is built and you pay the mortgage payments during the construction period. This up front money led to large investment firms who built homes and office buildings based on expected future growth. The growth was so rapid based on expected future demand and now there are 80 million homes and many more only partially completed sitting empty. The second biggest developer, Evergrand, recently declared bankruptcy and the largest developer, Country Garden, miss a payment is is in danger of failing. This means that many home owners will suffer loses. Henry put a down payment on a house three years ago and the house is still not completed. Henry has been making monthly payments and now finds the house many never be completed and that the builder has file for bankruptcy. Henry will not get his down payment back and he is liable for the rest of the payments coming due over the next 20 years. The building was the main thrust of the rapid growth in the Chinese economy and it was not limited to housing. The whole growth of government over the past 20 years was based on adding infrastructure and they overbuilt. In addition to empty and partially build homes there are empty office building, bridges to nowhere, high speed rail lines that don't run and ghost cities constructed for thousands and no one lives there. Adding to that the population of young people of working age has declined and they are also the consumers so consumption is down. As the Chinese people moved from the country to the city they had fewer children and the governments one child policy over the past 35 years has further aggravated the shortage. Wages rose and now Chinese industry cannot compete with countries like Vietnam and Thailand and manufacturing is moving to low wage countries. On top of that many western countries like the US are reshoring for safer and shorted supply chains and China is losing exports.

FBI

J Edgar Hoover was the first head of the FBI and he held that position from 1924 until 1972. He was known for having dirt on everyone and some say he used it for his own purposes. The FBI still knows about the skeletons in every ones closet so smart people know not to cross the FBI. Recently the Mayor of New York complained that the federal government was not doing its part to control the migrant flow at the border. Shortly after that his electronic devices were seized by the FBI. Maybe the ghost of J Edger is still around.

Students

This is information available on the Internet that most people are somewhat aware of but many may wonder why. In 2019, the United States spent $15,500 per full-time-equivalent (FTE) student on elementary and secondary education, which was 38 percent higher than the average of Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) member countries of $11,300 (in constant 2021 U.S. dollars). At the post secondary level, the United States spent $37,400 per FTE student, which was more than double the average of OECD countries ($18,400; in constant 2021 U.S. dollars). Here is one possibility. One local school district here that is representative of most districts has 2,100 teachers and 1,900 staff. The University of MN has 4,000 teachers and 20,000 staff. I am sure these figures can be justified by the people in education but they seem out of line to the average person. Between 2000 and 2017 in K-12 education the number of administrative staff increased by 75%, the number of Principal and Asst Principals increased by 33% and the number of teachers increased by 8%. During this time the number of K 12 students increased by 5%.

Pot

There are many strange things happening that are difficult to explain and one is the reduction in cigarette usage and the increase in marijuana smoking. Marijuana delivers harmful substances, including many of the same toxins and carcinogens found in tobacco smoke. A decline in consumption of cigarettes is credited with being the most important factor in the drop of cancer death rates. In 2022 68% of Americans support legalizing marijuana. The question comes up as to why people would not see that a cancer causing chemical is not good for your health regardless of what the source. Leaving cancer out of the question, pot causes many more health problems, a long list of which can be found on the Internet. -

News

On the news today they interviewed ten people who saw the video from the Oct 7 raid in Israel. Each one said the same thing using different words but the gist of it was something like this. It was the most inhumane thing. I will never get these pictures out of my mind. It was impossible to believe that one person could treat another person in such terrible ways and so on. No one said what they saw. What did they see. Did they see babies being beheaded. Did they see babies being killed in front of their parents or parents being killed in front of their children. Did they see people being burned alive. If they saw any of this why didn't they say so. They were interviewed for the specific purpose of reporting what they saw but they reported nothing. On Oct 12 a headline reads, Israel releases images of slain children to rally support. If you go to the site what you see is, the personal belongings of festival-goers are seen at the site of an attack. I watched a five minute clip by Jake Tapper and he gave warnings to those who chose to watch. Not one dead body was shown but witnesses described rape and murder. The news today does not report what happened but what will get readers. Why is it that the public is too immature to see terrible things but the elite people can handle it.

War

It is said that truth is the first casualty of war and that seems to be happening in the Gaza War. The reports of babies being beheaded and burnt to death in ovens are rampant across the Internet. The reports say that this information has been confirmed by many sources but there are no pictures. Some reports say the pics are posted on various sites but when you search there the pics cannot be found. President Biden said publicly that he has seen these pictures but a few days later said he was only told about the pics. If this did not happen why was it reported as if it did. The killing of civilians in the surprise attack on October 7 was an act of war and that was all Israel needed to respond. US congressmen have seen the videos but they did not say they saw beheaded babies. Why then was the story about the babies needed. Why would the Hamas fighters kill babies knowing how it would show them as inhuman. All of this has detracted from the fact that act of war was committed. It now seems that one country can attack another and so long as they don't behead babies it's not so bad.

Immigrants

Since 1970 the number of legal immigrants has increased from 10 million to 45 million as the percentage of the population increased from 5% to 15%. Prior to the new immigration law of 1965 most immigrants came from Europe but since that time most have come from Latin America and Asia. Since 2020 the United States has taken in 50% of all immigrants in the world. This does not count the many millions of illegal immigrants and got a ways. English speaking countries like Canada, Australia, and New Zealand have merit based immigration rules. This means the immigrants are graded based on their skills one of which is to speak English. Polls show that 900 million people around the world would like to emigrate and 180 million would like to come to the United States. This has become more apparent in recent immigrants. Almost 30% in the US came from Mexico. The next four countries, India, Philippines, China and Vietnam accounted for 15%. If a merit system were installed the mix would shift to immigrants from India and China. This is because of education and ability to speak English. So far this year 3 million illegals have crossed the border not counting 600,000 got a ways and they have come from 140 different countries.

China

Shortly after Xi took control of China he instituted the Belt and Road Initiative (BRI). A program designed to loan money to various Africa and Asia countries to build infrastructure that would connect countries to facilitate trade and speed up supply chains. China would make loans to countries and in return get access to build military instillations. Many of these countries are now defaulting on the loans and China stands to lose billions. Many projects are left incomplete leaving the countries in debt to the point where many are going bankrupt. At the last G20 conference a number of nations with encouragement from the US laid plans for a similar project with trade routes from India to Europe. This was to compete with China's BRI. Will this also end up with bankrupt countries and incomplete projects.

Woke

Many people are not sure what is meant by the phrase, Woke. Some say there is no such thing. The best definition is Woke is a way to show that any inequality in the western world can be attributed to some type of exploitation. It is equal opportunity that allows this to happen and the solution is equal results or equity. If one person or one group is ahead of another is was because they had some inherent advantage that others didn't have. It was not due to their talent or hard work. It was because they had a head start because of some past real or perceived good accident of birth.

Trump

As time closes in on the 2024 presidential election it seems most likely that it will be a repeat between Trump and Biden. The common refrain among Trump voters is we like what he did but not who he is. In broader terms it could be policy verses personality. Policy can be fact but personality is opinion. Policy can be measured but personality is more like a feeling. When voters say they like Trumps policies they mean two dollar gas, 2% home mortgages, real wage growth, 1.5% inflation, lowest unemployment for Blacks, Hispanics and women in history, energy independence, secure boarders, low crime, sanctions on Iran, import taxes on China, reshoring jobs, vaccine, no wars and Abraham Accords. Personality centers around Trumps openness in expressing his feelings, his very un political correctness, his insulting remarks about almost any individual or group. The dislike towards Trump is so strong it carries over to dislike for those who voted for Trump. According to many he is racist, misogynist, xenophobic and just an overall evil person. Most presidents are more secretive about their private thoughts but once in while an open mike reveals another side of the person. While other republican candidates can institute Trump like policies they cannot take on the bureaucracy like Trump. Polls show that Trump and Biden are running neck and neck and this is difficult for many anti Trump people to understand. He is under four indictment including 84 counts of which at least one will lead to a conviction. Studies show he gets 95% negative publicity. Since this election is close, it will once again come down to the ground game as to which group does the best at ballot harvesting. All of this could go away if at the convention Biden says he will not run and they bring forth Michelle Obama who would win easily. Then her husband could have a third term. This gets rid of Trump and overcomes the problem of replacing Harris.

Migrants

People often remain unconcerned about problems that do not directly effect them and a prime example is the Mayor of NY City who sat quietly for years while migrants invaded small border towns in Texas but is suddenly all agog as these migrants find their way to New York. While the Texas Governor is blamed for this mess, of the 120,000 migrants in New York the federal government sent 100,000. When Texas towns pleaded for help from the federal government many across the country showed no interest. Now cities like New York and Chicago are asking for help and the news is now interested. This has caused the federal government to finally admit that there is a problem at the border however it is not their problem because in typical Washington speak, congress is at fault. Will this caused the NY Mayor to go to congress for help.

News

During my life time, I have lived in two Americas. In the first half people were optimistic. The country had survived the depression and won the big war. The economy was expanding and good paying jobs were plentiful. People believed in the American dream and looked forward to marriage and children and the little house with the white picket fence. People had faith in big business and big government. The kids were learning the three R's and families wanted children because they felt that their kids would have a better life than they did. America was the shinning light on a hill. The crowing victory was the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1990 and America was the only super power. It was called a uni polar world. I was 53 and thus began the second half of my life. That was the beginning of the information revolution which led to a fundamental change in attitude among the populace. The amount of bad news that is currently available instantaneously to most people is overwhelming and people are finding it difficult to cope. Faith in various government agencies is on the decline. Big businesses like WorldCom and Enron exposed the unscrupulous activities of private companies and individuals like Bernie Madoff and Sam Bankman Fried stole from people with their Ponzi schemes. Groups of Hate Americans flourished with claims of inequality and pushed the dividing of the country based on gender, ethnicity and skin color. Equal outcomes replaced equal opportunity and many schools taught that parts of American life were based on the strong taking advantage of the weak. The constant bombardment of negative news forced many people to lose faith in the future. It is possible that much of this negativity has always been there and we were unaware because news was not that available but the fact is that it seems that times are getting worse.

Equity

For many people the current war between Israel and Hamas is just the beginning of a much larger war between Muslims and Christians or between the West and the East. It exposes a difference not just in religion but also in culture. The differences are most profound in Muslim countries of the Middle East but are creeping into the largest Muslim country Indonesia. The Arab Muslim countries are not democracies but a mix of Monarchy's, Tribes and Dictatorships while the west is mostly democratic. In the west all religions are welcome but this is not the case in Muslim countries were there is little to no tolerance for other religions. In Saudi Arabia the public practice of any religion other than Islam is prohibited. Women's rights are limited in Muslim countries requiring certain dress codes. There are 12 Muslim countries where homosexuality is punishable by death. Conversion by Muslims to other faiths is forbidden under most interpretations of sharia and converts are considered apostates. Some Muslim clerics equate this apostasy to treason which is punishable by death. This division has been percolating under the surface for a couple of decades. Certain groups who push the concept of equity find themselves caught up in this new idea of equal results.

Oppressors

People who are considered conspiracy theorist, a phrase used to discredit people, often speak of oppressor vs oppressed when discussing things like equity or equal results. It was difficult for them to condemn the summer riots of 2020 because these were the oppressed on the street just demanding fair results. This can be seen in the current way that many have come out to protest in favor of Hamas, whom they see as the underdogs. The plan is to divide people into the haves and the have nots. Marx said this was the way to revolution. Freeman and slave, patrician and plebeian, lord and serf, guild-master and journeyman, in a word, oppressor and oppressed, stood in constant opposition to one another, carried on an uninterrupted, now hidden, now open fight, a fight that each time ended, either in a revolutionary re-constitution of society at large, or in the common ruin of the contending classes. Some conspiracy buffs think there is a group who are trying to replace our current system of governance with some new form and that requires the tossing out of the existing system. What is currently going on with the protest is mindful of the old saying, first they come for the Jew and then they come for you.

Ukraine

This is from NBC news on November 3, 2023 WASHINGTON — U.S. and European officials have begun quietly talking to the Ukrainian government about what possible peace negotiations with Russia might entail to end the war, according to one current senior U.S. official and one former senior U.S. official familiar with the discussions.

Victim

An incident occurred in early November in Las Vegas where a 17 year old boy came to the rescue of his younger smaller friend who was being bullied by a group of older boys. The group then attacked the 17 year old and beat him to death. Not much was reported in the news until this week. It happens that the boy who was killed was White and the mob was Black kids. This is mindful of what is happening in Israel. Both cases represent what is called oppressor vs oppressed. Israel is seen as the oppressor and Palestine as the oppressed. In Vegas the White boy is the oppressor because he is White. The press reports based on who is considered the victim.

Money

The US State Department announced today that they were releasing billions of dollars to Iran that represents money owed to them from Iraq. When questioned about this they said the money would only be used to feed the people not for terrorism. The concern is that money is fungible. When money is used for one purpose it frees up money for other purposes. This is the same argument used by Planned Parenthood when they say the money they receive from government is not used for abortions but for other women's healthcare.

Budget

When the congress debates the budget there are 12 individual appropriation bills instead of whole package called continuing resolution. In the fall of 2022 congressional negotiators unveiled a mammoth $1.7 trillion funding bill called the omnibus bill. Did anyone read the 4,155 page bill before approving. It was stuffed with pork as every congress person could add their pet projects and no one would object. If the budget process is broken down into the 12 bills it gives the congress a chance to evaluate the individual budget items and maintain some control. As the government approaches another shut down on November 17 the Speaker has proposed another approach called laddered continuing resolution. It will allow different parts of the government to shut down at different times basically breaking down the omnibus bill into smaller parts. This will not be popular because it will be more difficult to hide pet projects.

Biden

For those who think that identity politics is just a catch phrase here is a quote from the Washington Post, Biden shouldn't run again. If Biden were the first woman, LGBTQ person or person of color as president, there would be a strong case to re elect him. There's not that kind of symbolism or cultural case for his second term either. The pressure from democrats to push Biden out shows that Biden was never their preferred choice but was the one person they thought could beat Trump. Now that it is felt that he cannot beat Trump he is expendable. While many democrats say the reason Biden is so low in the polls is because of his age many others think it is because of his policies but since the democratic leadership would probably continue these policies they cannot be critical.

Iran

The Palestinian Liberation Organization (PLO) is the group that officially represents Palestine at the UN. Policy disagreements caused a split and the PLO became the PA (Palestinian Authority). At the end of the 1967 War, Israel captured the West Bank, The Golan Heights and the Gaza Strip. In 2005 Israel pulled out of Gaza and the people there held an election and selected Hamas to lead them. The sending of rockets into Israel continued. During the 1990's so many suicide bombers were sent into Israel that they had to build a wall. Hamas does not recognize Israel and thus no two state solution is possible unless Hamas is replaced. The recent incursion into Gaza has caused the predictable outrage around the world. There are reports that Hamas hides behind civilians and these reports are questioned by some in the press. A look at motivation leads to the question, who benefits when civilians in Gaza are killed. The long term solution is to unite other Arab countries to join Israel to combat Hamas and this was well underway when the October 7 attack occurred. That is now on hold. Many feel that Iran is creating the problem to counter their prime enemy in the region, Saudi Arabia.

Plan ahead

If you were going to build a lake cabin you would not go out and buy a load of lumber and start nailing boards together but that is what happened with electric cars. Elon Musk started building electric cars and people started buying them. What power would be used to charge the battery, Where would the chargers be. Will there be enough copper, lithium and cobalt. Can these elements be made without harming the environment. How will be dispose of the cars when they wear out. The same thing can be said for windmills and solar panels. The whole process has the cart before the horse and no one seems to notice. This is very strange.

China

The China economic boom of the past 30 years was spurred on by two main directives. First was that China would be the manufacturer of goods for all countries and the second would be massive infrastructure projects. China was building high speed rail, highways, dams and housing developments along with high rise office buildings. They built so many homes and apartments so quickly that supply outpaced demand. Faced with the problem of overbuilding Xi came up with his Belt and Road Initiative (BLI). China would build around the world they way they had built in China. They would go into a county and offer to build a bridge or railway and they would finance the project with the stipulation that the project money be repaid in 15 years at 7%. These countries couldn't get loans through the World Bank so they saw China as their personal bank. Once completed the project would produce enough profit to repay the Chinese and would establish good will between the two countries. China is now ten years into the BLI and most of the projects are either sitting unfinished or stopped. They are much like the many projects within China that are also unfinished. The whole idea has become a bungled mess. Many of the countries who took the Chinese loans are now unable to pay back and their countries are overburdened with debt. China is now offering debt reduction if they are allowed to build military bases at strategic places.

Human nature

Thomas Sowell is a writer who has a different way of explaining things and his thoughts are worth considering. He talks about two visions of human nature that he calls Constrained and Unconstrained. The Constrained are tragic and limited in their capacities. They have selfish and dangerous impulses that can be contained only by means of society's laws and institutions. The Constrained vision has its lens fixed squarely on this moral weakness of humanity. The saying "Power corrupts; absolute power corrupts absolutely" is a Constrained one. The Unconstrained vision sees things very differently. For the Unconstrained, human nature is perfectible. Humanity has incredible potentials but we find ourselves in a system warped by power interests and with cynical incentives laid like carrots all around us. The Unconstrained vision asks us to imagine a world where instead of living "lives of quiet desperation" spending most of our time working at jobs we don't like for people we don't respect, what if humanity instead worked enough to meet its needs and then focused on flourishing. Life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness is speaking to the better angels of our nature, eyes fixed on the great heights to which humans can soar. The Unconstrained vision is a Utopian vision with a dream of a more perfect world. It doesn't think in terms of trade-offs but in terms of solutions. In contrast, the Constrained vision focuses on the negative side of human nature. It sees the pervasive selfishness and greed of humans not as an exception but as the rule. The only thing that keeps these dangerous aspects of human nature in check are the structures, laws and institutions that have evolved over the centuries. The Constrained are mindful of the distribution of power. This vision believes we must be very fearful of giving unlimited power to and individual or group of individuals to overhaul society in their ideal image. People who see the world through political glasses sometimes suggest that liberals are Unconstrained and conservatives are Constrained. The common example is a conservative is a liberal who has been mugged.

Tokyo

In early 1945 WW 2 was coming to an end. In an attempt to speed things up the Allies resorted to fire bombing cities in Germany and Japan which resulted in the deaths of hundreds of thousands of civilians. Japan's air force was no longer a threat and on the night of March 9, 1945, 334 B-29's took off to raid Tokyo and they dropped 1,665 napalm bombs on Tokyo. Napalm is designed to cause fires and Tokyo was a city with many wooden buildings so the fire was amplified and an estimated 100,000 people died. There were no military facilities in Tokyo. The Japanese refused to surrender until a few months later in August when the Atom Bombs were dropped on Japan. Some wonder how this would have been reported if the Internet were around.

Wheat

As the war in Ukraine drags on many countries in the Middle East and Africa will face food shortages. Syria and Yemen are both in the middle of Civil war and suffering food shortages will face starvation. Egypt with 100 million people gets 85% of their wheat from Ukraine and Russia. The price of wheat on the world market is rising rapidly and the last time this happened in 2010 it was partially responsible for the Arab Spring uprising. Last year the world was blessed with good weather but that may not be the case this year. The US should considered stopping the use of corn for ethanol and put that out on the market.

What next

What should the US foreign policy be as reshoring grows amid two wars. In the short term (five years) increase oil and natural gas production to the max. Accelerate the ongoing construction of liquid natural gas export facilities to replace the natural gas that Europe has lost from Russia. Begin expanding nuclear power plants using small thorium reactors. Recognize that wind and solar along with electric cars are not the future and use that money for nuclear. Place an oil blockade and stop Iranian oil shipments. Continue to back Israel in their attempt to destroy Hamas. Encourage NATO to reach a settlement in the Ukraine War by offering Putin the Dombas region and a guarantee that Ukraine will not join NATO. Strengthen US ties with East Asia countries like South Korea and Vietnam by allowing them access to US markets much like has been done with Japan. Japan has a shortage of working age people and too many elderly so they manufacture cars in the US and sell them in the US and use the profits to take care of their old people. Move to help European countries to develop nuclear power by sharing technology and engineers like Poland has already done with Westinghouse. Continue growing the economy by assisting in the rapid expansion of manufacturing in the US which will provide the taxes needed to promote the nuclear expansion.

Single mom

The total income earned in the US in 2022 was $26 trillion and the total taxes paid was $4.9 trillion. The top ten percent of wage earners paid 74% or $3.6 trillion in taxes. The child tax credit of $2,000 per child cost the government $60 billion dollars. If that were raised to $4,000 it would cost the government an additional $60 billion. If that cost was passed onto the top ten percent their income tax would increase from $3,600 billion to $3,660 billion. This would mean that a family with two children could earn up to $96,000 per year and pay no income tax. A single mom with two children earning $30,000 per year would qualify for $8,000 in child tax credits and $4,000 in earned income tax credits so her gross income would be $42,000 and she would pay no income tax. She would pay $2,100 in social security tax. There are additional state benefits but childcare would cost $18,000 per year. This is where collecting from dead beat dads comes into play. These two things, raising the child tax credit with a pay or jail policy for dads would allow a single mom to just get by.

Clinton

I voted for Bill Clinton because he was a moderate democrat. He raised taxes on the top one percent and lowered taxes on the middle income groups. He worked with congress to lower government spending which resulted in a balanced budget. Clinton put 100,000 new cops on the street and 100,000 new teachers in the classroom He reformed welfare requiring recipients to begin work after two years with a lifetime limit of five years on welfare He pushed for bi partisan way to reform social security and Medicaid and suggested partial privatization. He reduced the size of the federal government by 377,000 employees. He started the motor voter registration He expanded the earned income tax credit lifting 4 million Americans out of poverty He passed NAFTA which created 400,000 American jobs Enacted the tough on crime bill including the three strikes and your out Enacted laws to help collect child support Enacted Megans Law which required sex offenders to report where they live Strengthen enforcement of the clean water act. Added mental health coverage to insurance plans This was back in the days when congress and the president were more interested in the country than the party.

Hamas

Americans have a tendency to think that experts know and yet this was the position a week before Hamas invaded Israel. Just eight days ago, National Security Adviser Jake Sullivan, speaking at The Atlantic Festival, rattled off a long list of positive developments in the Middle East, developments that were allowing the Biden administration to focus on other regions and other problems. A truce was holding in Yemen. Iranian attacks against U.S. forces had stopped. America’s presence in Iraq was “stable.” The good news crescendoed with this statement: “The Middle East region is quieter today than it has been in two decades.” It appears that his judgment was influenced by his politics. Just three years ago what he said would have made sense. Stringent sanctions were in place on Iran. Their oil sales were reduced to 400,000 barrels per day. The Abraham Accords brought normalization between UAE, Bahrain and Morocco with Israel. These countries joined forces with Jordan and Egypt with civil relations with Israel. The stage was set for Saudi Arabia to join the group. Then the sanctions were lifted off Iran and their oil sales rose to 3 million barrels a day. Many believe that this led to the Hamas attack on Israel and the Middle East once again found itself in turmoil.

Evil

Back in the day various scenarios were considered about the end of the world and these powers were attributed to God or some authority beyond humans. It was in the arena of religion where such topics were discussed but that has changed. In today's world this power, formerly assigned to God, is now assigned to politics. Humans can end the world with climate change, lab made viruses or nuclear war so politics has taken on a fervor previously left to religion so in essence politics is the new religion. Informed citizens today take political sides with the same fierce beliefs that historically led to wars based on religion. Religion is founded on faith and needs no explanation. Things become simple. There is good and evil and I know which side is which. This leads to statements like one man's freedom fighter is another man's terrorist. A good example of this can be seen in the Ukraine War situation. All of the pundits be they talking heads or generals or politicians all get on TV and say we cannot let Putin win. Some on the other side fear what would happen if Putin lost but no one says lets work toward a peace agreement. When dealing with good and evil there is no middle ground. Many people who dislike Trump refer to his followers as cultist which is another religious reference. The implication is they are being led astray by evil. If Trump is evil it is okay to use what ever means to destroy him regardless of legality. During WW 2 civilians were deliberately targeted and that was alright because the enemy was evil. Even today Hitler is often times referred to as evil.

Running out

I do a lot of research in the area of climate change and it recently occurred to me that something was missing. Upon review I discovered that there are many articles explaining how we will run out of coal, run out of oil and run out of natural gas but no articles on running out of lithium, copper or cobalt all of which are needed for EV's. Not to worry though because EV's are not the future, the public just hasn't realized that yet.

Reshoring

As the United States gears up for reshoring and a doubling of the manufacturing base the need for energy will double. The dream of going green with wind and solar will suffer another blow because they were well short of meeting the requirements based on today's usage and adding this expanded need will end their dream. Someone has to step up and say the nuclear is the answer but we wait in silence and each day that passes makes the problem more difficult. Where is the leader we need.

Motives

It can be misleading and often dangerous to assign motives to people and situations. With the recent out break of antisemitism some are suggesting that this open dislike for Jews was always there and just waiting for the right opportunity to surface. Something similar occurs when people observed Trump followers. Many who had the preconceived notion that certain groups were racist, suddenly saw signs to confirm their thoughts and in many cases only they could see these signs. The next step in this process is to find signs to confirm their belief and this is accomplished by selecting certain individuals who are antisemitic and projecting this on others whom they suspect are antisemitic. Phrases like, I know what your thinking or I know how you feel can lead to false conclusions. This happens so often in the news that it has a name. They say it was or wasn't reported because it did or didn't fit their agenda. Once this happens other things they see confirm their belief and they slowly move away from the truth without realizing what is going on. There are occasions when their preconceived ideas prove right and this is enough to convince them that they could be right again. Psychologists tell us that people often project their own sins onto others as a way of getting rid of guilt.

Vets Day

I am looking forward to working today because the schools will put on a Veterans Day program which includes the chorus and orchestra playing, The Battle Hymn of the Republic and it will bring tears to your eyes. This year in the midst of two wars most Americans have never been in battle an it is difficult to understand what it is like. To get a feel for what happens take a few minuets to listen to the following song by Eric Bogle called And the Band Played Waltzing Matilda. Its about a young Aussie soldier being sent to fight the Turks in WW 1 at Gallipoli Bay. Be prepared as these lyrics are brutal. https://soundcloud.com/undercovermusic/and-the-band-played-waltzing

Prisoner

Israel is after Gilad Shalit the man they say is responsible for the Oct 7 attack. Back in 2011 this guy was serving a life sentence for murder in an Israeli prison. Hamas captured an Isreali soldier and agreed to return him if Israel would release 1,000 prisoners which they did and one of them was Shalit. Many thought it was bad when Obama released five terrorist for one US soldier who turned out to be a deserter but 1,000 for one beats all.

News

People often bemoan the fact that the news cycle changes so rapidly and a case in point is the admission by the government that they have alien ships and alien pilots US News. U.S. reportedly has 12 alien space craft under their control: Congress urges Capitol meeting. From NPR U.S. recovered non-human 'biologics' from UFO crash sites, former intel official says Instead of being the story of the century the whole thing was forgotten in a week. It is like the old joke about the news caster saying, we interrupt this broadcast for a special announcement...The Russians just launched their entire fleet of ICBM's toward the USA. In other news the market fell two percent. Some say the Public is so overwhelmed with news that they are numb.

Average Joe

Not many people have the luxury that I have to spend several hours everyday analyzing the news from dozens of different sources. The average Joe spends his time trying to keep his head above water. His concerns are about the simple things in life like paying the light bill. He has no interest in fiscal policy or monetary police and could care less about Pacts and military industrial complex. As Thoreau said, most men lead lives of quiet desperation. When it comes to voting the main concerns are kitchen table issues or as James Carville said, it's the economy stupid. Two questions remain about the upcoming 2024 election. Will a person's dislike for Trump overcome the poor economy and cause them to vote against him or to stay home and second which party will win the ballot harvesting race.

Trump

As early as 2009 top officials at the FBI knew that Carter Page was acting on behalf of the CIA yet did not reveal this to the FISA court when they got permission to tap his phone. Trump hires Page in March of 2016 and announces his run for president in June of 2016. In August of 2016 FISA approves spying on Page which then opened the door to spying on anyone he contacted which finally led to spying on the whole Trump campaign. Selective leaks about the campaign were then given to the press and this continued after Trump was elected. When Trump said he was being spied on the press laughed it off as fantasy without investigating. This was the beginning of the retaliation against Trumps pledge to drain the swamp but the people voted him in. The government continued its war against Trump but it took the pandemic to finally defeat him. Now the bureaucrats are facing the possibility of a Trump second term and they will pull out all the stops to prevent this from happening.

Trump

I searched the Internet to find out why people don't like Trump and here is what I found. They felt trump was critical of higher education Many said they would not marry someone who voted for trump Many said trump was racist and homophobic and didn't believe in women's rights They feel trump is opposed to federal government with his drain the swamp promise They feel that trump uses disinformation They believe he caused the death of many people because he questioned the use of mask He only won because of Russian interference Trump frequently made unproven or questionable claims as president Trump said the election was not honest Trump had little or no respect for the nation’s democratic institutions and traditions Most Americans placed at least some blame on Trump for the riot at the Capitol Even larger shares of Democrats said his words sometimes or often made them feel concerned, exhausted, angry, insulted and confused. Didn't like his calling the press fake news Didn't like his tweets especially when he blamed others for problems Thought he cut regulations at the expense of clean air and water It only took me a few minutes to compile this list.

Immigration

In a closed door meeting with Senator Dick Durbin, Trump asked if we could exclude immigrants from shithole countries such as Haiti and the nations of Africa. This was later leaked to the press. In that same meeting Trump said Last week, Democrats had a productive meeting with the president, during which he expressed a desire to help legalize not just the “dreamers” — those immigrants brought here illegally as children — but also the vast majority of the nearly 11 million illegal immigrants in this country who have not committed crimes. At one point, Trump turned to Durbin and said, “You want to know the truth, Dick? If we do this properly, DACA, you’re not so far away from comprehensive immigration reform. And if you want to take it that further step, I’ll take the heat, I don’t care. . . . I’ll take the heat off both the Democrats and the Republicans.” This was an opening for immigration reform but it was not leaked. This leads people to believe that immigration reform is not something congress wants.

Palestine

To many liberals, being liberal means to accept and respect those who are different and up to a point this is good. But like all things when carried to an extreme, trouble arises. People will allow pro Palestinian groups to protest even if they disagree with the premise of the protest. If the protesters change from speech to actions and the actions cause harm to others then most people feel it has gone to far. But what happens when the protesters represent the majority. Many of these Palestinian American groups are being joined by other American Arabs so in places like certain suburban areas of Detroit they are the majority. Will they be allowed use local laws to make things difficult for Jews. Will local officials look the other way when violence against Jews happens. Will these small areas become a blue print for other locations. One of the reasons these ideas come up is the way certain people describe what is happening now. A good example is a recent interview with former President Obama where he said there is no excuse for the way the Hamas fighters treated the Jews and then he proceeded to offer excuses. This is being done more and more frequently by different news people as the war continues. Even President Biden is softening his words as he substitutes pause for cease fire. The president is under some stress in this area. In 2001, 51% of Democrats told Gallup their sympathies lay more with Israelis, while 16% said their sympathies were more with Palestinians. Those numbers flipped by 2023, with 38% of Democrats saying their sympathies were more with Israelis and 49% saying their sympathies lay more with Palestinians. This change is attributed is seen by many as the result of the oppressor, oppressed concept that is popular among democrats. It also has shades of colonialism in the minds of many and there are an unknown of Americans who are and have been antisemitic.

Trump

Most experts now agree that it was the NATO push into Eastern Europe that aggravated the Russians and the threat of inviting Ukraine into NATO was the red line that led to Putin's decision to invade Ukraine. Many experts feel that Trump would have stopped NATO. Here is an article from New Yorker Magazine from 2019. After Toobin rants on about how terrible Trump was he adds. Even so, there is one element of Trump's thinking that should not be associated with the falsehoods he perpetrates, because it usefully challenges what has become a stalemated American policy toward Ukraine. According to Jeffrey Toobin in The New Yorker, President Trump realizes that attempting to seek to bring Ukraine into the Western orbit through NATO membership has been counterproductive. Indeed, that American policy, as developed by President George W. Bush and then sustained by President Barack Obama, has managed to help inflame U.S.-Russia and Ukraine-Russia ties without making life better for the people of Ukraine. It is reasonable to assume that had Trump been elected he would have opposed the entry of Ukraine into NATO which might very well have avoided the war in Ukraine.

War

Saudi Arabia and Iran are the two big powers in the Middle East. Iran has a stronger military but less oil. The Saudi's live in fear that Iran will come after their oil so they sell oil in petro dollars which helps the US economy. In return the US agrees to protect Saudi oil from invaders at least that has been the case for the past 50 years. That begin to change with the onset of fracking which allowed the US to become energy independent. In order to stay on the good side of America the Saudis were considering joining the Abraham Accords. This was a agreement by UAE and Bahrain to normalize relations with Israel. They would join Egypt and Jordan who had previously made peace with Israel. This is history but that leads to theory of why Hamas attacked Israel. They were fearful that if the Arab countries agreed to Israels right to exist this would give the edge to the Saudis. Why at this time leads to more theories and this gets political so all logic goes out the window. Trump told Iran to forget about a nuclear agreement and placed severe financial sanctions on them and put measures to reduce Iran's oil sales. Biden removed these barriers with the idea of opening up the nuclear talks and Iran's oil sales increased from 400,000 barrels per day to over 3 million. This extra money along with the potential Arab agreements with Israel prompted Iran to give the go ahead to Hamas. History will determine the validity of these theories but they look reasonable at this time.

Mining

The final nail in the coffin of the new green deal may come from environmentalist. They are opposed to mining in the US. The administration closed down the proposed nickel copper mine in MN. Indian tribes are protesting the proposed lithium mine in Nevada. The offshore windmill farms along the east coast have been temporarily shut down. This is a growing trend that will gather strength as people learn more about the mining, processing and disposing of green deal materials. These types of protest will continue across the country forcing the mining in other countries. The NIMBY idea has spread from neighborhoods to countries.

Hate crimes

On October 31 FBI Director Chris Wray said, “In fact, our statistics would indicate that for a group that represents only about 2.4% of the American public, they account for something like 60% of all religious-based hate crimes,” Wray said of the Jewish American population. Three days later VP Harris says, “For years, Muslims in America and those perceived to be Muslim have endured a disproportionate number of hate-fueled attacks. As a result of the Hamas terrorist attack in Israel and the humanitarian crisis in Gaza, we have seen an uptick in anti-Palestinian, anti-Arab, antisemitic and Islamophobic incidents across America.”

Ukraine

As the world watches the Ukrainian War and sees how the Russia Army has disintegrated many wonder about Russia's nuclear arsenal. Word is that they have not kept things in working order much like their conventional army and much like their infrastructure overall. What happens if they decide to use a tactical nuke and it goes astray or doesn't go at all. The world will know by satellite pictures what they did and there will be mounting pressure for NATO to go into Russia. The longer this war goes on the more opportunities for mistakes that could lead to escalation. Time to look for a negotiated settlement.

Sports

Here is an example of how things can work both ways. Massachusetts has only female field hockey so males can play. This is not about gender identity but about gender period. A Massachusetts high school student-athlete had her teeth knocked out and suffered “significant facial” injuries when an opposing male player shot a field hockey ball at her face during a playoff game on Thursday. This adds pressure to the idea of getting rid of men and women playing together in certain sports. Polls show that 70% oppose allowing men in women's sports More Americans than before oppose transgender athletes competing in sports that align with their gender identity and say transitioning genders is “morally wrong,” according to a report from Gallup released Monday.

Wars

It is interesting to compare the run up to the Ukraine War and the Gaza War. For over 30 years ever since the wall came forces were moving toward a show down with Russia. The push of NATO into the Eastern European countries was an increasing threat to Russia. The Russian leaders repeatedly asked the West not to surround them with military basis but no one listened. Reports are now coming out that they not only didn't listen, they were formulating plans to dissolve what was left of the old Soviet Union. It was to be the final nail in the coffin for communism in Europe. Meanwhile in the Middle East, the people in Gaza were surrounded and walled off from control of their own water and power supplies. Periodic wars broke out as the people of Gaza saw themselves as living in an outdoor prison. Just as in Russia all of the early warning signs were there but no one seem to understand or maybe care. It was only a matter of time until both Russia and Gaza exploded. There are many other warning signs appearing in the world today that may very well lead to disasters but once again the world seems unable to recognize a problem until it becomes a problem. A person would hardly run a business this way.

Protesters

In the world today there are 16 million Jews and 1.6 billion Muslims so if the conflict in Gaza is determined by the size of the protester crowds, Israel might as well give up. Leaders from a number of Arab Muslim countries are calling for a cease fire and then to work toward a two state solution. Hamas has maintained a staunch position against a two state solution. In fact they want a one state solution and they have plans to put an end to Israel. These Arab leaders know this so what they say lacks credibility. A former UN official was on CNN today and said the same thing...cease fire and look for two states.

Collateral damage

One of the new phrases to come out of the Gaza war is collective punishment which according to the Geneva Convention is a war crime. It means in the current situation that you cannot punish the Palestinian people because Hamas is committing war crimes. It sounds similar to adding new gun laws which restrict legal gun owners because criminals use guns in crimes. The Patriot Act allowed the government to spy on individuals without due process because terrorist attacked American. During WW 2 all sides deliberately bombed civilians. The rules of war are much like Mike Tyson's description of a boxing match. He says you have a plan until you get smashed in the face and then you fall back on instinct. Israel has been smashed in the face and they are still trying to limit collateral damage which will put their troops in danger.

Arab

Back in 2010 a situation occurred in Tunisia that triggered revolutions throughout the Middle East. This was called the Arab Spring and it now appears we are in an Arab Fall but this time the revolt is not about Arabs vs Arabs but Arabs vs Jews. One of the interesting details about these two incidence is that both were only possible because of the ease of communication. Just as the cell phone allows for instant gatherings in the US the same thing is happening on an international basis. As soon as one person is killed it is immediately transmitted to millions.

Junk bonds

Back in 1989 Michael Milken, known as the Junk Bond King, was convicted of securities fraud and racketeering. He was fined $600 million and sentenced to 10 years in prison. His sentence was later reduced to two years and he was pardoned by Trump in 2020. Since his release from prison, he has become known for his charitable donations for medical research. Milken and his brother founded Knowledge University in 1996, the largest childcare provider in the country. He invested in K12 Inc. that provides online schooling. Yesterday Sam Bankman Fried was convicted of charges similar to Milken's and he will get prison time but he, unlike Milken, is broke. It remains to be see how long he will serve.

Hate

Here is info from a recent article in Axios. Antisemitic and anti Arab hate crimes have skyrocketed in New York and LA. In reading that headline the reader may conclude that there is some equality or even more anti Arab crimes since it was listed first. Upon further reading the article says that in LA the number of anti Arab crimes increased form one in Oct of 2022 to 8 this year. In NY city during the same time periods crimes against Jews rose from 16 to 69.

Teacher

States give awards to the teacher of the year and one a year a national teacher is named. This says that some teacher are better than others which can be said for any profession. The Covid shut down has opened the door to take advantage of these gifted teachers. John, algebra teacher par exellence, conducts class by TV in 1,000 classrooms across the country. Each classroom has a teacher that answer questions and keeps order in the room. Teachers themselves will be learning from this top of the line teacher.

Vets

Black Friday ads start on Halloween, Christmas ads start on Thanksgiving, Mothers Day and Valentine Ads start a month early. We have nine days until Veterans Day and we have Black History Month, Women's History Month, Asian Pacific Heritage Month, LGBTQ Month and Hispanic Heritage Month but we have only one day for Vets. If it were not for the Vets there would be no holidays or special months. If you know a Vet call them and say thanks.

Leader

Time seems to move faster as you get older and technology adds to that feeling. During the past three plus years a lifetime of changes have occurred. The following list facts independent of cause. The county went from energy independence to energy dependence. Border crossing increased from 40,000 per month to 200,000 per month. Deaths from fentenyl doubled from 50,000 to 100,000. Over 8 million illegals have enter the country through the southern border not counting 1.5 million got a ways. Violent crime has increased bucking the downward tread since the 1990's. The numbers of people living on the streets and suffering from drug addiction and mental health issues have risen. Test scores dropped especially among minority students. A Supreme Court Justice could not define what is a woman. Men became lesbians. Men dresses as scantily dressed women are dancing in elementary schools. There are more than two sexes. School boards and parents are arguing over who controls the children. There are two wars both heavily financed by the United States. The national debt has doubled from $16.5 trillion to $33 trillion. Over one million Americans died from Covid. Tensions in the Middle East are once again threatening world war. Antisemitism is on the rise around the world. Northern city mayors have been awakened to the problem of illegal immigrants. Citizens have been surprised by how students have reacted to the war. Levels of trust in the country, in institutions and in politics are in a steep decline. The silver lining is that there are logical and doable ways to make changes in all of these areas. It will take a person of extraordinary leadership. Throughout history someone has risen to the occasion.

EV's

The fading excitement about EV's is opening the door to the whole concept of the new green deal. As people lose interest, the car makers are shifting gears and slowing down their move toward EV's. The problems associated with mining, processing and disposing of the materials needed just to exchange clean air for dirty water are waking people up to the fact that wind and solar are not the answer to climate change. This opens the door to nuclear and next is to replace large uranium power plants with small thorium plants. Things are finally starting to move in the right direction but those who profit form the green deal will not go without a fight.

Wooden

In my younger years I was an avid sports fan but that all changed when I retired and moved to Florida and found outside activities were more enjoyable than watching games on TV. Coach Knight died this week and he was mentored by my favorite coach John Wooden. Wooden was the first coach who realized that the inner city Black kids were the future of basketball and he knew that many of these kids came from homes without fathers and he wanted to teach them not only how to play ball but how to become responsible citizens. He did this in many ways but the one quote that best exemplifies his approach was when he said, the finest thing a man can do for his children is to love their mother. Since Wooden's time all successful coaches, including Knight, have followed in Wooden's footsteps.

Hamas

Everyone predicted that as time past the pro Israel stand taken would fade and the first sign appeared yesterday. Five days ago President Biden said: President Joe Biden says he would not consider backing a ceasefire in the Israel-Hamas war until hostages are released. Yesterday he said: President Joe Biden said Wednesday that a "pause" was needed in the Israel-Hamas war to allow more time to get "prisoners" out. It starts with words like pause vs cease. Get ready for much more of this type of rhetoric. This is what has happened in past conflicts in this area and what Hamas counts on.

Reporting

Back in 2002 when the hunt for Saddam was underway the US was following his cell phone calls and this enabled them to keep tracks on his where abouts. The NY Times then published this and Saddam quit using his phone. Recently the NY Times published the news that Israel had bombed a hospital. This forced Israel to reveal sources and methods to show proof that it was Hamas who had done the deed. This week many news outlets said the terrible things that Hamas could not be substantiated and thus forced Israel to release pictures of the atrocities.

Power

In recent years people called conspiracy theorist have contended that certain groups within the country would like to over throw the system and start anew. Recent events in Israel have given some credence to this theory. The Declaration of Independence says that all men are created equal. This concept has been replace by all groups are created equal. It started by dividing people by skin color but expanded in to many differences. Certain groups were considered victims and this became popular as these groups were given special treatment. More recently the victim/victimizers have been replaced with oppressed and oppressors and this is where Israel comes into the picture. The big difference was not race but power. The oppressors are the White males where terms like toxic masculinity and White Power come into play. In the minds of many, Israel is seen as the White male oppressor. The idea of skin color went out the window when the Asia American students at Harvard were discriminated against. It was their scholastic record and their economic achievements that caused the problem not their brown skin. A earlier version of this occurred in the 90's when many Korean Americans started successful businesses in the Black communities. The animosity against these businesses was revealed in the Watts riots. Once again it was not about skin color but power. Many Palestinians have whiter skin than many Southern Europeans but it is not about skin color. It is about power.