The real power

When a new administration takes office new officials take office. There are about 4,000 jobs that change with about 60 being significant with the new president but there are over 2 million federal government employees who stay on through different administrations. These are referred to a career employees and they each have their own ways of working within the system. These people have daily contact with various businesses and industries that work with the federal government on a whole series of projects. These same people are often the unidentified sources that appear in news stories and many thousands of these people have top secret clearance to deal with groups outside the government. These bureaucrats and their confederates in private industry keep the government functioning properly as one administration replaces another. In other words this whole group of lifetime workers represent the power behind the throne and they probably total around 4 million. Politicians are often accused of putting party ahead of country but these non-elected employees are likely to put their careers ahead of country. It is this large group that can be considered the deep state. The one group that acts as the glue that holds the whole thing together are the lobbyist. Any elected official that tries to challenge the authority of this group will likely be attacked from all sides and quickly be neutered. Recently Senator Schumer issued a warning to his friends saying they best not get on the wrong side of the NIA when he said, "Let me tell you, you take on the intelligence community, they have six ways from Sunday at getting back at you". This illustrates where the real power lies.

Deep state

Eisenhower famously warned about the dangers inherent in the military industrial complex and he was right. Overtime this duo expanded their power by joining forces with big corporations and big government. The big government part was particularly troubling because it was not the elected officials who became part of the cabal but rather the non elected people we call bureaucrats. In 2016 Mike Lofgren wrote a book called, An Anatomy Of The Deep State" and in this book he exposed how this powerful group had taken control of the country. Lofgren points out that it is not republicans or democrats that control this but a secret unwritten agreement between the national security community, Wall Street and Silicon Valley. When Trump was elected he took this on and was immediately attacked from all sides. This group uses the strategy of keeping political parties at war with one another to cover their misdeeds and the public, along with the press, falls dutifully in line. It is easy to turn the heads of those who have a vested interest in politics. The stronger they feel about politics the easier it is to control them. One simple proof of this is what is called the teenage defense. If your party does some dastardly deed all you have to do is find a similar incidence in the other party and all is forgotten, as in, Mom everyone is doing it. If Trump hadn't had such a controversial personality there is a chance he could have uncovered much of the deep state. The phrase deep state was attributed to Trump so as to disparage the whole concept and it worked even though the phrase preceded Trump.

More on thorium

Thorium nuke powered plants not only produce far less nuclear waste, they are easier and cheaper to build and can be designed to produce hydrogen which can be combined with CO2 to make fuels to replace fossil fuel without increasing the CO2 in the atmosphere. All electric power will be produced carbon free and a carbon free source of fuel for planes, trains and trucks will be available. There will be no net increase in CO2 from transportation and a net decrease in CO2 by switching to nuclear power plants instead of coal and gas. This would solve the climate change problem and according to some, save the world.

Thorium or climate change

Nuclear power plants came on in the late 50's and based on the technology at the time used water to cool the reactor core and that is how all plants operate today. The three accidents that have occurred in the past 70 years have all been caused by using water as the coolant. In a loss of power to the facility the pumps no longer operate and the cooling is shut down. Today's new technology using thorium as the fuel and molted salt at the coolant provide a safe shutdown in the loss of power. The molted salt as it cools solidifies and becomes its own seal. All new plants should use this newer safer technology and older plants should be retired and replaced as soon as possible. The same people who say that the world as we know it will end in a few short years are the people who oppose this change to thorium. Nuclear reactors with old technology have produced one accident in the United States since 1958 and faced with the pending destruction of climate change these people refuse to go to thorium power. Do they really believe that climate change is as threatening as they say?

Juan vs dollar

Money is sold on the open market like any other commodity. If the demand for the dollar goes up the price of the dollar goes up. Simple supply and demand. Say the dollar is worth 6 Juan. If a gizzmo in China cost 6 Juan and I want to buy one I pay one US dollar for it. If one smizzmo in the US sells for 1 dollar a Chinese merchant can buy one for 6 juan. Now China sells Juan on the open market and it drives the cost down. Meanwhile China buys dollars on the open market and it drives the cost up. So now 4 Juan is worth one dollar. People buy more because the price is lower. China exports gizzmos to the US and people buy them at 4 Juan rather than 6 Juan so sales increase. US exports smizzmos to China and the people buy 4 for a dollar instead of 6 for a dollar so they buy less. Sales decrease when the price goes up. The currency for most countries depends on the open market price which is determined by supply and demand. China manipulates the open market price by buying and selling its own currency while at the same time buying and selling dollars. About 20 countries, most notably China, have engaged in such practices over the past decade at an annual rate that has averaged $1 trillion in recent years. The U.S. trade deficit has been several hundred billion dollars a year higher as a result and we lost several million additional jobs during the Great Recession.

Payoff debt

Senators Warren and Sanders have suggested the if the government would pay off student loans this would stimulate economic growth and I agree. However! We are constantly told that going to college means a higher life time income and I agree. Therefore! How about paying off private debt for people who never went to college, things like credit cards and car loans. That too would stimulate the economy but it would help lower educated, lower income people who will not get the future pay increases that the students will get. These are the people who witnessed their good paying manufacturing jobs disappear while they were working hard to put their kids through college. Doesn't that sound more equitable.

Thorium power plants

A new report from the EPA estimates that over 100,000 people die each year from air pollution caused by burning fossil fuels. The United States has been using nuclear power plants to produce pollution free electricity since 1958 and has had one accident at Three Mile Island from which no one was injured or died. Most of the inherent dangers from nuke plants come from the use of uranium as a fuel and that can be eliminated by using thorium instead of uranium. Thorium is safer and less expensive. The plant is safer because it doesn't need high pressure water to cool and if the power is lost it shuts down by itself. The bi-products are fewer in number and decay more rapidly. The use of thorium could also help solve the shortage of rare earth metals because thorium is a bi-product of rare earth mines. Thus it is safer and easier to mine than uranium and has much more energy per pound than uranium. The only reason uranium was used at the start was that uranium plants product bi-products than can be used to make nuke bombs and that is why the government financed these plant. You cannot make bombs from thorium. There is no air or water pollution from thorium power plants.