I'm going to quote FoxNews "security analyst" K.T. McFarland at length, with my comments, on her prescriptions for fighting violent Islamists... THINGS THE OBAMA ADMINISTRATION IS LARGELY ALREADY DOING:
KTM: "An economic component that bankrupts radical jihad by cutting off their oil revenues - attacking their oil fields, refineries and tankers -- while we also develop our own resources to be energy independent of Arab oil."
Me: The U.S. is already energy independent, thanks to Obama's relaxing rules on fracking. We have so much U.S. oil -- and that's a mixed blessing, if you read the WSJ or Bloomberg -- that Obama even ended the long-time ban on exporting U.S. oil. ISIS does control oil fields in Syria, but they sell it all on the black market, and we are already bombing them.
KTM: "A banking component that uses the US primacy in international banking and finance to freeze out any country or company that does business with radical Islamists from ISIS to Boko Haram."
Me: Ditto the above. I'm sure we could do more to root out the middle men trading ISIS's oil, (cough! Turkey!) but again, it's not like ISIS is trading oil on the world futures market.
KTM: "An alliance component that draws together moderate Muslims into an alliance against radical Islam. If they’re reluctant to join an anti-Islamist alliance, we should let them know they shouldn’t come running to us if things don’t work out. We should call them out if they have some in their inner circles that play both sides.
"And we may have to hold our noses and partner with countries we do not always approve of, as we did during World War II."
Me: Who are the moderate Muslim countries that have the capacity to fight ISIS? I can think of only one: Turkey. Saudi Arabia has the capacity but it is not a moderate Muslim country. The Kurds are everybody's favorite moderate Muslims but they don't have their own state; and moderate ally #1, Turkey, will not allow the Kurds to form their own state.
KTM: "An anti-hostage component – we will not negotiate, exchange prisoners with nor pay ransom to terrorists. If you take our people hostage, we will turn the tables on you and put a very large bounty on your heads. We promise to hunt down kill anyone who kills our citizens, no matter now long it takes."
Me: Who's the greatest terrorist hunter of all time? President Barack Obama. Indeed, The Atlantic's Jeffrey Goldberg just revealed that, "killing the so-called caliph of the Islamic State, Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, is one of the top goals of the American national-security apparatus in Obama’s last year."
And that's not an empty threat, coming from the guy who killed bin Laden and most of Al Qaeda's senior leadership during his term in office.
KTM: "A communications component which champions western values, like we had during WWII and the Cold War. Violent radical Jihad and western civilization are NOT morally equivalent. No apology tour, no comparing the Crusades to ISIS. Be proud of America or be quiet."
Me: Communications are a funny thing. Compel somebody to say something they don't believe -- good luck with that! -- and it comes across as lame. And when the U.S. tries to do it ourselves -- and we do, assiduously -- the results are mixed, because we're even lamer, and nobody there trusts our motives. The truth is that, in the age of social media and instant viral communication, it's very hard to shape the dialog, especially in a region we understand poorly. Putin's Russia does the best job of it, with an army of paid trolls and bloggers, but what they mainly accomplish is sowing doubt in the concept of objective truth of events itself to create cover for Putin's maneuvers, not creating a new accepted truth.
KTM: " An Internet component that blocks their online recruiting and training efforts and uses metadata to track and destroy terrorist leaders."
Me: This sounds a lot like more cyber spying. And who's the greatest cyber spy of all time? Again, President Obama.
KTM: "A religious and ideological component which applauds moderate Muslim leaders – like Egyptian President Sisi and the Grand Imam of Al Ahzar Mosque- who speak out against radical Islam."
Me: Ouch. Egyptian President Sisi is now widely regarded in Egypt and the region as a worse tyrant than President Mubarak. He doesn't "speak out" against radical Islam, he jails, tortures and kills anybody suspected of associations with such. That's not exactly clean and neat, and certainly not representative of traditional American values. Nevertheless... who is Sisi's greatest patron? Again, President Obama.
KTM: "And finally, a military component which does not, repeat does not, require thousands of American combat forces, but rather gives our allies every inducement and all the arm twisting necessary so they put their own boots on the ground. And which supplies them with whatever they need to do the job."
Me: This is the only semi-novel and impactful recommendation of McFarland. She's basically saying, arm the Saudis and the Turks to fight our battles for us, because nobody else has the capacity even to accept such help. Israel does but they don't want to get involved. (BTW, gee, isn't it funny that our bestest ally in the Mideast isn't helping us to fight ISIS in Syria and Iraq? Why is that??) But we have problems with Turkey (see: Kurds); and with Saudi Arabia, which spends millions of dollars all over the world promoting a radical Wahhabist version of Sunni Islam; and which is still more concerned with Iran than ISIS or Al Qaeda.
So in summary, McFarland's prescriptions on how to fight "global jihad" boil down to a distinction without a difference vis-a-vis current U.S. policy. The truth is, there is only so much the U.S. can do in the world, especially in the fractious and conflicted Arab Middle East, and even less our "allies" are willing to do, no matter what bribes or inducements we throw at them.
Finally, I've said it before, but comparing all of these people to the Nazis or the USSR, and saying we can copy-paste what we did in the 40's or the Cold War to defeat them is moronic, stupid, wrong, impractical...I just don't know how else to say it. Political correctness has nothing to do with this fight either. Whenever you hear somebody say any of this, know you're listening to an old fogey who doesn't understand "franchised" terrorism and the root of these many regional conflicts -- which have nothing to do with Islam, originally -- that create power vacuums and provide the perfect breeding ground for Islamist terrorism.
Yes, America, it's war. Here's how we can stop losing and start winning
By K.T. McFarland
March 22, 2016 | FoxNews
URL: http://www.foxnews.com/opinion/2016/03/22/yes-america-its-war-heres-how-can-stop-losing-and-start-winning.html?intcmp=hphz01
Tuesday, March 22, 2016
Tuesday, February 16, 2016
Anti-vaxxers aren't dumb, just wrong
I agree, anti-vaxxers aren't stupid. They're by and large successful, well-educated, concerned parents. They're not negligent, and accusations that they are only offend them and harden their opposition.
This article falls short, however, because we must recognize that on the Internet, many "experts" and even people with medical degrees have an ax to grind against established medicine, and they use the vaccine "debate" as a plowshare to sow seeds of distrust of peer-reviewed medical science in general among these smart, concerned parents. These "natural medicine" proponents cultivate that doubt with junk science and flat-out wrong interpretations of cherry-picked scientific studies. (I know, I've taken the time, unlike most readers, to follow some of their citations of studies that don't support the conclusions they say they do).
Yet when scientific studies contradict natural medicine, the natural medicine proponents say we can't trust it because it's corrupt and "paid for" by Pharma. See, they get to have it both ways.
(Once I responded to a group of anti-vaxxers on Facebook and their leader challenged me to read an FDA label, any label, for all the adverse events that happened during testing, which the FDA requires to be listed, by law. That was the "expert's" aha moment. So I did. And when I pointed out that the FDA nevertheless approved this drug as safe and effective, the expert just said the FDA is corrupted. Having it both ways: case and point.)
The problem isn't that anti-vaxxers are dumb. They're smart. They think they're so smart that their fears and "common sense" can overcome peer-reviewed science; and there is a whole community of anti-science "experts" assuring them they are smart to reject established science.
I will say the natural medicine movement probably does have a lot to teach us about nutrition and preventive medicine (where established medical practice in the U.S. falls way short, due to a lack of attention to it); however, their claims that herbs, food, lifestyle choices, etc. can CURE any illness or PREVENT all infectious disease is unproven and therefore dangerous.
Proponents of natural medicine should find ways to test their hypotheses and publish their results, so that other scientists can attempt to replicate their results. They should rely on the scientific method, not argue that science is one big conspiracy.
Anti-Vaxxers Aren't Stupid
By Emma Green
February 16, 2016 | The Atlantic
URL: http://www.theatlantic.com/health/archive/2016/02/anti-vaxxers-arent-stupid/462864/
This article falls short, however, because we must recognize that on the Internet, many "experts" and even people with medical degrees have an ax to grind against established medicine, and they use the vaccine "debate" as a plowshare to sow seeds of distrust of peer-reviewed medical science in general among these smart, concerned parents. These "natural medicine" proponents cultivate that doubt with junk science and flat-out wrong interpretations of cherry-picked scientific studies. (I know, I've taken the time, unlike most readers, to follow some of their citations of studies that don't support the conclusions they say they do).
Yet when scientific studies contradict natural medicine, the natural medicine proponents say we can't trust it because it's corrupt and "paid for" by Pharma. See, they get to have it both ways.
(Once I responded to a group of anti-vaxxers on Facebook and their leader challenged me to read an FDA label, any label, for all the adverse events that happened during testing, which the FDA requires to be listed, by law. That was the "expert's" aha moment. So I did. And when I pointed out that the FDA nevertheless approved this drug as safe and effective, the expert just said the FDA is corrupted. Having it both ways: case and point.)
The problem isn't that anti-vaxxers are dumb. They're smart. They think they're so smart that their fears and "common sense" can overcome peer-reviewed science; and there is a whole community of anti-science "experts" assuring them they are smart to reject established science.
I will say the natural medicine movement probably does have a lot to teach us about nutrition and preventive medicine (where established medical practice in the U.S. falls way short, due to a lack of attention to it); however, their claims that herbs, food, lifestyle choices, etc. can CURE any illness or PREVENT all infectious disease is unproven and therefore dangerous.
Proponents of natural medicine should find ways to test their hypotheses and publish their results, so that other scientists can attempt to replicate their results. They should rely on the scientific method, not argue that science is one big conspiracy.
Anti-Vaxxers Aren't Stupid
By Emma Green
February 16, 2016 | The Atlantic
URL: http://www.theatlantic.com/health/archive/2016/02/anti-vaxxers-arent-stupid/462864/
Saturday, February 6, 2016
Trump sold old lie of health insurance across state lines
Trump just said in New Hampshire that he's going to unleash competition on U.S. healthcare after he repeals Obamacare, specifically by allowing Americans to buy health insurance across state lines.
Trump said the insurance companies are making a killing on Obamacare. The fact is, insurance companies are taking about 3 cents of every healthcare dollar in profit.
The problem is that U.S. medical care is too damn expensive. Insurance companies chip away at the edges and screw us in the process, through recission, yes, but they aren't the real problem.
Buying a cracker-jack health policy from a rinky-dink insurance provider in Rhode Island isn't going to do a thing for the cost of your care at home; it's only going to hit you when you actually need it that your insurance policy doesn't cover s**t.
Trump said the insurance companies are making a killing on Obamacare. The fact is, insurance companies are taking about 3 cents of every healthcare dollar in profit.
The problem is that U.S. medical care is too damn expensive. Insurance companies chip away at the edges and screw us in the process, through recission, yes, but they aren't the real problem.
Buying a cracker-jack health policy from a rinky-dink insurance provider in Rhode Island isn't going to do a thing for the cost of your care at home; it's only going to hit you when you actually need it that your insurance policy doesn't cover s**t.
Ted Cruz: The first talk radio presidential candidate
Ted Cruz is the first talk radio presidential candidate, so it's no wonder Glenn Beck has endorsed him. Rush Limbaugh, Sean Hannity and others also gush over him.
I say that because Cruz, like a talk radio host, owes his popularity to staking out the "purest" (read: most extreme) views within his party, without any hope of ever getting what he wants.
Cruz has never compromised in the Senate, he only grandstands, meaning he gets nothing done. He's a shameless self-promoter who has zero endorsements from his Republican colleagues in the Senate, who can't stand him.
It's amazing that Cruz looks like a strong candidate for the GOP nomination, having just won Iowa. (But not without some dirty tricks.)
It just goes to show that talk radio runs the GOP. Too bad talk radio takes zero responsibility for governing, just like Ted Cruz.
Now if you want a good look at the real Ted Cruz, in his young and striving young-adult years, read this:
http://theslot.jezebel.com/heres-what-happens-when-you-try-and-track-down-a-ted-cr-1752337625
I say that because Cruz, like a talk radio host, owes his popularity to staking out the "purest" (read: most extreme) views within his party, without any hope of ever getting what he wants.
Cruz has never compromised in the Senate, he only grandstands, meaning he gets nothing done. He's a shameless self-promoter who has zero endorsements from his Republican colleagues in the Senate, who can't stand him.
It's amazing that Cruz looks like a strong candidate for the GOP nomination, having just won Iowa. (But not without some dirty tricks.)
It just goes to show that talk radio runs the GOP. Too bad talk radio takes zero responsibility for governing, just like Ted Cruz.
Now if you want a good look at the real Ted Cruz, in his young and striving young-adult years, read this:
http://theslot.jezebel.com/heres-what-happens-when-you-try-and-track-down-a-ted-cr-1752337625
Sunday, November 29, 2015
Call me a pessimist, but... (On Sustainable Development)
The idea of "sustainable development" is not radical, crazy or hard to understand. Most anybody would have a hard time arguing against it, in theory. It just means economic development today that doesn't happen at the expense of future economic growth. Some people have called unsustainable development a "tax on the future" because it's indeed stealing prosperity from the young and generations that haven't been born yet.
The obstacle to sustainable development is not a lack of know-how or technology. By and large, we know what to do. But it does require trade-offs and sacrifices; and the pain won't be equally distributed. And that's the rub.
The obstacle to sustainable development is politics -- to be more precise, power. Those with power don't like it. (As an aside: I posit that those in power, among them some very "smart" and "visionary" thinkers, rarely think seriously about the future, alas.)
The people seriously concerned with sustainable development are by and large powerless: scientists, professionals in the "biz," activists, mid-level bureaucrats and such. They say and do and write enough to force those in power to pay lip service to their arrived at consensus. But that's about as far as it goes.
No, I'm not talking about an opposing global conspiracy. Real conspiracies are rare, and they're usually stupid, for stupid, shortsighted aims....
The real obstacle to change is that power is concentrated in a few hands, yet separated by nations, cultures and geographies, with few formal nodes of interdependence, where common aims can be realized....
An attendant obstacle is certainly capitalism. More broadly, the obstacle is our global political economy, with its capitalistic innovations tacked on to feudalistic holdovers and narrow nationalistic structures.
"There is a lack of global leadership," we hear again and again. True. But from where are the necessary global leaders supposed to emerge? It's asking too much from our global political economic systems.
Ideally, democracy should save us. The good ideas should convince the majority of what is needed, and republican leaders should pay heed to their wishes. Ideally, yes. But that's naive.
First, we don't have real republican democracy in most countries, either by force of regimes or by failed states of many stripes. Second, even where there is formal democracy, concentrated power (read: wealth) still trumps democracy by various well-understood technical means. (Again: there is no conspiracy here; secrecy is not at all necessary for concentrated power to subvert democracy; the facts are are all well-documented for those who take the time to pay attention.)
So where does that leave us? Up the proverbial creek, I'm afraid.
The richest nations do tend to be democratic. And democratic polities can exercise their power -- when dramatic events move them. But unfortunately, the world -- and sustainable development -- cannot wait for dramatic events to awaken the confused and slumbering giant of democratic public opinion. By the time the giant comes to, it will be too late.
Yes, I'm talking about global warming. And the death of our oceans and fisheries. And water shortages. And new global pandemics. And massive extinctions. And die-offs of millions if not billions of people. -- And for those ensconced in the relative safety of the developed, democratic world, something beyond mere discomfort and inconvenience, but drastic cuts in standards of living and overall well-being.
By nature I'm not a pessimist. But I simply do not see how our current political economic system can react -- or should I say, fail to react -- otherwise. Everyone is to blame -- and hence no one. I hope I'm wrong and that smarter, more visionary and leadership-worthy individuals will prove it.
This post was inspired by this book review : http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/S0140-6736(15)61215-6
The obstacle to sustainable development is not a lack of know-how or technology. By and large, we know what to do. But it does require trade-offs and sacrifices; and the pain won't be equally distributed. And that's the rub.
The obstacle to sustainable development is politics -- to be more precise, power. Those with power don't like it. (As an aside: I posit that those in power, among them some very "smart" and "visionary" thinkers, rarely think seriously about the future, alas.)
The people seriously concerned with sustainable development are by and large powerless: scientists, professionals in the "biz," activists, mid-level bureaucrats and such. They say and do and write enough to force those in power to pay lip service to their arrived at consensus. But that's about as far as it goes.
No, I'm not talking about an opposing global conspiracy. Real conspiracies are rare, and they're usually stupid, for stupid, shortsighted aims....
The real obstacle to change is that power is concentrated in a few hands, yet separated by nations, cultures and geographies, with few formal nodes of interdependence, where common aims can be realized....
An attendant obstacle is certainly capitalism. More broadly, the obstacle is our global political economy, with its capitalistic innovations tacked on to feudalistic holdovers and narrow nationalistic structures.
"There is a lack of global leadership," we hear again and again. True. But from where are the necessary global leaders supposed to emerge? It's asking too much from our global political economic systems.
Ideally, democracy should save us. The good ideas should convince the majority of what is needed, and republican leaders should pay heed to their wishes. Ideally, yes. But that's naive.
First, we don't have real republican democracy in most countries, either by force of regimes or by failed states of many stripes. Second, even where there is formal democracy, concentrated power (read: wealth) still trumps democracy by various well-understood technical means. (Again: there is no conspiracy here; secrecy is not at all necessary for concentrated power to subvert democracy; the facts are are all well-documented for those who take the time to pay attention.)
So where does that leave us? Up the proverbial creek, I'm afraid.
The richest nations do tend to be democratic. And democratic polities can exercise their power -- when dramatic events move them. But unfortunately, the world -- and sustainable development -- cannot wait for dramatic events to awaken the confused and slumbering giant of democratic public opinion. By the time the giant comes to, it will be too late.
Yes, I'm talking about global warming. And the death of our oceans and fisheries. And water shortages. And new global pandemics. And massive extinctions. And die-offs of millions if not billions of people. -- And for those ensconced in the relative safety of the developed, democratic world, something beyond mere discomfort and inconvenience, but drastic cuts in standards of living and overall well-being.
By nature I'm not a pessimist. But I simply do not see how our current political economic system can react -- or should I say, fail to react -- otherwise. Everyone is to blame -- and hence no one. I hope I'm wrong and that smarter, more visionary and leadership-worthy individuals will prove it.
This post was inspired by this book review : http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/S0140-6736(15)61215-6
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