Russia attacks America, kills 450,000 Americans

 Ex president Trump’s medical advisor on the pandemic, Dr Brix, just said that the first 100,000 COVID-19 deaths could be expected as everyone was trying to understand what was happening, but the next 450,000 deaths were due to Trump incompetence/?/inaction/sabotage?  Her quote:

“All of the rest of them,” she said, referring to almost 450,000 deaths, “in my mind, could have been mitigated or decreased substantially had the administration acted more aggressively.”

Trump’s stupidity is easy to blame for this, but I think it was worse than that. I think he was acting at the direction of his master, Putin, who was and is waging war on America.  Putin wants to destroy America, and destroy democracy around the world. 

If Russia sent a nuke into an American city that killed 450,000 Americans we would all know we were at war.  But he sent a vicious clown with the brains of a turnip, and strict instructions to tear America apart.

Sorry to say, we are at war, and I thank goodness that our current president, Joe Biden knows it.

Magicians dream , scientists and engineers build

We are, of course, in perilous climate change times - forest firestorms in the West, power plant killing freezes in the South, 100 year floods in Australia, killing off of coral reefs due to heat stress, etc. etc. etc.  

Our approach has to be two pronged - less production of carbon and methane - and more pulling of carbon from the atmosphere.  There are three projects that I have recently read about that give me hope.

You pull carbon out of the atmosphere by adding greenery on the ground.  There are scientists, the "Weather Makers", looking to turn the Sanai desert green in Egypt, and they have a plan, and the Egyptian government may be interested in doing this.  These scientists were inspired by a documentary- "Green Gold" - that showed that China did just that in a desert within their country.  I have seen a similar documentary on Netflix but I don't recall it's name.  Can you imagine if the greening of the desert in the Sanaii succeeds, what the very wealthy Middle Eastern nations might do to the terrible deserts they inhabit?

There is another wonderful documentary on Netflix named "Kiss the Ground" that shows smaller projects in the U.S. about returning desertified land back to lush agriculture with green farming practices.  Very worth seeing.

A second idea is about an economic way to reduce the production of carbon by covering the 1500+ miles of Calilfornia aqueducts that transport northern california water south to the rest of California.  Cover the aqueducts with floating solar panels. This, of course, produces non carbon producing power during the day, and it also reduces the evaporation of water from these extensive canals.  Pretty deeply researched project and I hope it moves forward.

I read a third article about the development of plasma jet engines to fly our airplanes - using a generated electromagnetic field to create a plasma that propels the jet.

Not all of us are environmental scientists.  Not all of us are green power engineers. But all of us can and do dream of reversing the desertification of the planet. We can all dream of environmentally supportive power generation.  We can all dream of the human race waking up to the reality that the environment, that nature, that wild forests and jungles, and rivers, and oceans are as essential to our human survival as strong economies and functioning beneficial governments and industries.

I am pretty sure of one thing: the smartest kids in MIT, Stanford, UC Berkeley, Cal Tech, England, France, India and all around the world are dreaming of coming up with magnificent breakthroughs in green energy, environmental restoration, carbon capture, energy storage, etc. etc. etc.  They are not wasting their time dreaming of developing more environmental damage.

We dream, they make it real.  By our dreaming it, we become much more accepting of the changes that the new science will produce.

Why do I keep thinking it is going to end?

A young white Southern Christian man slaughtered 8 people in a racist attack on Asian women.  This is hard.  Another white Christian killer.  When will it end?  Why do I think it will end?  Another white Christian bigoted killer terrorist.  It goes on and on.

Why?

What do Fundamentalist Christians in the South (and around the country) get taught? 

• To admire and perhaps worship a racist, authoritarian, fascist president - as a model of what it is to be a man.
• That as Christians they are persecuted even though they are the rulers not the ruled
• That they have been chosen by God Himself to work God's will - as defined by the racist authoritarian preachers propagandizing them
• That they are "in the world but not of the world" - and the world is anyone different than their white selves
• That sex is sinful and Satan tempts virtuous young men to sin - and therefore women are tools of Satan
• That to be a good manly Christian they need guns and the willingness to kill
• That God is vindictive, and so should you be vindictive
• That Christ will return and burn the sinful world to the ground because the non White Christian world deserves to be destroyed by --- Jesus? 

People are being taught, propagandized, brainwashed into believing that a twisted destructive model of manhood and spirituality are goals to attain to.  This has nothing to do with the actual teachings and life of Jesus Christ himself, whose radical message to the world was of gentleness and love.

Put the teachings of Christ into the hands of a violent chauvinist white supremacist on a pulpit and you get white supremacist Christian terrorists who kill and kill and kill and....

Jim Crow is alive and ill in the Republican Party

After the killing of Reconstruction in the South in 1876 by withdrawing Federal Troops that were enforcing it, the white supremacist South disenfranchised and terrorized blacks and instituted the reality of Jim Crow.  One main feature of Jim Crow was keeping blacks from the polls.

Tragically, Jim Crow is rising again.  Suppression of black votes seems to be pretty much the only strategy that today's Republican Party has.  The most recent and obvious example is the statement by Arizona Republican John Kavanaugh:

"...we don’t mind putting security measures in that won’t let everybody vote — but everybody shouldn’t be voting... “Quantity is important, but we have to look at the quality of votes, as well.””

"Quality" of votes?  You mean only white votes?  Yup.  Hard to be more blatant than that.  

The Supreme Court made a tragic mistake (?) when they overturned the Voting Rights Act in the Shelby county v. Holder ruling in 2013.  They claimed the racism was gone and the "previously racist" states could be trusted going forward.  

Nope.

The restraints were taken off those states and racist voter suppression measures were enacted with gusto - from closing polling places in black and brown communities, to requiring onerous voter ID requirements, to preventing early voting, to restricting mail in voting, etc.  Jim Crow all over again.

The pretense is that the Republicans are nobly protecting against voter fraud.  But the Reps have been trying and FAILING to prove voter fraud for decades.  

Most infamously, Kris Kobach of Kansas pretty much based his whole career on the racist claim that black and brown people were committing massive voter fraud.  He failed to prove it over and over again. His most recent most consequential failure was when Trump had him head up a commission to find voter fraud and disbanded it as quietly as possible in 2018 without producing a report.  The report, if honest, would have simply said that they could not find meaningful voter fraud.

So, what to do?  LIE.  

The Former Guy in the White House came up with the Big Lie that he won the election in a landslide and voter fraud stole the election from him.  Big Lies end up killing people and this one still could.  But, for now, Republicans are content to just do everything they can to suppress black and brown votes.

Jim Crow rides again.

Reaganism is dead, Trump killed it

The basic idea of Reaganism was "government is not the solution; government is the problem."  The financial crisis of 2008 proved that wrong (deregulation of banking almost destroyed the world economy) but it wasn't until the idiotic Trump presidency that the wrongness of a destroyed government became obvious - without a government led attack on COVID-19 the pandemic killed over half a million Americans and ravages the world.  

If Obama had still been president in 2017, or if Hillary had been, the Federal Government would have very likely moved into a warlike footing against the virus with the Defense Authorization Act being used to flood the country with effective PPE, virus testing advancements, and quick response vaccine research, distribution, and implementation.  The only thing Trump did right was spend Federal Government funds on Operation Warpspeed to develop vaccines (contrary to basic Reaganism idea of shackling of the government) but he failed to follow up with distribution and implementation.  Hard to find things more damaging than obsolete dogma.

So, the country turned its suffering eyes to Biden, who promised and is implementing an active, effective Federal Government led response to the pandemic, to child povery, to racial inequality, to the many things that only government can do and which private industry is incapable of doing.  I have mentioned often that we need both capitalism (private industry innovation and drive) and socialism (government boundaries for safety, scienetific research, economic policy direction, economic safety net, public benefits via public spending).

Perhaps Reaganism was vital to overcome the Stagflation of the '70s and defeat Soviet communism, but today is very different from 40 years ago. Reaganism is totally incapable of solving the thee greatest crises of today - the Pandemic, Climate Change, and crippling economic inequality.  These require the Federal Government.

Reagan changed politics 40 years ago (I voted for him twice).  He limited goverment and boosted business.

Now the country wants to change again, to meet today's world - a competent, expertize driven government to deal with today's world.

Maybe we should thank the astonishingly ignorant and incompetent Former Guy in the White House - he gutting the government of expertise, science, diplomacy, money, and purpose.  The result was the Pandemic raging while the Former Guy tweeted about what a wonderful job HE was doing, and tweeting about how much he hated Libs.

America is on a new path.  Excellent.

I was wrong about welfare

It turns out that welfare to the poor actually gives them a hand up. It’s not just a handout.  It helps people find and do work rather than incentivizes not working.  Reagan was wrong.  I was wrong when I was in my Republican years.

Stockton CA just did an experiment where they gave $500 per month to the poor. It made a huge difference in their lives, including the ability to find employment.  Annie Lowery of the Atlantic wrote an article -  “Stockton’s Basic-Income Experiment Pays Off”.

From the article:

“ More work, less destitution, more family stability, less strained social networks, less stress, fewer incidences of homelessness, fewer skipped meals: This is what welfare could give the country.“

Andrew Lang’s idea of a Universal Basic Income May be the best thing to do after all.  Especially in the coming world of ever increasing career obsolescence as a result of technology.  

America has been lost in obsolete dogmas long enough. Time to rethink. Follow the data.