Republicans of 2017 (and Russians) should beware the Republicans of the 2020s

When the dust settles on the Trump administration a new McCarthyism could be next.

As I mentioned in an earlier blogpost there appears to be no limit to the opportunistic treason of the current Rep party, particularly in the wake of the sacking of the head of the FBI.

I feel sorry for the historians that will have to explain this Comey business,

HISTORY STUDENT FROM 2025 : "so.. just before an election Comey announced to the press that thousands of security risk emails had been forwarded to a private account.. 
.. but didn't announce to the press that the Russians were attacking the election..
...then it turned out that the emails weren't a security risk and there weren't thousands of them...
WWWHHHAATTT?!?
What was everyone on in 2016?"

The very least you would expect this to do to would be to call into question the fairness of the last election. Even for Republicans. Even if there was no Russian interference (see below) the FBI has obviously disastrously undermined the voting system.

But no
the current Republican thinking seems to be
"lets move on"

And since the Democrats have allowed them to control all branches of US government it would appear they will be able to do that, at least until next years mid term elections.

HISTORY STUDENT FROM 2025 : ".. so yeah...Trump fired the man who made him president...
 the head of the FBI...
to cover up the evidence of it ever happening 
WHHAATT?!"

Rather than ask current Republicans and supporters to be non partisan and consider the long term health of their own democracy
which, on current form, is laughable
I would ask them to consider their own self interest, because there is no way this is going down well in the long term for you.

I imagine the Democrats in the next few decades will be pretty much what they are now, trying to be non-partisan, trying to do the right thing and failing miserably at both.

In the bitter aftermath of Trump I see most of the serious reaction to be from future Republicans, who I'm sure will have been convinced by then that Trump and his fellow travelers, like Bush II, were never a real Republicans anyway. That way of thinking would insulate the future GOP from contagion with the current generation.
History won't paint you as Republicans - you will be
 'Trump supporters'
something else entirely.

Who should really be worried though, in the long term, are the Russians. A country economically the size of Italy who it would appear are earning the long lasting enmity of a scientific and economic super power​.

I have a lot of personal goodwill towards Russia and Russians. I studied their history intensely at school. It's my favourite classical music. Some of my favourite movies are Russian.
My grandfather served on Arctic convoys in WW2.

Putin might have looked like a political chessmaster last year, now he's starting to look like a midget cheating at cards with a powerful drunken paranoiac who is too focused on his drinking - right now - to realise what is happening.

Japanese Admiral Isoroku Yamamoto   said this much more eloquently after December 7th 1941
"I fear we have awoken a sleeping giant and filled him with a terrible resolve"

Americans are lousy at getting over history - some of them even like to imagine the Revolutionary War was somehow equivalent to the Eastern Front 1941-45.

Even allowing for the fact that the United States has attempted to do similar (as has my own country)
I think we will all be long dead before the US gets over the history of 2016. The reaction in next couple of decades could make McCarthyism look mild. Intelligent Russians must be horrified as to where this could eventually go. They are going to be the conspiratorial boogeymen of the next 2 or 3 generations - even the Chinese might find dealing with them toxic.

One intelligence analyst on CNN suggested the Russians had only intended to empower Trump, not get him elected, making this one overly successful intelligence op that has run way out of control. Of the two Russian intelligence agencies that helped Trump into office "Fancy Bear" and "Cozy Bear" - which one was the Sorcerer and which one was the Sorcerers Apprentice?

Fantastic art from Matt Davies - Newsday and Andrews McMeel Syndicate & Politico's Cartoon Carousel

The White House's Ted Nugent : In his own lyrics

Jailbait you look so good to me
Jailbait won't you set me free
Jailbait you look fine fine fine
I know I've got to have you in a matter of time

Well I don't care if you're just thirteen
You look too good to be true
I just know that you're probably clean
There's one lil' thing I got do to you
She's young she's tender
Won't you please surrender
She's so fine she's mine
All the time, all mine mine
It's all right baby
It's quite all right I asked your mama
Wait a minute officer
Don't put those handcuffs on me
Put them on her and I'll share her with you

Jailbait, jailbait

---

Sarah Palin invited Ted as her guest to the White House apparently
"Because Jesus was booked"

White evangelicals voted overwhelmingly for Donald Trump, exit polls show

Relax, James Burke says everything will turn out fine -- if humanity can manage the introduction of the Nano Fabricator

"These major problems ... will be utterly irrelevant with 50 years" - James Burke

Dan Carlin's Hardcore History is finally getting the attention it deserves as the best history podcast. His other series Common Sense is also good for provocative political comment. A recent episode featured legendary BBC mind blower James Burke, really I think just to get Burke's take on Brexit and Trump. Burke talks about using AI gestalts for everyday voting, dereliction of the press, and his new Connections app.

But his response to a question about oncoming doom has stuck with me and I've tried to use it to lighten up every gloomy pub conversation since.

About 33 mins in responding to a question about climate change denial
http://www.dancarlin.com/common-sense-home-landing-page/#1489641597761-6eb3932e-085a

"These major problems of .. things like climate change and pollution and over population and so on
these will be utterly irrelevant with 50 years and yet we are busting a gut in some cases doing serious harm socially and economically to our societies in order to solve these problems when the problems will be gone in 50 years time when the Nano Fabricator arrives and blows them all away.... and everything else in the present day economy"

Dan Carlin responds somewhat skeptically that he'd heard his uncle predict the end of cancer, only to die of cancer, but Burke thinks is possible and is worth researching right now.

"If the United States decided to run a project with all the intensity and involvement that it ran the Apollo project on bringing the Nano Fabricator into existence sooner than 50s years.. putting money into nano technological resource then we would know fairly rapidly if it is going to happen, and if it is we could start planning socially for what we'll do when it turns up.. because it's going to cause, like all technological advance, massive social ripples....What do we do when the Nano Fabricator gives you everything you need using dirt air and water and a minor amount of other things that most people can get hold of for nothing?"

He talks about this here on New Mexico in Focus, with correspondent Gwyneth Doland
at 17.17

And again on Eddie Mair's droll PM show on Radio 4

and this article by James Evans in the New Statesmen
http://www.newstatesman.com/business/2013/09/forty-years-until-we-get-personal-nanofactories




When I try and explain this optimistic future
(in the pub)
the next thing mentioned, with regard to the Nano Fabricator is this..

Crazy eh? that'll never happen

James Burke Connections - The App

Fusion Reactors are now a thing - and they will fit in a van apparently

So
Princeton Field-Reversed Configuration experiment (PFRC-2) magnetic confinement fusion team

PRINCETON FUSION ENGINE

is bench testing a fusion engine which works. It's small, only a few metres in length and apparently cannot be scaled up but it sounds like you could fit it in typical American van.

TYPICAL AMERICAN VAN

It runs on Helium 3. I'm not sure if that counts as unleaded. I would imagine so.
Cleaner than the Tocamak reactors being developed at huge cost in France and I'm sure cleaner than diesel.
I certainly trust Princeton on mileage more than Volkswagen right now.


Here is the engaging Dr Steph from Princeton Satellite Systems talking in full about her fusion rocket. The fusion specifics start at about 6.48.

You might enjoy how they spend about 5 seconds on the real world implications of actual fusion power on Earth...

And then 15 minutes  explaining how to on strap it to a space probe and send it to Pluto

Colour shade on electromagnetic spectrum indicates proximity to genuine Mad Science

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

​​This post is a horrifyingly dumbed down version of this post by Zain Husain
https://brownspaceman.com/direct-fusion-drive/


PintofScience is a thing
I'm more Pint than Science myself but I like to be supportive

Princeton are obviously awesome (is that scientific?)

Think Big for Brexit Deal : UK, Ukraine, Turkey and Libya could be the EU's 'Interface States'

One way out of the morass of Brexit talks and Article 50 is to call the bluff of the Europeans who promote the big vision of their transnational project. The UK, to EU eyes, is currently an inward looking organisation reducing the great problems of the world to local issues from an earlier age.

We could counter that one of the reasons UK has lost interest in the EU project is that the EU has been sidelining a few issues on it's borders recently.  Ukraine to the east and Libya to the south are both gripped by civil wars, both of which the EU (including the UK) has some responsibility for igniting.  On Europe's south east border economically booming Turkey is sliding into authoritarianism.

Ukraine and Turkey have both been offered the carrot of EU membership in the past in a frankly unrealistic and disingenuous manner which did nothing really but cause them further internal turmoil.

The UK Prime Minister talks, of the positives for Europe which could come from a good Brexit deal. The future of the world economy is obviously that of large distinct trading blocks and we have to ensure relations between these blocks are not harmed by the encroaching isolationist sentiment.

Perhaps we could offer a blanket solution to the EU's problem border states with other trading blocs which would also invigorate world trade and resolve Brexit?

UK, Ukraine, Turkey and Libya could be defined as 'Interface States'. 

'Interface States' would have

• Hybrid of local/EU trade rules (as the UK and Turkey currently have anyway) featuring favourable trade tarrifs with EU, to be particularly applied to transit goods coming in from outside the EU from larger trading blocs.

• The option of using the Euro. Currency policy such as interest rates would still be controlled by the ECB and it would be made clear to all that no bail out would ever be offered to states outside the EU. Large parts of Africa already have their own currencies pegged to the Euro and there are ten nations currently using the US dollar without any control or influence on US monetary policy.

• By default no free movement of labour - which has been the major stumbling bloc for integration with UK and Turkey and would be with Libya and North Africa. This could codify rules to protect EU frontiers.

Ukraine would be the interface with Russian bloc, and could include a wider trade deal initially more favourable to Belarus and Georgia than Russia, with an inducement to Russia for further progress if the current semi-Cold War improves. (This would at least provide some positive way out of the current impasse with Putin).

Turkey would be the interface state with the Middle East - as it effectively is at the moment but without the formal status and guarantees it probably needs to work effectively long term.

Libya, or perhaps in the short term Tunisia, would be the interface state with Africa, A semi-Eurozone in North Africa could only be good for local stabilization and might encourage economic migrants to trade and proper instead of risking their lives crossing the Mediterranean.

UK would obviously be the Interface state with North America and the Anglozone and the Commonwealth. (It wouldn't have to adopt the Euro).

We could go farther.

Cuba could be offered Interface State status to become EU's favoured partner in Central/South America, which would be a huge diplomatic gain for the EU in that area.
US objections would disappear as this inevitably improved Cuba's internal politics.

A comprehensive oil/gas deal in the South Atlantic could be offered if the Falklands became the EU's Interface State with South America. If the Falklands retained British sovereignty and security guarantees but adopted the Euro and in every other economic respect became a controlled conduit for EU trade how could that be a bad thing economically and politically all round?

This could be applied further as well, out beyond the EU.

By sidelining national politics completely Taiwan could be the Interface State between North America, Japan and China, leading to a wider solution which would lesson tensions in the area.

Afghanistan or even Kashmir could be declared Interface States between South Asia and China, allowing an influx of trade and investment which would undermine the political problems.

To codify this Interface States could even be given their own trading organisation and forum at the UN.

I've heard this idea promoted before as 'Britain as the bridge to the Americas' but it seemed an ambitious idea wrapped in British self interest. We should avoid being portrayed as little Englanders, recover the internationalism of our forefathers and be prepared to roll this idea out on a global scale - with the help of the Europeans.

I'm sure  cynical post Brexit Europeans will be suspicious of this, thinking perhaps in terms of Perfidious Albion

(I voted Remain by the way and consider myself a committed European)

but the message endlessly disappointed Europeans need to learn is on the front page of every self improvement book -

"Learn to accept the situation the way it is"

The bloody vote happened.
Most people really don't like the result.
Let's get on and make the best of it.

If the Interface States idea seems hopelessly impractical and optimistic consider the state of Ireland after Brexit. With no hard border to the Republic in the south, Northern Ireland is likely to become a  test case 'Interface State' between the EU/UK whatever happens.

And in any case I think right now the world needs all the optimism it can get.

The Defeat of the Floating Batteries at Gibraltar, 13 September 1782. By John Singleton Copley (1738–1815)

The breathtaking, treasonous, self interest of the US Republican Party is probably unique in world history

You have to admire the Russian operation of 2016 - which perhaps in the long term has fatally damaged faith in both U.S. political parties,
and Wikileaks,
and the concept of truth itself.

But to achieve this it has had the help of what is perhaps a uniquely dedicated political institution, the Republican Party, an organisation which historically has risen above petty concerns like the good of its own country and citizens to embrace naked self interest in a way I don't think I've ever seen in any other historic example anywhere in the world.

I was shocked by the House Intelligence hearing into Russian hacking hearing a few days ago. I shouldn't have been.

Despite broad consensus of Russian interference in the 2016 election, Republican Trey Gowdy only wants to prosecute those 'leakers' trying to expose the extent of the conspiracy. Even the Russians must be embarrassed to watch this.


Treason is harsh dirty word not really used in UK politics since the Elizabethan era - but it seems inadequate now to describe the acts of politicians quite prepared to cover up and even encourage malign foreign influence if it helps them prosper politically. It is almost pantomime villain territory and would  be difficult to believe had not the Republican party been quite capable of similar in two previous historical examples.

In 1968 Republicans working behind the scenes sabotaged the Paris Peace talks to ensure the Democratic government at the time did not get credit for ending the Vietnam War. The war by then had already killed 30,000 Americans and countless Vietnamese.Thanks to Richard Nixon's successful electioneering tactics the Vietnam War would go on until the disastrous collapse in 1975.

In similar fashion - it is alleged (by many) - that Republicans prolonged the Iranian hostage crisis in 1981, again to ensure a Republican victory in the election of 1980.
 "Allegations that the Reagan administration negotiated a delay in the release of the hostages until after the 1980 presidential election have been numerous but unproven. Gary Sick, principal White House aide for Iran and the Persian Gulf on the Carter administration’s National Security Council, claimed in his book October Surprise: America's Hostages in Iran and the Election of Ronald Reagan that CIA Director William Casey and possibly Vice President George H. W. Bush went to Paris to negotiate such a delay. Many others have made the same allegations."

We could perhaps add the Southern Strategy to this. Though it does not include the collusion of a foreign power it does indicate the Republicans willingness to undermine social and racial cohesion within their own nation if it suits their political agenda.

And don't think that sacred constitution is safe either. More recently the Republicans, who routinely wave around the United States constitution as if it were personally handed to them from Mount Sinai,  have also sought to directly undermine that supremely sacred document to their own political ends. The Founding Fathers enshrined within the constitution checks and balances to moderate the influence of the Presidency, such as the Congress (the lower chamber) and the Senate (upper chamber) and the creation of a independent Supreme Court. Membership of the Supreme Court is for life and it is with the power of a president to replace Supreme Court members if one should pass away.
Or it was.
Until 2016, when a President elected with a substantial majority in 2012 was blocked from appointing his own choice of Supreme Court judge by Republican Congress, an act which directly undermines the obvious written intent of the US constitution.

It would seem, for the purposes of the Supreme Court at least, the United States is already a one party state.

Republicans are enabled in this by the other party, the Democrats, who have seemingly fallen off their high horse so many times now they have serious concussion. "We go high, they go low" might be a noble policy when dealing with normal political opponent but when dealing with an opposition quite happy to even collude with a hostile foreign  power and cover it up, ongoing Democratic ineptitude and weakness must hover around treason itself.

I'm not being naive about my own country. The Conservatives have rigged at least one UK election  and members of the Labour Party and the Unions that backed them in the 1970s have long been suspected to be under Russian influence. Perhaps Nazi influence on British society in the 1930s or German influence on the monarchy before that could also be cited as examples of recent political treachery in the UK.

But these are individuals, not an entire organisation with an established record of doing similar. There is nothing, I think historically in any nation which compares with the naked greed for power AT ANY COST which can be seen in the Republican Party right now. I'm sure in future they will defend themselves by hiding behind the breathtaking incompetence of the current occupant of the White House, but this is a much bigger issue than one man. He is a bumbling opportunist who was presented with the opportunity to become the most powerful man on Earth - can we really blame him for taking that opportunity?

The ones who will ultimately carry the can for this are the ones who enabled his rise - and somehow future historians will have to explain how they chose to do this at the expense of the country they swore an oath to protect.

Netflix IRONFIST is not bad (but you should be watching LEGION)

Netflix's new Marvel series, IRONFIST, is getting a critical pounding. Don't believe the hype. It won't win any awards but it's far from the worst superhero show on tv.

Confession - I've read the comics.

As is, Danny Rand is a long way from the most original comics character of all time. A clumsy amalgam of Bruce Wayne and the 'lost in ShangriLa' legend used for The Shadow and more recently Dr Strange, there is little new about him beyond the elevation of a martial arts concept 'chi', into a full blown super power, the IronFist. He's a bit dull, and obviously in the long lead up to THE DEFENDERS, you can see why Netflix chose to get to Danny Rand last after Matt Murdock, Luke Cage and Jessica Jones.

That said, after his rehabilitation in 'Heroes For Hire' team up comics, where Rand and Luke Cage setup a mercenary superhero team, some talented comics writers have had a crack at the character over the years and by concentrating less on the Shadow/Shangri-La/Dr Strange/Martial Arts yawn background and more on the Rand family saga, and interaction with other (better) characters like Colleen Wing and Luke Cage, he now has his own identity.

They've obviously tried to go some way with this in the new Netflix series with, I think (up to Ep 2 anyway) some level of success. It's a fairly pedestrian version of something like BILLIONS with some fairly likable characters that might grown on you. This series probably only exists to setup Danny's friendship with Luke Cage - it not is not meant to be the definitive statement in any way on Marvel martial arts characters. Yes it does have a white western guy teaching martial arts to an American Asian, but it's not like the villain is a fiendish Mandarin supervillian with a stringy mustache and long fingernails*

IRONFIST is definitely a notch below in every department DAREDEVIL, LUKE CAGE  and especially JESSICA JONES but
trust me
it's a hell of a lot better than MARVEL'S AGENTS OF SHIELD. Perhaps that's the main issue with IRONFIST, it's Netflix expectation. Their standard level of product is so good the merely mediocre looks terrible in comparison.

Mainstream tv critics who've embarrassed themselves over admitting liking the other Marvel Netflix shows are particularly laying into this one for a variety of reasons and should really get over themselves. DAREDEVIL  is good but seriously overrated for me - sliding heavily into repetition and wasting great acting talent. LUKE CAGE starts magnificently before running into blaxploitation parody. Only JESSICA JONES really sustains itself until the end of the run.

Those looking to punch IRONFIST for not being on the same supposed level as DAREDEVIL should be looking at FX's breathtaking LEGION, which quite frankly is making them all look like children's tv.



*The premier martial artist in Marvel's universe of superheroes is of course full blown, 100% Chinese Shang-Chi, who has no super powers beyond being THE Marvel Master of Kung Fu - which keeps him surprisingly competitive in a world of genuine gods and monsters.

Shang-Chi, a son of Hu'nan province, will initially have little in the way of racial complication for his screen depiction unless we get as far as his parentage, at which point the racial correctness movement will no doubt go into meltdown. For the most part the character is a close analog of Bruce Lee's character from ENTER THE DRAGON, but Shang-Chi's father is no less than the arch-devil of racially insensitive western depictions - the Fiendish Fu Manchu!

Tilda Swinton was the best thing about DR STRANGE.