Month: February 2017

Even if you don’t like our honey badger President, you’ve got to love the way he abuses the media.  I remember Nixon’s press conferences, and how he loathed the press, but never challenged them.  We’ve never had a President willing to take these puffed up, self reverential lightweights head on.  He seems perfectly candid, telling us how he really feels.  It was genuine, authentic, and a delight to behold.  He’s being honest with the American people, and it’s the best policy.

And everything he said was true.  The elite media is a hive, and the Queen has issued her directive.  Trump must be destroyed.  Nothing else matters.  As long as Trump is in the White House, they will swarm around him, searching for an opening to make a sting.  But forewarned is forearmed, and most people in this country don’t like or trust the media, so he can beat them, just as he did in the general election.  It’s war, for the duration.  He may as well face the facts, and rally the people to his side.  Everyone at the Saturday rally in Florida will encourage him to keep hitting them, and he will,  no doubt.  And the best part is that he enjoys doing it.  He’s got that New York, in your face, attitude, and slapping the media around is a form of recreation.

I’ve been trying to figure out where all this anti-Russian hysteria is coming from.  Russia is no threat to our national security.  They’re not the ones challenging our right to patrol the seas of the world.  That’s China.  Behind our ocean borders, we are protected by our Navy, and as long as we rule the waves no one sets foot on American soil without our permission.  The Russians learned long ago that it was pointless to challenge us on the high seas, so we have nothing to fear from them.

Except, of course, their nuclear arsenal.  But maybe the best way to deter a nuclear attack is to normalize our relations with Moscow.  Russia is a great power, and has legitimate security concerns.  If possible, these concerns should be accommodated.  If that’s not possible, we should demonstrate our good will to the Russian people, and deepen our relationship with them.  They could not have beaten the Nazis without our help, and there is a reservoir of good will between our two peoples.

I think it all comes down to money.  Chamber of Commerce Republicans (and that’s most of them) do the bidding of their contributors, and big business wants the United States to defend Europe.  If we don’t,  it’s bad for business, and if a bunch of American soldiers from the heartland have to die to keep the multinational corporations happy, so be it.

I think that’s contemptible.  And it’s unnecessary.  As Peter Zeihan points out in The Absent Superpower, “As a percentage of GDP, the United States is the most self-sufficient country in the world.”   Only 8.25% of our GDP comes from merchandise exports, and a third of that goes to Canada or Mexico.  We can get by without Europe.

The Task Force’s Mike Stern did a little research on the history of the BBA in Maryland, and made some interesting findings.  Maryland State Senate President “Irish” Mike Miller was the first of ten siblings, is the father of five, and grandfather of fourteen.  As a freshman State Senator in 1975 he vote for one of the first BBA Resolutions.  It was sponsored by a man he greatly respected, Senator Jim Clark.  In 1987 he was elected Senate President, and used his position to help defeat a rescinding Resolution sponsored by Delegate Nancy Kopp.

Miller is still Senate President, after 30 years.  He’s a spry 74, and has all his wits about him.  Kopp is now the Treasurer of Maryland, and is once again pushing a rescinding Resolution.  I’ll hazard a guess that President Miller will not look kindly on this proposal.  When he first voted for the BBA the national debt was $500 billion.  That was 40 years ago, and the debt is now, at $20 trillion, 40 times as large.  I’ll bet even George Soros isn’t going to convince Mike Miller that we don’t need a BBA.

If we can keep Maryland, we won’t need Montana, and our road has one less obstacle.

 

The “deep state” is heavily invested in Russophobia.  Establishing good relations with Russia undermines not only its power, but its reason for existence.  Russia has been the greatest threat to our security for 70 years, and if that threat is removed, it’ll put a lot of spies out of work.  The CIA might have to be downsized!   May the saints protect us.

So it is that the most visibly pro-Russian member of the Trump circle, General Flynn, is torpedoed by the intelligence community.  If Trump believes that’s what happened, he’ll want vengeance, and he’ll want heads to roll.  Rather than deflect his drive for normalization of relations with Russia, he’ll double down.  He campaigned, very explicitly, on wanting friendship with Russia  —  it’s part of his electoral mandate.  I remember him asking the audience at one of his rallies, “Wouldn’t it be a good thing to be friends with Russia?”  The audience nodded in approval, and Trump felt validated.

The American people have no grudge against the Russians.  Those of us with long memories remember the Second World War, and the fact that it was the Russians who beat the Wehrmacht, and it was the Russians who paid the price.  Better them than us.  They were our allies then, and could be again.

NATO is not a mutual defense treaty.  We’re not looking for fellow NATO members to protect us from invasion.  As a continental island, we don’t need them.  But they need us, or so they think.  Geopolitically, they get, we give, and get nothing in return.  If you’re a believer in America First, that’s a lousy deal.

Maybe I’m naive, but I don’t think Putin has any intention of starting a European war.  He wants NATO out of his immediate neighborhood, and who can blame him?  It’s an anti-Russian alliance.    Geopolitical guru Peter Zeihan disagrees.  He thinks that war is already underway, in Ukraine, and that Russia will need to invade and occupy all or parts of eleven countries in order to achieve the security it craves.

I don’t believe it.  Under Merkel, the Germans are no threat to Russia, and the Germans are the only people that Russia needs to be worried about.  The Germans are in the process of becoming Swedes.  For hundreds of years, the Swedes were one of the bad asses of Europe, and then they gave up on it.  There was really no point to it.  So they holed up in Sweden, and don’t want to fight anybody.

I don’t think today’s Germans are any more militaristic than the Swedes.  If anybody ought to be anti-war, it should be the Germans, and I think they are.  And I think Putin understands this, and isn’t really worried about the Germans, especially if we’ve left the scene.

And I think that’s the key to peace in Europe  — American withdrawal.  Bring the troops home, and let the Europeans figure things out for themselves.  The Germans beat the Russians in World War One, and the Russians returned the favor in World War Two.  Do they want a rubber match?  If they do, they’re crazy, and we want no part of the insanity.

An American withdrawal from Europe will be a boon to Russia.  Our presence in Europe was provocative, and entirely unnecessary in a post Cold War world.  Everybody should want the Russians to have a sense of security.  It lessens the chance of a European war.

And an American withdrawal allows us to pursue our national interest vis a vis China.  We want the Russians to back us in any confrontation with the Chinese.  If we’re out of Europe, that’s likely to happen.

It seems to me that the Chinese are constructing a stationary aircraft carrier in the South China Sea, and that this aircraft carrier would be a threat to ours.  If that’s the case, counter measures will be required.  If we have to go nose to nose with the Chinese, we want the Russians at our backs, not theirs.

Once we establish cordial relations with Russia, and come to an understanding with China, we’ll be at the dawning of the Age of Aquarius.  An astronomical age lasts 2,160 years, so we should be good until the year 4177.

If there is a war between any of the Great Powers in this century, it will be a monument to human stupidity right up there with World War One.  Are we really that dumb?

Nobody likes to look like a fool.  I repeatedly told my wife, with complete confidence, based on a lifetime of studying and practicing politics, that Trump could not possibly win the Republican nomination.  I am regularly reminded of these assurances.  I’ve got a lot of company.  I’ve come to terms with my comeuppance.  The ruling class hasn’t.

Right before the election NYT economic guru Paul Krugman gave everyone a stock tip.  Trump was going to destroy the market, and it would be, like, forever, before it came back.  Like a lot of people in the market, I’m up 20% since the election.  I wonder how Krugman’s portfolio is doing.  My God, he’s a Nobel Prize winning economist.  This is embarrassing.  He’s been humiliated, and it’s got to piss him off.

The whole ruling elite has been made fools of.  How many pony tailed poli sci profs told their students what I told Babbie about this election?   With utter and absolute confidence.  How many fancy cocktail parties in the liberal enclaves featured loud and confident predictions of Trump’s demise?   How many jokes were cracked about how sweet it was going to be to see Trump crushed, in a landslide, no less.

To make things even worse, the Orange Dynamo has not changed his ways since the election.  He’s as outrageous as President as he was before.  He says and does things that are outside accustomed political mores.  And he’s getting away with it!  This cannot be.  This cannot stand.

All of which results in Trump Derangement Symptom, a far more lethal strain than its predecessors.  But anger is not a strategy, and the longer the left wallows in impotent rage, the better for Trump team.

We passed out of Wyoming Senate Rules today, 4-0.  A floor vote next week.  #29.  Every one is bigger than the one before.  There has got to be a magical political number, like the real Article V magic number of 34.  It’s when people take you seriously.  I guess it’s #32, or three more.  If we succeed in Arizona, Idaho and Wisconsin, which all look very, very good, we’ll hit #32, with Kentucky, South Carolina, Minnesota, Virginia and Montana still available, to one degree or another.  They’re all controlled by conservative Republicans, who all agree that the debt has the potential to sink this country.

They just don’t understand Article V. It’s like an alien concept.  They can’t figure out how something so fundamental to the federal Constitutional system can be so, well, obscure.  How come they’ve never heard of it before?  Why hasn’t it ever been used, if it’s so safe?

Most of these people can be educated.   But then there’s the Birchers, and you can’t reason with these people.  It’s like they’re in a cult.  And the Koch brothers are the leaders of this cult.   Their father, Fred, was an original Board member of the John Birch Society, and Article V scared him.  At this time, in the mid-50’s, the Republican Party was at a low ebb, other than the White House, and the Birchers even thought Eisenhower was a Communist dupe.   Traditional American conservatives, like Fred Trump, were very afraid we were going to lose it all, that the Constitution was going to be destroyed.  In their extremely weak political position, with the Democrats and liberals having an electoral lock, it made sense to oppose the use of Article V.  I would have opposed its use in the 50’s myself, because if it was going to be used, it would be used by the left.

But times have changed, and we’re in the dominant political position, and conservative opposition to Article V is lunacy.  Some one needs to explain this to the Koch brothers. Maybe Sen. Mike Lee could do it.

 

When the Soviet Union dissolved, eliminating our only superpower rival, we should have reexamined all of our obligations around the world.  What made sense in the era of the Cold War didn’t necessarily make any sense at all when it was over.  But instead of reducing our commitments, we increased them.  We expanded NATO, for no damn good reason.

We got involved in the Middle East because of oil.  The fracking revolution has eliminated our dependence on this region, and it is no longer required for our national security.  As long as we needed that oil we had to stay involved in this hellish part of the world.  Now we don’t need the oil, and we don’t need the trouble.   Sunnis and shias have been butchering each other for centuries.  If they want to get back at it, that’s their business.

I’ve started Peter Zeihan’s The Absent Superpower: The Shale Revolution and a World Without America.  Ir follows his excellent 2o14 book, The Accidental Superpower, in which he described the foreign policy view that Trump campaigned on.  You have to give this guy credit.  He was calling for a Trump to emerge, and to say exactly what Trump did say, on foreign policy.

With no superpower rival, and with no need of foreign oil, Zeihan predicts a Great American Retrenchment.  The way he sees it, we’re in the catbird seat.  We’ve got everything we need, and are due for an industrial renaissance.  We will have peace and prosperity.

Not so, for the rest of the world, according to Zeihan.  It will all go completely to hell.  I haven’t read that part yet, but you can see where he’s headed.  Without the United States as the world’s policeman, there will be no police, no “law” enforcement.  Everybody is on their own, and the strong will survive, and the weak will perish.

In other words, thank God you’re an American.  Zeihan can get a little apocalyptic, but he’s basically right.  I have more confidence than he does about the ability of other countries to figure a way to a better future.  But one thing seems clear, to me.  American citizenship is more valuable than ever, and will only increase in value.  There’s a high demand for it, and for good reason.

As far as I’m concerned, it’s in the best interest of the people of this country that any immigration, from  here on, be restricted to people that bring something to the table, wherever  they’re from.  If someone wants to bring a million dollars into this country, to invest, and spend, and put people to work, then that person is bringing something to the table.

Or we could use an auction.   But letting law breakers have it is crazy.

 

 

 

If you travel across California you’ll cross the mighty California Aqueduct, the legacy of the great Edmund G. “Pat” Brown, governor of California from 1959 until 1967, when he was defeated by Ronald Reagan.  It gathers the waters of the northern Sierra and transports them 400 miles south, where it serves the people of Los Angeles.  It’s one of many which were built by the California State Water Project.  California has, since then, done virtually nothing to ensure itself an adequate supply of water.  The Aqueduct stands as a monument Pat Brown, still serving his people 50 years after it was built.

Pat’s son, Jerry  — or, as he’s semi-affectionately referred to, Governor Moonbeam  — will have a different monument, or legacy. It will be a stretch of railroad track, from nowhere to nowhere in the Central Valley.  The California High Speed Train, or the Moonbeam Express, may wind up laying a few miles of track.  That’s all that will ever be built, and these rusting railroad tracks in the middle of nowhere will be the Moonbeam Monument.  It might be kind of a tourist attraction in the future, where people can come and marvel at the stupidity and arrogance of politicians back in the day.

The snakes in Sacramento foisted this project on the people of California, duping them into believing that the $10 billion bond they voted for would be all that they’d have to pay for this thing.  The federal government and private investors would come up with the rest of the money.  Wishful thinking.  California will get no federal money, if Trump can prevent it, least of all for high speed rail.  And no private investor in his right mind would put a penny into this boondoggle.

They need $68 billion to complete a scaled back first stage.  No one’s going to give them a dime.  California High Speed Rail will soon be dead.  It will be finished off, for good, by an initiative on the 2018 ballot.  It’s being promoted by CA Water 4 All, and it will take whatever’s left of that $10 billion high speed rail bond, and dedicate it to water storage and conversation projects.  These are long overdue, and desperately needed. You may have heard that the mighty Oroville Dam is full to bursting.  That should never happen.  There should be dams upstream of the Oroville to relieve the strain, and to conserve the water.

California has been in a severe, five year drought.  Everybody’s cutting back on water usage.  Babbie and I have disconnected our irrigation system.  When the people —  who have been taking great precautions to save water  — see all that beautiful clear mountain water come blasting out of the emergency spillway at Oroville Dam, wreaking destruction in its path, they should ask themselves, Why are we wasting all that beautiful California water?  To hell with high speed rail, let’s build some dams.

This flooding in Northern California, caused in large part because of a failure to build a water infrastructure, will be what Ca Water 4 All needs to win that initiative election.  Governor Moonbeam may hang on to his railroad dream, but no other Democrat will embrace it.  When he leaves office, two years from now, his dream goes with him.  He can always go down to that lonely stretch of track in the Valley, and see how far he got.  He’s been an arrogant son of a bitch his whole life.  I don’t mind rubbing his nose in it.

We passed the Arizona House, 33-25.  With Master Lobbyist Konstantin Querard at the controls, we should get it through the Senate before too long.  Idaho is looking very strong, and we should have Wyoming in two weeks.  The coast is clear.