FALLACY OF RUSSIAN INFLUENCE ON 2016 ELECTION

The latest “fake news” story circulating around the so-called main stream media is that Russia influenced the 2016 election.  See “Russian 2016 Influence  Operation targeted African
Americans on Social Media” (NYT Dec 17, 2018).   If you still have an unwarranted confidence in “journalists” reporting the truth and only the facts—read the report from the celebrated German news outlets “Der Spiegel” December 19, 2018. .  The publishers of that journal were forced to admit that one of their “award winning journalists  (he was CNN (!) “journalist of the year for 2014”) was fired for making up stories and phony interviews. See Der Spiegel Germany: Der Spiegel says star reported made up materiel, Dec 19, 2018 by Frank Jordans. Spiegel’s revelations are not alone.  There are many cases of egregious journalistic fraud always cropping up. See examples from: NY Times ( fraudster: Jason Blair) Associated Press (fraudster: Chris Newton) Washington Post (fraudster:  Janet Cooke) among many others.   

The idea of Russian Influence is so powerful and appealing to the “Clintonistas” and the Anti-Trump crowd that they simply can't resist the temptation to accept and embroider, elaborate and reiterate  often with their own fraudulent additions.  The concept of journalistic integrity and probity are no where to be found when as story is so appealing to a wide audience. There is no incentive to evaluate the question logically.  If indeed the Russians did have an effect on the election,  such a scenario  would help to remove the stigma of the  embarrassing and devastating election loss of the Clintons to a brash, bloviating, underfunded, novice politician.  Trump turned the tables on the “best qualified ever” candidate, flush with dough, widely supported—a media darling—pollster verified “shoo in candidate”— and the progressives and feministas that supported that campaign.  It would assuage their pain greatly if the fable of “Russian influence” had a real impact.  But even more importantly such a fallacy  would further the political goals of the opposition to delegitimize Mr Trump as the President.  This concept —-so damaging to the nation as a whole— has been the focus of the left:  since election night 2016.  Their aim is to claim that Trump won the White House with the influence  of a “foreign power”—even with no facts of. support for such a claim.  

The total bill for the 2016 election campaigns has been tallied at a shameful $6.5 billion dollars, of that we know that the Trump and Clinton camps spent  nearly $2 billion dollars on their campaigns.  Clinton spent about $1.2 billion and Trump about $700 million.  

It is claimed by the Mueller investigation that the Russians may have been involved in the campaign to the tune of about $1.2 million dollars over a period of about ten months. (Warning: these are only estimates of what a cash poor, very secretive nation may have spent.)  That amount is a paltry sum—by USA standards—where even small scale House and Senate campaigns run up bills in the tens of millions—But indeed, if they did spend that amount, it would literally be a drop in a barrel in comparison to the overall nearly $7 billion amount spent to  influence the overall electorate.  

Considering only the Clinton-Trump 2016 campaign expenditures, the alleged Russian expenditure of $12 million dollars must be compared to the  @ $2 billion  (that is 2,000 million) spent by the C/T campaigns. That is:: 12/ 2000,  or  0.006,  or  about 0.6%  That is: the Russians  allegedly spent six tenths of one percent on their efforts as compared to what the candidates spent . Thus  the total Russian investment in “assaulting” the Clinton-Trump campaigns may have been approximately half a penny spent for every dollar spent by the domestic campaigns.  The media are trying to have us to believe that such insignificant  amounts of spending had an impact on the election of  Mr. Trump.  That is hard to believe.  

THE ALABMA SENATE ELECTION—A SECRET EXPERIMENT? 

But in the Alabama, special Senate race of 2016  to replace Senator Sessions (who was tapped to be President Trump’s first AG) a Democrat-affiliated  political cyber security firm listed as “New Knowledge” carried out a “secret” social media campaign to “enrage Democrats” and “depress turnout” among Republicans so as  to support the candidacy of Democrat, Doug Jones and weaken the campaign of the Republican candidate Judge Roy Moore.  Moore lost to the Democrat in a very tight race. (See: “ Secret Experiment in Alabama Senate Race Imitated Russian Tactics (NYT December 19, 2018)  The NYT characterizes the effort as “modest” and “too small to have a significant effect on the race”,  But In that effort, the firm New Knowledge  spent a total of $100,000 dollars compared to the $51million dollars that both candidates spent.  The expenditure by New Knowledge  involved ( 100,000 to 51 million is about 0.2%) is in the same order of magnitude as that of the alleged Russian investment in the Clinton Trump campaigns, yet the Times’ conclusions concerning the impact of the effort are completely reversed.  For the Russian effort; the Times concludes that “Mr. Putin succeeded in delivering the presidency to his admirer, Mr. Trump” (NYT 9-2-18 The Plot to Subvert an Election) and many many more reports with similar conclusions.  This is a fine example for journalism students how biased and politicized even the celebrated NYT can be.   

MORE NUMBERS TO PONDER

The Mueller investigation also revealed that the Russian “assault” included more than “10 million tweets, 1000 You tube videos and 60,000 face book posts”.  That may sound like a lot of social media activity to my readers,  if you didn't t know the following:  

Even in non-election years there are about 6,000 tweets per second, or 500 million tweets per day—that is 200 billion tweets per year.  The 10 million Russian Tweets sent over a ten or twelve month period would be a very small fraction of even one day’s  tweet-total (500 million) and be  lost in the deluge of hundreds of billions of tweets sent every year.  Again another example of a drop in the bucket and likely to have little effect. 

As for Facebook posts of alleged 60,000 posts.  Sixty thousand Russian tweets over the election year is only a tiny fraction of the 1.5 billion posts uploaded EVERY DAY.

As for the alleged 1000 You Tube videos posted over the 2016 election year—they would be lost in the 5 billion videos that are watched on You Tube EVERY DAY!   

Russia, as pay back for the many Obama era discourtesies and attacks against the Russian Bear, may have attempted to influence the US 2016 elections, but thankfully, our system is so diverse, so large, so complex and so widely spread out over a nation of 50 states that actual influence would be very very difficult to attain with the paltry Russia effort claimed by the anti-Trump gang.

ILLEGAL IMMIGRANT VOTES

If we are looking for improper influences on the election outcome.  I would suggest we look elsewhere.  

What is more likely than Russian influence  is the truly significant numbers of undocumented immigrants illegally voting  in the numerous sanctuary cities and ethnic urban neighborhoods and venues around the nation.  Yes, it is probable that the total may have amounted to as much as the three million that Clinton won over Trump in the popular vote.  

TRUMP PULLS TROOPS OUT OF SYRIA—GOOD MOVE!!

THE WAR HAWKS ON LEFT AND RIGHT ARE LIVID—TRUMP DECLARES A WAR ENDED!

NO MORE KILLING AND BEING KILLED FOR USA TROOPS IN SYRIA

The situation is Syria has stabilized.  Mr. Assad has finally taken nearly full control of western Syria with the help of Mr. Putin. The bombing and killing has abated.  ISIS the causus belli which ostensibly drew the USA  into Syria is defeated.   Mr. Obama and his State Department and Pentagon unwisely used ISIS as the reason to enter Syria without an invitation. Syria is in fact a sovereign nation which must invite a foreign force in—-and we had no invitation.  The Obama strategy from the beginning of the Syrian tragedy was —“dumb, destructive, counter productive  Bush-style regime change”.  From the first days of the uprisings Obama policies in Syria  prolonged and intensified the killing and devastation and tragedy there. .  Obama’s actions would have led to another failed state in the ME had not Mr. Putin intervened.  (Mr. Putin is the only chess player in the West—his contemporaries  are playing checkers).  Mr. Obama’s Syria policy was from the very beginning unrealistic, impractical, and poorly executed..  It was never going to come to fruition given the nature of the Syrian geography, and its ethnic and religion demography.

As it stands now..the USA has no national interests in Syria, and no rational reason to be there uninvited.  Recall that our troops are there on the basis of some ancient agreement passed immediately after the 9-11 tragedy.  They are in Syria without  a Congressional imprimatur.  That is another good reason to bring them home.  There is also the cost.  It’s costs us about $1 million dollars per trooper deployed abroad per year. Saving 15 to 20 million dollars annually is no bad thing.   Mr. Trump is saving money and lives in withdrawing them where they are not wanted and not needed.

Good

Next lets bring them home from Iraq, Afghanistan, Yemen, Ethiopia, various states in Africa, and where ever else they are.  We can no longer put the massive financial burden of “peace keeping” and world dominanntion on the backs of the American taxpayer.  We apparently do not even have the will or resources to secure our own southern borde from invasion and incursion—yet we are off in the worlds hinterlands—wasting resources and destabilizing regions that are problbaly best left to their own devices.  .  What chutzpah the phony war hawks have to complain when Trump calls the troops home and ends a war. .



   

MR. MUELLER, WHERE IS THE BEEF? HAS NONE SO SERVES UP BALONEY

NO BLUE DRESS, NO INTERN UNDER THE DESK, NO BEEF!

SP Robert Mueller has embarrassed himself and the nation.  He was tasked with determining whether the 2016 election was tainted by Russian influence and whether the Trump campaign “colluded” to alter the outcome of the election.  Instead he and his highly politicized team used their very powerful position  to scratch up dirt unrelated to their mandate and only useful to destabilize and delegitimize a sitting President.

Mr.  Mueller and his team were avidly at work over the last 18 months (at least) in an attempt to undermine and disenfranchise the will of the 63 million voters who won the election by taking 30 of our 50 states.    He has done irreparable harm to our democracy, to the nation, to its foreign policy, and to our judicial institutions.  His team continues its politicized work which weakens our nation.   If there was no evidence of collusion—no beef, he should have simply made that clear and ended it.  His indictments today make clear he and his team are operating not as unbiased investigators, but as political hatchet men. They now function as a disservice to the nation.   This is not how OUR DEMOCRACY is supposed to work.

Mueller has no beef in his sandwich.  He substituted cheap baloney for the real thing and is attempting to display his offerings to the public— mendaciously presenting them as something they are not.

The beef the Democrats and the Clintonistas were salivating to have served up was  of “collusion” between Russian and the Trump team.  There is NO EVIDENCE of that juicy delectable after 18 months of desperate searching.  Baloney is what they got. .

Mueller and his highly politicized team, (supported and condoned by the deep state and establishment sympathiezers in the government and media-operatives) have revealed that Mr. Manafort made a lot of money selling influence to pro-Russian Ukrainians.  Manafort did not pay his fair share of taxes on those earnings.  He lied and misled the FBI investigators about his highly lucrative contacts and dealings with these folks. His unknown illegal actions occurred long before he was tapped to work with the  Trump team.   Nothing new there—illegality, crime and misdeeds galore—but no relation to Mr. Trump,  and no beef—no collusion.

Just after the election Mr. Flynn was still a private citizen (who had been recently tapped to be the President’s  National Security Advisor) when he spoke to  Russian Ambasador Kislyack at a cocktail party. Nothing illegal here.  But he misrepresented that fact when he was interviewed by the FBI (Someone in the Obama Administration—illegally unmasked him while tapping Kislyak’s phones and alerted the FBI.).  As an incoming White House official—he was within his rights to speak to those he would soon be dealing with.  But when questioned,  he misrepresented his contacts. He lied about a non-crime.   When Mueller threatened to indite his son as well on a similar “process crime” he fell on his sword and pled guilty.  No beef here either.

Mr. Cohen, a New York lawyer who made his way up into the edge of prominence in gritty NYC politics,  was caught l about shady deals, tax evasion and other matters related to his many marginally legal businesses.  He was also the guy who it is alleged paid off two females sex workers who came forward with claims of “affairs” when Mr. Trump made clear he was going to be a candidate for the White House.  Trump is alleged to have paid these women to keep silent. We don’t know whether their allegations are true or not.  But to enter into such a contract is not illegal for a private citizen.  But Mueller’s inditment of Cohen attempts to make the claim that these payments for silence were a way to “effect the outcome of the 2016 election”.  This statement alone is enough to convict Mueller of bias, political mischief, and politicization of his investigation. Because that statement is such a stretch.  That is the real baloney.

What Mr. Mueller and his team have revealed is the extent to which the deep state, the establishment and the corrupt institutions and leadership of some government agencies will go to protect their lucrative networks, the “one hand washes the other”system , rampant nepotism, and the simple corruption that had come to characterize our government.  The People voted them out in 2016.  They are desperately trying to delegitimize the leadership they chose to clean house.

Don’t let them do it.


.

DEMS—NO RESPECT FOR BALLOT BOX AND WILL OF PEOPLE

DEMOCRATS, RESISTERS:

NO RESPECT FOR BALLOT BOX , ELECTION AND WILL OF PEOPLE

DANGEROUS TREND—-ELECTIONS DON’T  MATTER ANYMORE?

Today we see pictures of Paris, France—the beautiful city, closed to tourists and filled with billowing white clouds of tear gas,  streaming water cannons, and the scurrying “gilet jaune” colliding with baton wielding Paris policemen.   The government of PM Emanuelle Macron is in trouble.  He misrepresented himself to the people, he ignored the desperate needs of the working classes.

I listened to day  to the interview on UK’s LBC of a young woman—a “yellow vest” Paris protester. When asked why she was protesting, she explained that she earns about 1200 (Euros) or about $1400 a month, and has to travel about and hour each way to her job in the countryside. She  is forced by Macon’s new stiff gas taxes to pay now more than about $6.00 a gallon for gasoline. There were elections in France only a year and a half ago...but the needs of these desperate people were ignored.

Let’’s assume she has a small car that will give her 30 miles per gallon—she needs two gallons each way—that is $12 dollars each way or $24 dollars a day or (24 x 25 work days) = @600 a month.  That leaves her with abut $800 dollars a month for rent, food, clothing, and everything else.  She claimed she could not survive. That was her reason for protesting—survival.   I agree.  These are the “Les deplorables” of France that were ignored by Macron when he formulated his gas taxes for the poor and working classes and CUT income taxes of the affluent elite, well-educated, who use little gasoline and mostly reside in the big cites of Paris, Lyon, and Bordeaux  

That is what we are faced with here in the USA if we continue to undermine the legitimate outcomes of our elections and attempt to ignore the results of what the people vote for when they cast their ballots. The government, the Democrats, the resisters, the deep state, the Media have ignored the outcome of the ‘16 elections and expressed will of the nation’s people and focused—like Macron—on the urbanites and elites.

During the 2016 election the people spoke of their needs though the ballot box.  They elected Mr. Trump who won fairly and widely across the nation.    But the Democrats, the Media, the Establishment, Deep State, and many Republicans chose to ignore  the will of 63 million Americans across thirty state as expressed in that vote.    During the ‘16 campaign, and after the election, these deniers and resisters continued (now for two years)  to attempt to nullify the desires of the people who assented and posited the campaign pledges of Mr. Tump.  The voting public rejected the loser’s—Mrs. Clinton’s— pleas.  As part of our system we all agree to accept the will of the majority.    But that seems to have been ignored this last time.  This is a very dangerous precedent these people are setting.  Because it undermines the validity and sanctity—yes sanctity—of the democratic process and the election process.

We should all—Democrats and Republicans alike— be deeply concerned with this trend of ignoring the results of our  elctions and the expressed direction the people have assented to when they vote.  Can the leadership of the establishment and Washington DC have greater validity, greater import  in our Democracy than the expressed will of 63 or 64 million American votes and of the outcomes in 30 out of 50 states?  These densizens of Washington have only one vote each—they have no right to overturn an election.  But that is their intention.

We should all be very much concerned with the debasement of our Democracy.

Elections have consequences—-

G HW BUSH 41

“Pappy” Bush always seemed like a nice guy to this author.  Our 41st President who just passed away last week, was a typical Eastern-USA elite,  raised in affluence and political power. (His daddy was US Senator Prescott Bush, the long-term  Senator from Connecticut).   George H W Bush  touched all the bases in the traditional American “curses honorum”.  Like his father before him, he served in the military, went to Yale, started a business with daddy’s friends (in oil)  and entered politics.  A political career was the goal and early life-plans for George Herbert Walker Bush.  

As I write this, the remains of Mr. Bush are being shuttled here and there across nation in a extravaganza Roman Empire-style deification ceremony that seems out of character for the nice guy, unassuming gentleman President.  One wonders why?  Perhaps the Bush dynasty and its out-of power supporters would take the opportunity to revise the history of  the Bush family and the disaster that befell their “brand” after Bush junior (43) finished with it.  But just as important seems the need of the “establishment”, the ‘never-Trump” Republicans, the Democrats and the Deep State to use the corpse of Pappy Bush to bludgeon the sitting President.  The TV and MSM commentators take great pleasure  to contrast this  “gentlemanly” President with  our present “tough guy” White House occupant.  G HW Bush does not deserve this misuse.  

“HW” seemed the epitome of the  American “decent guy” of the Great Generation.  But he was a not a “god” he human being with some failings too. As when as a raw “kid-pilot” of twenty years-old– he parachuted from his shot-up Grumman Torpedo Bomber in WWII leaving his rear gunner and bombardier behind to crash and perish in the Pacific— in their now  pilotless plane. Or when as an old man he was accused of “inappropriate touching” by multiple women.  But we all are guilty of such youthful blunders and some =—the foibles of an old man suffering from advanced stenosis of the cranial arteries.  What is true is that the bulk of his life was one of exemplary service to nation and family. 

He served the nation as a young WWII flyer, Congressman, Ambassador to the UN, CIA Director, Ambassador to China, Vice President and our forty-first President.  With his experiences in the Navy and in government as training, he was probably one of the best qualified candidates ever elected to the White House.  He signed the Clean Air Act and the Americans with Disabilities Act, and banned import of automatic weapons.   He brought the nation through a difficult period during the fall of the Soviet Union. He wisely supported German reunification and also (the questionable) expansion of NATO.  Faced with big spending deficits, he raised taxes which he had promised in his campaign NOT to do.  His infamous “read my lips” speech cut deeply into his support when he went back on that pledge.  A recession in 1990 caused hardship in the American workforce which he seemed oblivious of.  Also due to monetary policies of the FED, economic recovery was very slow—similar to that of Obama’s term.  Workers and voters were dissatisfied with both Washington and Bush policies. 

 He did some bad stuff too.  In the Middle East, Iraq’s strongman Saddam Hussein—whom Bush initially befriended—complained bitterly to his US handlers when he discovered that neighboring Kuwait was pumping excessive amounts of oil which kept prices low and as well was  secretly tapping into into Iraq’s underground oil reservoirs, and selling the oil in competition with Iraq.  Kuwait drillers used the technique termed “slant oil drilling”. (Later, that same technique with some added twists would be used in the USA in the process of “fracking” hard to exploit and played out US domestic oil reservoirs .) .  President Bush and his US Iraq Ambassador April Glaspie listened, but with little sympathy to Saddam’s  legitimate complaints.  Then either ignoring or unwilling to get involved, Bush gave Saddam a “green light” to solve his “inter-Arab problems on his own”.  It was a major foreign policy blunder that was to encourage Saddam into a disastrous invasion and then occupation and annexing of Kuwait.  

With Iraqi troops in Kuwait,  shivers of fear through the entire Arab oil-producing world.  Bush was forced to respond.  He turned on Saddam, a former strongman-client, when he orchestrated the UN response and a US-led international force in the First Iraq (Gulf) War.  During this conflict, Bush used American air power improvidently—perhaps as a demonstration to prove that after the Vietnam defeat the USA was still a potent force to reckon with.  US forces proceeded to “degrade” the Iraqi army—- and as well, they targeted  Iraq’s civilian infrastructure.  US bombs and missiles took out water treatment plants, dams, flour mills, factories,  civilian bomb shelters (with great loss of life) , transportation hubs, food storage facilities and similar “soft” targets.  The UN characterized this over-reaction as tantamount to “war crimes, though these charges were never fully implemented. Many  Iraqi civilians died as a direct result of the bombing,  and after the conflict, during the “punishment of Saddam phase”. many thousands more died of malnutrition, disease, and exposure.  

This first US invasion—never reaching Baghdad— set the political and military stage for the disastrous Second Iraq (Gulf) War under George W Bush.  Iraq which had been degraded both militarily and economically by the First Gulf War was considered a “soft target” by Bush (43) “junior” who after the 9-11 attacks imagined he could bolster his reputation and popularity by easily and successfully invading that nation— falsely claiming Saddam  harbored nuclear weapons.  He was horribly duplicitous and wrong on all counts.   That second “Bush blunder” turned out to be the worst foreign policy decision in all of American history.    

Thus, last week a descent man, a former President  passed from the scene.  A man of his times. Perhaps not the greatest occupant of the Oval Office.  George H W was always the elite “patron”, the epitome of the establishment  “insider”.  His only weakness was his inability to take the pulse of the common folks—with whom his life experiences gave him little contact (Andover, US Naval Officer,  Yale, then Congress, Ambassadorships, CIA, VP and President).  His gentlemanly demeanor  were  all part of a life-training of one surrounded at all times by powerful friends who eased his way and opened doors to smoothly advance his career. But he had little training in leadership

The Media are raising Bush 41 to a godlike stature as a better cudgel to attack President Trump.  But these times—when the establishment is being exposed as ignoring the will of the people as expressed in elections,  too cozy with power and and money and too corrupt—all call for an attack dog in the White House— not a companion or service dog. 

   

BAN PHOTOS OF “PROUD HUNTERS WITH DEAD GAME” FROM INTERNET

December 3, 2018

KILLING ANIMALS FOR A CHEAP PHOTO-OPPORTUNITY IS DISGUSTING

DON’T COMPOUND THE STUPIDITY BY SHARING IT WITH THE WORLD

Yahoo News (UK) recently published an article with a photo of a fishermen in Queensland, Austrailia with a rare 700 kg ( @1,500lbs) Black marlin.  The authors report that thousands took to Facebook to call the killing of the masssive fish a “disgrace”.  Rightly so.  The captain of the fishing boat claimed that the marlin died of exhaustion while being reeled in.  The catch was legal...but it IS a disgrace to kill a magnificent beast—threatened by extinction and overfishing—-simply for the opportunity to take a picture with it—a photo-op.

This magnificent specimens —WHICH SHULD HAVE BEEN RELEASED AFTER BEING HOOKED AND —BRIEFLY PLAYED—may have been killed as a result of poor judgement and overzealousness of the game-fishier boat captain and crew.  However, it does NOT compare with the utter stupidity and waste of those who kill African (and other) wildlife simply for “sport” or “fun” or to take a photograph and post the evidence of stupidity on Facebook or some other web outlet.  Think of the magnificent elephants, lions, Cape buffalo, tigers, etc. etc, all threatened with extinction and other smaller beasts all of which  are alaughtered needlessly.  We are irreversibly altering an depauperating our planet—all for naught.

Just what are these rich folks  trying to prove?  That  they had enough loose cash to travel to some exotic place.  That they had more lucre to hire an expensive guide who would direct them to a shooting post— while other paid staff drive wild critters to this place of death.  Then the so called “sportsman or woman” is  directed where to point their powerful weapon and told when to pull the trigger.  Does that require great skilll or accomplishment?  Not in my book.

The Facebook “photo op” that sticks in my craw is a recent one of a woman sitting in an apparent African venue, holding her high-velocity rifle in front of the collapsed body of a huge male giraffe. The long mottled legs of this magnificent beat were crumpled in death and its graceful neck was coiled around toward the camera.  The limp—and innocent— dead beast stood out in stark contrast to the stiff, sport-clothed, floppy hatted,  proud-of-herself- woman posing with a happy smile for her photograph of death.  . Now that WAS disgusting!

The solution to the prevention of such idiotic behavior may be the following.  Simply ban such photographs from the web.  We limit pornography and we actually ban child pornography from the WEB.  It is illegal because children can not protect themselves from such evil.  Threatened game animals—like children— are also unable to protect themselves from base human predatory behavior.  They need our help and protection too..

Ban animal-kill “photo-ops” they are almost as disgusting as child porn.

WORLD WIDE DECLINE OF INSECTS.:SCARY!!!

In an October 15, 2018  frightening article: Ben Guarino of the Washington Post published a piece entitled: ‘Hyperalarming” study shows massive insect loss.  Guarino’s piece reviews recent studies around the world which show the recent decline in the bug populations.  In the past 35 years an international team of scientists have concluded that the abundance’s of a group of land Arthropoda we generally refer to as “bugs” have declined by 45%. A study in a German nature preserve reported that in the past few decades there was a 75% decrease in flying insects.  As a natural consequence these studies also report on the decline in frogs, reptiles and birds which feed on insects have declined in step with the bug losses.

You may think “Oh well, good riddance.  Who wants them around anyway?”

Well a recent study of the National Acdemy of Sciences revealed that aside from plants which make up 80%of the biomass on earth (bacteria are next —13%—and fungus —2% less again) animals make up only a small part of the total biomass —only 2 gigatons our of the 550 gigatons total.
But it is insects (bugs) which make up half of that —a full 1 gigaton.  Fish in the sea and lakes make up nearly another gigaton—about 0.7 gigatons.  The remaineder on0.3 gigatons comprises all the other critters on the Earth.  (PS the human species—is only 0.06 gigatons—and that is way more than it should be in a natural systeM)

So if we are reporting these massive losses of insects—that is a really really scary and thereatening problem which portents a massive fall off of those other critters —which in the interdependent system which is our environment —depened on.  This is a system after all—we are all in this Earth together with birds, bugs and blue whales.

The authors of these hyperscary data all seem to ATTRIBUTE THE BUG LOSS TO CLIMATE CHANGE—with the group think going on these days.

But I suggest that the fact that the big chemical companiesnies in this world of our see fit to produce and sell 6 billion pounds of organophosphate neonicitionods and glyphosate insecticides and herbicides annually.  That is roughly almost one pound for each man, woman and child on the Earth.

It seems to this observer that though climate change may have its effects—it is the poisonous chemicals we are immersed in. These chiemcals soak into our soils, percolate into our groundwater, into our stream, rivers and into the ocean.  We are killing the insects.  That is a sure sign we are drastically poisoning our Earth.  If it is unfit for insects.......

CALIFORNIA WILDFIRES: NOT JUST CLIMATE CHANGE—DEVELOPMENT TOO

CALIFORNIA FIRES:MORE CAUSES THAN JUST CLIMATE CHANGE

California is prone to wildfires.  The cause of the recent tragic California forest fires which destroyed more than 12,000 homes and incinerated about 150,000 acres of forest (equivalent to ten Manhattan Islands)  are a natural consequence of that state’s geography, the type and distribution of natural vegetation, its climate,  and most importantly the recent rapid housing and other development in formerly unpopulated forested areas.  The element of climate change though a factor is only one many causes.   

Wednesday November 21, 2018

Monday of this week was a bit hazy.   Weather observers in NYC noted the existence of a high dry haze which created a colorful sunset and was later reported to be a plume of tiny carbon particulates generated by the extensive forest fires in California.  The smoke plume was carried eastward over New York and New England by the prevailing upper air winds. 

When the topic of California’s forest fires are reported or discussed—the oft repeated watch word seems to be “climate change”.  On a visit to the affected areas in California this last week  President Trump ( a self described climate change denier)  was harangued by Governor Brown repeatedly  regarding the presumed cause of the several blazes.  Governor Brown emphasized climate alteration as if that was the only cause of the tragedy.  Though human climate alteration is no doubt one of the factors—it is not the prime cause. 

Wildfires are a natural phenomena in California.  

First the geography.  California is situated on the US west coast of a mountainous North American continent. Within the state’s eastern boundaries are highlands such as the the Cascade and the Sierra Nevada ranges. In bordering states to the east the Colorado Plateau and the high-dry Basins and Range provinces of Nevada and New Mexico rise up thousands of feet above sea level.

Meteorology and the infamous Santa Ana winds.    In the fall of the year cool, dry air  often settle in the above described  interior highlands, creating a zone of high pressure. Under those conditions any low pressure systems in the Pacific Ocean off the California coast generate an “egg beater effect”.  Highs circulate the cool, dry air from the interior highlands toward the off-shore counterclockwise spiraling low pressure center,      As these northwesterly winds move over California, they follow the contours of the land moving  from high elevations to lower ones near the coast.  As they move they undergo a heating process (“compression heating”) caused by their change in elevation and pressure.  The air heats up dramatically (@ 5 degrees for every 1000 feet they descend) as a result of increasing atmospheric pressure at lower elevations. (Recall how air pumped  when compressed to fill an automobile  tire heats up the tire as it is inflated, or the heat generated in the metal walls of a propane tank when it is filled) Such heating is common in the atmosphere and is termed “adiabatic” temperature change. It has   That is non-passive heat or heat generated by changes in pressure.  But as the air heats its relative humidity drops drastically as well. 

As a result of these natural circumstances, California, in the autumn of the year, under Santa Ana winds —is often very much hotter and much drier than the expansive deserts which are found over the Cascades and the Sierra Nevada to the immediate east.  Furthermore, as the air descends and flows westward it is forced though several wind gaps in the north-south mountain ranges. In these “gap” areas wind speeds increase dramatically.   Speeds may reach gale force levels during times of Santa Anas. That is a wind velocity (@ 40-45 mph) which can break branches off trees and impede walking. 

The Climate. California has hot, dry summers and a mild winter.  The Koeppen climate classification map for California indicates that the “hot summer Mediterranean” climate zone is the most widely distributed and covers the most  extensive area in the state. (This climate type is also found in southern Spain, and Portugal, northern Morocco, the Balearic Islands, Sardinia and Corsica, Sicily, and Greece)   In this climate regime temperatures in the coldest months average above freezing.  Winters are mild and bring three times more precipitation than the driest months of summer.  While summer  precipitation is very sparse, being typically less than one inch.  These climate conditions: hot, droughty summers and mild relatively moist winters naturally control the type of vegetation which grows in these extensive areas of the state. 

The natural vegetation.  Over eons of time before man arrived, the process of natural selection and evolution resulted in vegetation types which were naturally adapted for survival in the climate in zones found in the state  The natural plant community found in the “hot summer Mediterranean” climatic zone in California is called: chaparral. 

Chaparral, (a designation derived from a Spanish word: “chaparro” meaning small or dwarf)   is a community of drought and heat resistant  low-growing, shrubby, woody, leathery and resinous-leaved evergreen plants These often form dense thickets.  The plants are adapted to summer drought, high summer temperatures and infrequent (10 to 15 year interval) wildfires.  As they have evolved over thousands of years to resist drought, their physical characteristics of low branching growth (to conserve moisture), and small, evergreen, highly resinous leaves make them also very highly flammable.  Wildfires in chaparral explode in intensity.  The intense heat from the abundant fuel and winds cause surrounding  trees and brush to rapidly and contemporaneously reach its kindling temperature.  At that point large areas of vegetation go up in flames at once causing a “fire explosion”.  Under certain conditions these fire explosion cause turbulent air to form rising and spiraling columns of fire or: “firenados” which may move over the surface like dust devils or tornadoes.   

 Population Growth.  Forest fires in unpopulated pristine natural areas are rare.  Lightning strikes may cause forest fires in ten or fifteen year intervals.  But wild fires in recent decades are many more times frequent.  In a study of forest fires in Colorado lodgepole pine forests report that in the USA 40% of new homes have been built in the “wild land-urban interface”.  These are areas where residential neighborhoods border forest, grasslands or other natural lands.  Paradise, California was such a place..  Forest fires are caused most commonly by human actions.  Roads, infrastructure and housing developments generate sparks and open fires from auto accidents, fallen power lines, camp fires, or home fires which escape into forested areas and build into conflagrations.

This author is NOT a climate denier!  I am well versed in the subject and support the idea that the earth is experiencing human-induced climate alterations...there is no question about that.  It is likely that certain aspects of the recurrent and persistent drought that California has experienced has been intensified by climate modification. But that has not been proved by the weather and climatic data available.   But to attempt to claim that a slowly altering climate is the PRIMARY cause is a mistake. 

Climate change is a cause that we will have only limited ability to control and modulate.  And even if we eventually gather up the gumption to make the hard choices to stabilize the levels of greenhouse gases we are dumping in the atmosphere the effects will take multiple generations to have any effect.  So those who reside in California must attempt changes which CAN have more immediate effects. There are no quick and certain ways to stem and then reverse climate change. Any efforts in that direction will take decades.  But conflagrations in California forests can be more effectively  controlled by limiting development and road construction in areas which are naturally prone to fire.  Just as coastal and flood plain development in areas prone to flooding is in many states is now limited—so should the natural fire prone forests of California be protected from excessive and dangerous development.  Most of the fire prone vegetation zones in California should remain as useful natural areas free from habitations and with only limited access during fire season. 

UKRAINE DISASTER: BLAME IT ON OBAMA/CLINTON/NULAND

OBAMA’S UKRAINE BLUNDER

Result:  Another USA sponsored dysfunctional state.  Economic decline in Ukraine.  Festering war in Donbass, Ukraine’s loss of Crimea to Russia, Ukraine loses access to Azov Sea, Ukraine loss of commercial port of Mariupol.  Revenge of Mr. Putin on Obama and Clinton in 2016 elections. 

Yeah great work Obama!  Perhaps you and Ms Nuland of the State Department better scratch off any trips to the Ukraine. 

In 2014 the Obama Administration whose State Department was shot through with neocons, and Clinton arm-chair warriors—a sinister group who never let an opportunity to create conflict around the world escape their attention and the attendant economic chaos, human suffering, death and destruction that goes with it.  One wonders how these folks were not summarily fired when Obama—who campaigned against such policies—was elected.  

The now infamous Bush-Cheney crowd had led the USA into what is now known as the worst foreign policy blunder in all of US history—the Iraq War.   Somehow Obama inherited these folks, but being a novice had little expertise or gumption to fire them.  Sadly, they led Obama into more foreign adventurism, this time to interference in a nation on the  border with Russia—the Ukraine.  I guess the swathe of failed states, death and destruction they had sown across the Middle East was not enough of a sad display of the limits of American military might for them.  This Obama group turned their attention to the Baltic and Eastern Europe as another area to create dysfunctional states, where the blunt force of American might could be squandered.   Obama agreed to it.  

Obama and his CIA spent millions of dollars to help destabilize the government of Ukraine’s moderately pro-Russian President, Viktor Yanukovitch.  Obama’s intention appears to have been an attempt to lure Ukraine out of the Russian economic sphere and encourage it to join NATO. This  was a clearly seen in the EU (and in Russia) as an existential threat to Russia—and was sure to be strenuously resisted.  

The Obama policy of poking the Russian bear in the eye was the act of a bad chess player and a novice foreign policy team.  To this day it remains unclear.what the Obama strategy was—or was there a strategy?  Ukraine is a border nation, with a powerful neighbor.  It is a state where a large portion of the population is of ethnic Russian extraction, and whose social, religious and economic ties to the powerful eastern neighbor are very old and very strong.  Imagine the Russias trying to lure Canada away from USA economic dominance and into the sphere of the Russian federation. What hope would it have of success?  And how would we react?   

Obama’s Ukraine policy was clearly not a well thought out.  Did it rise to the stupidity of the Bay of Pigs, the Iraq War,  and Johnson’s Vietnam fiasco?  Perhaps not, but it is up there high on the list, near the top.. 

Within a short time of the Obama Administration’s intervention, pro-Russian President Victor Yanukovitch, was driven from office by street demonstrations and riots which turned violent.  Obama immediately helped install the pro-western regime of former candy manufacturer turned politician Petro  Poroshenko.   

At the time of the unrest and fall of the legitimate government, DC talking heads touted the actions of covert American operatives in the Ukraine as a  foreign policy victory for Obama—but very soon it became clear to all that it was a Pyrrhic one. In the end Obama and the USA were outfoxed by Mr. Putin (who is a much  better chess player).  

What were the end results of Mr. Obama’s foolish attempts at  intervention in the Ukraine ?  A festering war in eastern Ukraine known as the Donbass War (thousands killed, over two million displaced and no end in sight), economic downturn and disaster for Ukraine, the loss of strategically critical Crimea to Russia, the loss of Ukraine of access to a good part of its coastline in the Azov Sea and the important commercial ports of Mariupol in that body of water.  The Azov Sea has now become in effect a Russian sea...effectively closing off the large Ukrainian ports of Mariupol and Berdyansk from normal traffic.  Finally, Mr. Putin even seems to have attempted to extracted his revenge upon Mr Obama and Ms Clinton with his well published attempts at Russian intervention in the 2016 US elections.  

Perhaps the present hatred for all things Russian in Washington DC appears to have its source in the Obama Blunder.  

Big looser that Obama! But the present Administration should not make us all losers by continuing the failed and foolish policies of past administrations.  

COHEN LIED—ABOUT A “NO DEAL” IN RUSSIA—BIG DEAL? NO!

Bloomberg: Cohen lied about “closely guarded Trump secret”.  NYTimes:” Trump lawyer, felon and Russian general chase a Moscow deal”.

If the public trust is ever to be regained by the institutions of the state and the media—they will have to stop trying to generate indictments and for the media stitching together stories out of thin air.  But they seem unable to help themselves and they continue to erode the pubic trust.

The American public has common sense—they know when a story is worth the ink and paper (or electric current) it consumes is worth it or not.  Let’s take this story of Mr. Cohen’s (a Trump attorney) lie—about a long term plan by the Trump organization to build a sky scraper in Moscow,

All  businesses have  plans for the future—ideas for the growth, for entering a new venue,  pie in the sky projects...that is the stuff of the American entrepreneur.  Most of those plans may never come to fruition.  But some may.  That spirit of innovation is what makes the USA the greatest economy in the world.

So what is the big deal?  Yes candidate Trump—still a US businessman—had long term plans to build a Trump Tower in Moscow.  He had set in motion those tentative plans and his associates—as in any business large and small—continued to follow the potential plan.  What is the big story here?  

There is no indication of any wrong doing.  In fact the other side—the Democrats— had more interaction, sent activists to Moscow, used foreign organizations in the UK etc,etc. and had more sinister connections to the Russians than anything that has surfaced about the Trump candidacy or the Trump Administration.after the election.

These stories do not sit well with a common sense audience of Americans. 

MODERN PARENTING GONE AWRY— AND SAYING “NO” TO KIDS

Putting the parental “N” word back into use.  Tough Love Parenting.  Learning to say NO to your teenagers. 

After the Thanksgiving Holiday we are all back to our individual lives, having had to suffer through the enforced ritual of togetherness imposed on us in our family gatherings or at the holiday dinner table.  Those of us of more advanced age who were faced with teenagers (and their permissive parents) at the holiday table were sure to be dismayed by the lack of any semblance of polite behavior among our nation’s youth and of the self imposed impotence of parents. 

Their teenage heads bowed over their tiny screens, their thumbs feverishly working the micro key board, not one of these kids paused to look up from the rectangles of blue light to greet a new arrival, to thank the host, to nod a “thank you’ to the server, or utter any signs of gratitude or appreciation for  the many delicacies placed before them-the result of hours of hard work.    Not one of them manifested  even a passing  interest in giving up their digital activities (either passive mouth-gaping observation of some electronic game or feverish text-messaging) for actual interaction or communication with the live people sitting next to them around the table.    They apparently preferred the digital world— and no one in the room had the authority or temerity to alter their impolite behavior.  What will become of these individuals?  

Their parents,  if they were not themselves occupied in a similar manner, were unable to alter their child’s behavior to a more socially acceptable one.  A parental request such as: “Johnny please put that phone away” was generally met with a muffled child-grunt, but no change in  behavior.  Any further, more direct and firm parental requests would be dangerous to the parent’s reputation.  Since it would too often result in a response such as: “Don’t bother me Mom”—revealing just how little control, respect  or.direction the  parent had over the child.  Any more firm and direct parental request  would be just further verification of how out of control so called “parenting” is.  

Modern parents apparently try to be “buddies”, accomplices, and co-actors  with their still-developing charges rather than asserting authority.  In fact “authority, or control” seems to be two other banned words.  

The result is that not one of these so-called “parents”  knows how to say “NO” with finality and determination. 

The word “NO” seems to have become the parental “N” word forever banned to the dustbin of history.  Parental permissiveness and fear of asserting themselves —being an authoritarian” —-have left children to decide for themselves what they—with their inexperienced and still developing minds to decide what is  permissible or appropriate —if they were to ever think about such things.

The facts are that children are still developing.  Their brains are not fully wired.  As teenagers —many psychologists claim—these developing humans are prone to excesses and irrational behavior.  Perhaps, as these scientists suggest, childhood lack of control and tendency to push the limits of behavior are part of an evolved human development that thousands of years ago encouraged childhood innovation and experimentation.  Such behaviors sometimes led to positive results—a new food source, or a better route to the spring—but it more often than not had failed and deadly results too...but the human family could afford those losses at that time.   Today those tendencies have to be put under more control.  However, modern parents with their often more than two decades of (hopefully) mental growth and experience are loath to use or even assert that  extra brain power and life experience to direct their still mentally unformed progeny to a more survivable modern life style. 

For hundred of thousands of years human parents have been (yes) controlling and (yes) directing their off-spring to prepare them for survival.  The ancients knew that they could not simply push their progeny  to the edge of the cave and expect them to survive in the wilderness.  Not a chance.  In the last several decades however, modern parents seem to have done just that.  They have abandoned their essential responsibility to the new generation and  left them—with their young brains still incomplete and developing—to their own devices and behavior patterns.

For modern parents the first thing to accept is that you are the leader...with the fully developed brain and with more than two decades of life experience over your child.

The second thing is to lean how to say “NO” and mean it.  You have the power of the purse and the power of parenthood at your disposal.  You can restrict access to electronics or encourage them to pick up after themselves, do some chores around the house, keep their rooms neat, perhaps even be responsible for their own possessions.  Each interaction can be a learning experience for them. 

The third factor is to practice TOUGH LOVE.  You must honestly decide what is best for this child. Not what is best for you or the easy way out.  Then do that.  You can’t be a buddy. You can be a friend— you are the parent.  That requires you to make honest best-decisions for a still incompletely formed youngster that will in your best assessment benefit that child when he or she is an adult .  

That might mean insisting the child pursues their piano lessons, or joins a travel team, or does not do those things. It may not be easy to do but the question to answer is: what is best for this child?    

Big responsibility!..But fully worthwhile endeavor. 

  

IGNORING THE EVIDENCE OF KHASHOGGI MURDER AND DISMEMBERMENT

On November 11, 2018 the AP reported on the discovery of the bodies of two young sisters, both Saudi nationals. The bodies—taped together with duct tape—washed up on the shores of  the Hudson River in New York City.  Evidence seems to suggest that the sisters were  alive when they were dumped into the river.

Other evidence indicates that the young women were seeking asylum in the USA after escaping from their father’s home in Virginia.  Their father traveled regularly to Saudi Arabia and maintained a home in the USA.  The NYC police are investigating the case as a possible suicide. (?)  But other evidence seems to indicate that the two young women were fleeing male relatives who in Saudi society have complete control over the lives (and deaths) of young unmarried women.  Male relatives control who these women can marry, where they can work, where they can travel, etc. etc.  through the so called “guardian” system.    The NYC investigators, always a bit hesitant at pointing the finger of criminality at the Saudi government, should evaluate how the two sisters were able to  tape themselves together, and then in this bound up condition, managed to throw themselves into the Hudson River.  It seems on first evaluation that what is more likely— that rather than a suicide—this is a murder case.  But then US officials tend to look the other way when it involves the Saudi government.

Which bring me to the case of the murder and dismemberment then dissolution of the body (in acid) of Saudi journalist Jamal Khashoggi.  The Turkish government has released voice recordings of the brutal death and dismemberment  of the journalist.  However, National Security.Advisor to President Trump, John Bolton, who has not heard the tapes personally, claims that the tapes, which record the screams of the victim as well as the voices of the perpetrators (all liked closely to the top levels of government) as they dismembered the body, claims that there is no evidence to implicate the Saudi Crown Prince Bin Salman in the actual murder.  


I do not see this brutal murder being “swept under the rug”...even though the body of poor Mr Khashoggi—now reduced to its chemical elements—will never be recovered.  The stain of such a brutal act will spread to smear all those who  ignore the facts and facilitate the cover-up of those who clearly culpable.

There is an element of ugly hypocrisy here as well from the Trump Administration and the US media.  I recall the case of  President Putin of Russia (who is not purchasing “100 billion dollars worth of war materiel” or able to control world oil prices, was very quickly and summarily indited, and found guilty by the media—-of poisoning former Russian spy Sergei and his daughter Yulia Skripal in Salisbury, UK.  There was no credible evidence to attribute the crime to Putin, but that did not stop the media or Mr. Trump...it served their immediate political needs.

Mr. Trump must stand up for the rule of law and insist that those responsible—even in high places—must and should be punished.  To do otherwise will simply be unacceptable.

So Mr. Bolton please go back and listen to those tapes.