Cromwell

I admit it:  Ta-Nehisi Coates drives me nuts.

Having spent the Obama Administration complaining that Obama was too white, calling for white people to pay reparations, and arguing that white people are fixated on breaking the bodies of black men (not something I’ve ever once thought about, and neither have you), he has belatedly discovered the virtues of the Obama years, and is appropriately indignant about Trump and his supporters in a new article in The Atlantic.  As usual, however, he goes way too far, and insists that the outcome of the election was solely dictated by racial views, and had nothing to do with the economic frustrations of white working people.

I don’t accept that West Virginia voted overwhelmingly for Trump because its citizens are bigots–not because they wanted their coal mining jobs back.  I don’t accept that businessmen voted for Trump because they are bigots, and not because they wanted deregulation and a big tax cut.  I don’t accept that evangelical Christians all voted for Trump because they are bigots, and not because they think their morals and their way of life is under threat.  I don’t accept that the vast majority of the white working class cares more about racial issues than their own economic well-being just because small farmers in the South were willing to fight for the Confederacy 150 years ago.

And what if he’s right?  How, exactly, is the Democratic Party supposed to regain power if it has no chance to regain the votes of millions of bigoted white workers? Going to West Virginia and telling unemployed miners that they should pay reparations is not exactly a winning electoral strategy.

I agree with Coates that Bernie Sanders’ class-based approach to American politics is simple-minded, and that identity issues, by and large, are much more important.  I do not agree, however, that race is the only part of identity that truly matters to the average voter.  Coates is almost as simple-minded and wrong as Sanders on that point.

 

Trump has a natural affinity for athletes and soldiers, because he can divide them into “winners” and “losers.”  That makes his new battle with LeBron James and Steph Curry very awkward for him.

What’s he going to do, call them “losers?”  They have five rings between them, and they are much more popular than he is.

Sometimes even the Wizard of Id should know that keeping his trap shut is the best option.

I’ve previously noted that the GOP’s stance on climate change is dramatically different from that of conservative parties in other energy-producing countries, such as Canada and Australia.  I attributed the difference to the greater popularity of right-wing religion and higher amounts of anti-state DNA in American culture.  I’m thinking now, however, that there is another culprit;  the environment is collateral damage in the culture wars.

What do I mean by that?  Well, the Reactionary faction of the GOP has no inherent interest in protecting the pocketbooks of fossil fuel producers. However, the Reactionaries view the American government as being nothing less than evil, given that it allegedly promotes the interests of “those people” over salt-of-the-earth white Christians, so any attempt to increase its power to do anything must be opposed to its utmost.  Since any effort to combat climate change inevitably involves both the use of scientists (a highly suspect non-Christian group) and the augmentation of state power, it must be resisted regardless of its policy implications.

I say “conservatives” because there is nothing genuinely conservative about pretending that an existential threat doesn’t exist.  As I see it, there are three separate strands of “conservative” thought:

1.  Climate change is a hoax.  It doesn’t exist.  Unfortunately, there is a mountain of objective, undisputed data which shows that the planet is warming. Taking this position requires you to ignore the evidence.

2.  Climate change is real, but is a purely natural phenomenon.  If you truly believe this, the logical response is to funnel money into capital improvements that address the symptoms of climate change, if not its causes.  That would require increased federal spending and a larger state.  As a result, #1 is more popular among “conservatives.”

3.  Climate change is real, and at least partly man-made, but doing anything about it won’t be cost-effective.  This approach essentially shifts the costs of climate change from fossil fuel producers to the victims of natural disasters; it doesn’t make them go away.  No politician is going to admit to believing that the fossil fuel industries are more important than the lives of the victims of Harvey, Irma, and Maria, but there you have it.

The best we can hope for in the foreseeable future is a shift to #2 and a realization, without openly admitting it, that it is more cost-effective to prepare for disasters than to pay for clean-up.

 

Donald Trump enters a room in a hotel in Beijing.  Kim Jong-un is waiting for him.  A Chinese government official is there as an observer.

KIM:  Mr. President!  Good to meet you at last!

TRUMP:  It’s good to meet you, too!  How should I address you?

KIM:  As Rocket Man?

TRUMP:  No, that was just a joke.

KIM:  Well, Dictator-for-Life sounds kind of formal and stuffy.  You can call me Mr. Kim.

TRUMP:  I wanted to start by saying that, in spite of appearances, we have plenty in common, and there is lots about you and your country that I admire.

KIM:  Such as?

TRUMP:  First of all, we both have awesome, outrageous hair.

KIM:  True.

TRUMP:  We’re both great trash-talkers.

KIM:  I agree.

TRUMP:  We both love golf.

KIM:  No, that was my dad.  I’m more into basketball.

TRUMP:  And that’s the fourth thing:  we both know and admire Dennis Rodman, although I had to fire him from Celebrity Apprentice.

KIM:  That was a big mistake.

TRUMP:  I also admire the way you stomp out your opponents.  You’re a winner! The way you execute your enemies shows great flair and imagination.  And you have great parades, with lots of impressive military hardware.  I want to do some of that, myself.

KIM:  Yeah, there’s nothing like a good military parade to show people you’re a winner and a real man.  Particularly with nukes!  There’s a reason missiles are shaped the way they are.

TRUMP:  I understand why you want to keep your nukes, but I have to tell you, we will have to turn your country into a cinder if you keep up the nuclear and missile tests.  My credibility as a winner is on the line.  I can’t lose on this.

KIM:  But we need those nukes to protect ourselves and impress the population. Do you have any suggestions on how to deal with the situation?

TRUMP:  Actually, I do.  I promise to you that we have no interest in regime change in your country.  In exchange for that, you would ship all of your nuclear material to China for safekeeping without telling anyone.  You can still do your missile launches and threaten us, and I’ll periodically say we’re going to destroy you.  No one will be the wiser, so your people will still be impressed.

KIM:  What if the information leaks?

TRUMP:  I’ll just call it fake news.  That’s what I always do.  My base believes anything I say.

KIM:  Why should I trust you?  You may be ripping up the Iran deal, and you even stiff your contractors.  How will I know that you’re not taking me to Trump University?

TRUMP:  That’s a legitimate point, but I would note that the US could have destroyed your country for the last sixty years, but we didn’t, because the ramifications to South Korea and China were too dangerous.  You have that as a guarantee.  Also, the Chinese could give you your stuff back if we violate the agreement.

KIM:  I’ll think about it.

Both men leave the hotel through a back door.

According to The Economist, both American envoys and General Suleimani have been trying to persuade the Kurds to postpone their referendum, which tells you that America’s relationship with Iran is more complicated than Trump makes it out to be.

Our policy since the Bush Administration has been to hold Iraq together, at least in part because we believed we would be the predominant outside influence on the Iraqi government.  In fact, the current Iraqi leadership is about as friendly to us as anyone could plausibly hope.  On the other hand, the Iranians also have plenty of reason to believe that a unified Iraq will always be subject to their control.   Only one of the two countries can be right.

If, for purposes of argument, you assume that the Iranians will probably gain the upper hand in Iraq, and that Iran is the devil, then isn’t it time to try something else? Wouldn’t it make sense to adopt something like the Biden Plan, support the Kurdish referendum, and start to patronize the Iraqi Sunnis?  An “Iraq” consisting of three parts, two of them friendly to the United States, would make more sense than a unified nation doing the bidding of a mortal enemy.

Admittedly, supporting Kurdish independence would piss off Erdogan, but he’s already playing footsie with Putin, so it might be a good idea to show him that we have other options, as well.

It’s worth considering.

My thoughts on the General Assembly speech:

1.  If the idea was to come across as an angry, bellicose, snarling force of nature, it worked admirably.
2.  Part of the purpose of the speech apparently was to try to reconcile the two opposing strands of Bannonism:  extreme nationalism and international cooperation against enemies of the West.  As such, it was a complete and utter failure.  We apparently believe in universal human rights in places like Iran, Venezuela, and North Korea, but in “sovereignty” for places like Saudi Arabia. You can be sure that the Russians and Chinese will have taken note.
3.  I can’t help thinking that Trump is prepared to go to war with North Korea if he is driven to it, but he really wants to go to war with Iran.
4. Who was the audience for this speech?  The strident tone won’t reassure our erstwhile allies.  Our enemies won’t be intimidated.  I can only conclude that it was just more red meat for his base, which in this context includes the governments of Israel and the Arab nations that hate Iran.

This one practically wrote itself.

Rocket Man

I packed my bags last night, for flight.

Zero hour, nine a.m.

‘Cause the bomb’ll be higher than a kite flies then.

I miss my home so much; I miss my wife.

It’s lonely underground.

On such an endless flight.

 

(Chorus)

And I think it’s gonna be a long, long time

Till fallout’s all cleaned out; survivors find

I’m not the man I used to be at all.

Oh, no, no, no.

I’m a rocket man.

Rocket man

Living on what’s left for everyone.

 

This ain’t the kind of place to raise your kids.

In fact, it’s dark as hell.

And there’s no one there to raise them

If you did.

And all the conflict I don’t understand.

I only know I have to go.

A rocket man.

A rocket man.

 

(Repeat chorus)

 

Parody of “Rocket Man” by Elton John and Bernie Taupin.

 

So Trump wants to have a big military parade (glorifying himself) on July 4. What a shock!  The only problem is that D.C. doesn’t have a street or a square suitable for the purpose.

I can see it now:  let’s demolish some useless old 19th century buildings and create Trump Square for our parade!  It would have to be bigger than Red Square, of course.  It would be yuge!

South Korea was a desperately poor nation when it was invaded by the North Koreans, and then the Chinese, in the 1950s.  American troops were sent, and succeeded in creating a stalemate.  They are still there today.  In the meantime, South Korea has evolved from a politically repressive basket case into a genuinely democratic state with a first world economy.

American troops also succeeded initially in creating a stalemate in Vietnam. After the troops were withdrawn, however, it became clear that the South Vietnamese government and military lacked the willingness and the ability to hold off the enemy on their own.  The result was a defeat and a blow to American prestige, although, in the long run, it probably didn’t matter much;  today, Vietnam is more of an ally to us than to its erstwhile patrons.

Why were the outcomes so different?  Two factors jump out at you.  First, the American military commitment to South Korea was open-ended, while the commitment to South Vietnam was not.  Second, and more important, the South Korean government was a success story;  the South Vietnamese government was a failure.  The ultimate success of the mission thus depended largely on factors that were mostly out of our control.

Which of these models more closely resembles Afghanistan?  You decide.

Other than getting to sleep in his own bed at Trump Tower, this week figures to be a nightmare for Trump.  Instead of throwing red meat to an adoring crowd, his speech to the General Assembly will require him to read a highly structured speech from a teleprompter to an audience that undoubtedly views him as an ignorant, arrogant boor.  Then he will have to meet with countless world leaders about whom he knows little and cares less.

Don’t be surprised if he never does this again, regardless of the protocol.

Sometimes people get what they deserve in this world.  Sometimes, particularly as a result of natural disasters, they don’t.  Anyone attempting to create a logically coherent religion/philosophy must be able to account for both situations.

On a somewhat similar note, the GOP battle cry of rugged individualism and limited government can work reasonably well under normal conditions, but it fails utterly in the face of economic or natural disasters.  At that point, everyone looks to the state for solutions.  And so, you have the spectacle of Governor Scott, a man who scoffs at climate change, views public employees as underworked moochers, and opposes virtually every effort to increase burdens on business, running around furiously imposing new and costly rules on nursing homes and using state power to provide gas for residents and evacuees.  And, to be fair, he’s done a pretty good job of it.

Any successful system of government must be sufficiently flexible to operate under both normal and emergency conditions.  Our system has met the test, so far.

On the Florida Governor Scott.

He’s right-wing, until he is not.

He’s dashed ’round the state

Saying things he should hate.

Will the voters connect all the dots?

Nobody foresaw a world war in 1914.  While historians argue about this, in my opinion, the war escalated from a minor localized conflict into a pan-European disaster as the result of the following miscalculations:

1.  The Austro-Hungarian government somehow thought that the prestige gained by crushing Serbia was going to solve the problems of a dysfunctional political system.  The government also thought, with some reason, that the Russians wouldn’t intervene.  They had backed down before, most notably in 1908.
2. The Russian government believed that the danger of backing down exceeded the danger of intervening and losing.  Guess how that turned out.

The current analogy is, of course, North Korea.  I don’t have the impression that Trump really wants to fight the North Koreans;  if he did, the war would already be over.  War could nonetheless come, however, over a miscalculation of motives, including the following:

1. The administration could view a harmless North Korean provocation (say, a missile intended to miss Guam by 20 miles) as an actual declaration of war.
2. Kim could start taking Trump’s tweets seriously and assume that a preemptive strike is imminent, when it really isn’t.
3. And, of course, there is the matter of Trump feeling humiliated, and needing to “win” for his ego and for domestic political reasons, but that is the subject for another day.

The approval of ACA may seem preordained in 2017, but it certainly didn’t look like it at the time.  Even with 60 Democrats in the Senate, every day was a crisis: if it wasn’t Joe Lieberman demanding the elimination of the public option, it was Ben Nelson and the “Cornhusker Kickback.”  Legislation based on GOP ideas about health care ultimately passed by the skin of its teeth.

Notwithstanding that, Bernie Sanders is proposing to sell us a Lexus without telling us how much it will cost, which makes no sense in a world in which the GOP has come within a few votes of eliminating the more limited health care legislation we already have.  Single-payer has absolutely no chance of being approved in the foreseeable future, because:

1. Can you see the Democrats getting 60 votes in the Senate again?  Me, neither.
2. The drug and insurance companies would mobilize all possible support against it.  Hillary Clinton will be happy to tell you what that means.
3.  More to the point, the legislation would threaten the livelihoods of tens of millions of health care providers.  If it doesn’t, it won’t do anything to control costs, and it will be useless.  Bernie only talks about taking on drug and insurance companies;  he doesn’t have the guts to extend the battle to the vastly more popular doctors and nurses.
4. And, of course, he would be replacing the benefits already enjoyed by over a hundred million Americans with a promise.  Will they go for it?  I doubt it.

Sanders surely knows that single-payer isn’t going to become law in his lifetime. One assumes that his rationale for the bill has something to do with playing the long game;  a proposal that seems unrealistic at any given time can be viewed as common sense a decade later.  But what about the current problems?  For them, he has no solution.

To me, this looks like the left-wing version of the PBPs using Reactionaries to get votes for tax cuts, while providing nothing but lip service in return.  The backlash that we are experiencing today was inevitable.  The same thing will happen if the Democrats win elections on the promise of single-payer and then can’t deliver.