Category: government

2024’s Top Geopolitical Risks

On By Rick McIn bad news, economics, ethics, GOP USA, government, human rights, IslamLeave a comment

January 2024.

Even if Trump loses the election, the USA will be further divided and destabilized through the election cycle, exactly what Xi, Putin, and the rest of American enemies want.

I’ve been trying to avoid coverage of Gaza — as it’s so depressing.

In fact, I gave up on that issue decades ago concluding that successive Israeli governments were horrible — and successive Palestinian governments even worse. My friend Mike taught school in Libya and Egypt for many years, coming away very sympathetic for innocent Palestinians.

NOW I find myself brought up to speed by listening to an excellent podcast interview with Ian Bremmer.

Search “Conversation with Ian Bremmer — 2024’s Top Geopolitical Risks”

Click PLAY or watch it on YouTube.

Not as good — but similar — is his recent TED talk.

Click PLAY or watch it on YouTube. (43min)

As a happy Canadian, I didn’t suffer in any way from the G.W. Bush recession of 2008 nor Trump’s incompetent 4 years — and I MIGHT survive another 4 years of the emotional toddler as President.

But I’m worried about 2024.

As Bremmer points out, once Trump gets the GOP nomination, all Republicans will have to fall in line with that idiot — or vote for Biden.  Or NOT VOTE.

As for Russia, as Economist said at the very beginning, there’s no scenario where Russia wins their invasion of Ukraine. Even if they eventually control all of that nation, the population will be uncooperative with Putin for decades to come. The rest of the world will be leery of Putin-land for decades. Russian assets will stay frozen. And at least a million Russians who fled the nation will mostly not return.

NATO is much strengthened, as well.

When Abortion is Denied

On By Rick McIn economics, education, ethics, GOP USA, government, happiness, health & fitness, human rightsLeave a comment

Diana Greene Foster is a professor at the University of California, San Francisco.

She led the ten-year nationwide Turnaway Study analyzing the health and wellbeing of women who seek abortion in the United States — including those who do not receive one — and in 2020 published a book, The Turnaway Study: Ten Years, a Thousand Women, and the Consequences of Having—or Being Denied—an Abortion, on her findings.

In 2023, she was awarded a MacArthur Fellowship in recognition of her scientific work, including the book and more than 120 scientific papers. …

In 2022, she was recognized as one of the ten people who shaped science that year by Nature.

One of the most expert in the field.

Here’s a fascinating new TED Talk. Unsurprisingly, the women forced to carry a child to term have worse consequences than those who have the freedom to make the choice to abort.

Anti-choice advocates in the USA often simultaneously deny raises in minimum wage, health care for children, maternity leave, and even free school lunch. Pro birth. But not pro life.

Click PLAY or watch it on YouTube.

Abbott Elementary – season 2

On By Rick McIn economics, education, GOP USA, government, humour, TVLeave a comment

Hilarious mockumentary sitcom.

Season 2 is still charming.

Abbott Elementary stars 4 ft 11 inch (149.9 cm)​​ Quinta Brunson as Janine Teagues, a perpetually optimistic second-grade teacher at the underfunded Abbott Elementary, a predominantly Black school in Philadelphia. 

William Stanford Davis as Mr. Johnson, the school’s eccentric, overqualified and talented, custodian is my favourite character.

It’s an insight into the American public school system. ReTrumplicans insist on reducing funding for public education, while subsidizing rich kids in private schools.

The GOP later complains about crime when these same underfunded kids can’t make it in a nation with poor health care and a $7.25 / hour minimum wage.

Click PLAY or watch it on YouTube.

For kids, this is a silly show making fun of teachers.

For adults, there are many funny little details. This typical school group photo, for example. 😀

Charlie Chaplin’s Great Dictator speech

On By Rick McIn education, ethics, government, moviesLeave a comment

The Great Dictator is a 1940 American anti-war political satire black comedy film written, directed, produced, scored by, and starring British comedian Charlie Chaplin …

Chaplin’s film advanced a stirring condemnation of the German and Italian dictators Adolf Hitler and Benito Mussolini, as well as fascism, antisemitism, and the Nazis.

Mocking Hitler

At the time of its first release, the United States was still formally at peace with Nazi Germany and neutral during what were the early days of World War II.

Chaplin plays both leading roles: a ruthless fascist dictator and a persecuted Jewish barber.

It’s best remembered for this speech.

Click PLAY or watch it on YouTube.

Culper Ring trilogy by Brad Meltzer

On By Rick McIn books, governmentLeave a comment
  1. The Inner Circle
  2. The Fifth Assassin
  3. The President’s Shadow

I’m not much of a fan of thrillers, especially political thrillers.

And didn’t manage to get through all 3 books.

Beecher White is an interesting character, however. A government archivist in Washington D.C.

I did enjoy enjoy reading about the archives and historical anecdotes.

Author Brad Meltzer is interesting, too.

His novels touch on the political thriller, legal thriller and conspiracy fiction genres, …

… Meltzer counts former Presidents Bill Clinton and George H.W. Bush as fans, and both have helped him with his research. …

The Culper Ring books imagine that a secret spy ring, founded in real life by George Washington, continues to exist today. 

Though they didn’t work for me, many others really enjoy these books.

Of the 3 books, I felt the first — Inner Circle — was best. And I did finish that one. 😀

You could try it and see if you want to continue with the trilogy.

Wade Davis – The Wayfinders

On By Rick McIn books, climate change, ethics, government, health & fitness, things getting worse, travelLeave a comment

I’ve been a fan of Wade Davis for decades.

An academic and adventurer. He crossed the Darién Gap at age-20, for example.

This book is a summary of his Massey Lectures:

The Wayfinders: Why Ancient Wisdom Matters in the Modern World (The CBC Massey Lectures 2009) 

Very good. Smart and succinct.

Davis compares cultures quickly and easily, looking for lessons for us who haven’t lived with Amazon tribes for years.

Of the thousand key point, one really struck me. His discussion of how the British — on arrival — could not understand the Australian aborigines.

These are and were a people with no notion of linear time.

Theirs was one of the great experiments in human thought. The notion that the world existed as a perfect whole, and that the singular duty of humanity was to maintain through ritual activity the land precisely as it existed when the Rainbow Serpent embarked on the journey of creation.

… But in life there is only the Dreaming, in which every thought, every plant and animal, are inextricably linked as a single impulse, the inspiration of the first dawning.

Had humanity followed this track, it is true that we would have never placed a man on the moon.

But we would most certainly not be speaking of our capacity to compromise the life support of the planet. I have never in all of my travels been so moved by a vision of another possibility, born literally 55,000 years ago.

TED Blog

Edmund Wade Davis CM (born December 14, 1953) is a Canadian cultural anthropologist, ethnobotanist, author, and photographer.

Davis came to prominence with his 1985 best-selling book The Serpent and the Rainbow about the zombies of Haiti. He is professor of anthropology and the BC Leadership Chair in Cultures and Ecosystems at Risk at the University of British Columbia.

Real Tigers by Mick Herron

On By Rick McIn books, government, humour, TVLeave a comment

Not at all my favourite of the Slough House books.

Still, the humour and banter of Jackson Lamb alone makes it worth reading.

Roderick Ho is entertaining, as well.

One of the regulars is kidnapped. And it all goes wrong after that. 😀

This is the Mick Herron’s third novel in the Slough House series. …

In addition to the inhabitants of Slough House, the main characters are Dame Ingrid Tearney, the head of the service, and Diana – ‘Lady Di’ – Taverner, who wants to be head of the service. The two women clearly loathe each other – a fact that Herron conveys superbly by having them behave towards each other with a studied politeness.

There is somebody else who wants to run the intelligence service – Peter Judd, the Home Secretary, within whose department the intelligence service is included. He wants to control it as part of his career plan to become Prime Minister. There is a deliberate similarity to the popular side of Boris Johnson in his portrayal. …

Kirkus

Shortest History of Germany by James Hawes

On By Rick McIn books, governmentLeave a comment

FROM JULIUS CAESAR TO ANGELA MERKEL–A RETELLING FOR OUR TIMES

… fast-moving encapsulation of German history …

… Hawes sees the birth of Germany as we know it with the partition of Charlemagne’s kingdom into West Frankish (France) and East Frankish (Germany) …

Kirkus

I read this wanting to know more about the history of Germany. It’s not nearly so well known to me as Great Britain and/or France.

The author argues that historically and culturally, eastern Germany is quite different from the rest.

It’s been true for hundreds of years. And was true in 1933 when the east of Germany voted more for Hitler.

Eastern Germans are more likely to be anti-American, anti-NATO and anti-Western.

Some are pro-Putin.

Alternative for Germany (AfD) party is one of your typical right wing hate groups: anti LGBTQ, anti-Muslim, anti-Gay marriage, anti-everything.

Here’s where the AfD party was most popular in the 2017 federal election.

The author almost argues that it would have been better if Germany had not unified.

Despite trillions in subsidy provided by the west, many in the east would rather go back to the Soviet Union.

If there is ever a referendum on separation, I hope it happens.

The Nine Lives of Pakistan by Declan Walsh

On By Rick McIn books, government, human rights, IslamLeave a comment

I’ve never been to Pakistan. But am keen to go as there is terrific hiking in the Himalaya.

I read this excellent book as research.

Sadly, in terms of progress, India has done far better since Partition .

The invasion in 1979 by the Soviet Union was a huge setback, of course.

Declan Walsh is an Irish author and journalist who is the Chief Africa Correspondent for The New York Times. 

Walsh was expelled from Pakistan in May 2013—an experience he wrote about in his 2020 book The Nine Lives of Pakistan: Dispatches from a Precarious State—but continued covering the country from London.

In fact, Walsh was ejected just prior to the 2013 Pakistani general election when Nawaz Sharif was just barely elected.

The subtitle of the book is Dispatches from a Divided Nation and the author criss-crosses those political, religious, ethnic and generational fault lines, assembling a portrait of the vast country of 220 million people through his travels and the lives of the nine compelling protagonists.

Walsh is a wonderful writer, with a gift for sketching an impression of a place, time and ambience with a few brief lines. …

What also shines through is the relish with which Walsh throws himself into the far corners of Pakistan, into crowds, celebrations and rites, with a drive born of fascination with the land and its people. …

Guardian Review

“Above all, Pakistanis are survivors. Yet a country, like a person, may only have nine lives. Rather than fate to overtake them, some of the people I met in the Insha’Allah nation took matters into their own hands…”

Book Review: The Nine Lives of Pakistan by Declan Walsh

Red Team Blues by Cory Doctorow

On By Rick McIn books, economics, governmentLeave a comment

One of the best books I’ve read so far in 2023.

Cory Doctorow is one of the most respected Tech pundits. Super smart. Incredibly well spoken.

Too smart for school. Though he attended 4 universities — he never got a degree. 😀

His novel called Red Team Blues (April 2023) is a financial thriller about cybersecurity.

Martin Hench is an entertaining character. 67-years-old. Steeped in Silicon Valley. In this book, Martin makes $300 million in just a few days. Then ends up penniless and homeless in the tent cities of San Francisco.

The story is merely a vehicle for Cory to reflect on the current state of technology and politics. I learned a lot.