On Social Systems

Sometimes a simple answer can “blossom” into so much more. Ever happen to you? It happened to me recently.

       The trigger was a simple Facebook question and answer regarding possible Democratic candidates. The issue revolved around Sanders/Warren, even though Biden is apparently the (hopefully short lived) front runner. The statement was:

“Bernie and Warren are not home free. To many of our voting public just don't understand socialism.”

       I was forced to reflect that the above statement may well reveal that even those who feel they do “understand socialism”, have little or no political real-world basis for that belief. Certainly, believing that the Green New Deal is a panacea for “what ails us” indicated profound ignorance of how we got here and how deeply entrenched a market economy is in Americans at even the small businessman level. Using the term Socialism, by implication and definition means (Oxford English Dictionary):

1) “A political and economic theory of social organization which advocates that the means of production, distribution, and exchange should be owned or regulated by the community as a whole.”  (Regulated really somewhat reflects the concept of a regulated market economy, but most Americans see “Owned” and reject that out of hand.

2) “In Marxist theory, a transitional social state between the overthrow of capitalism and the realization of Communism.”

       It's a sliding scale, and there's the problem. Communism is specifically called State Socialism. Other than the occasional 15 or 20 hippies in the desert with a bushel of pot, there has never been a really successful Communist state or, for that matter democratic state. 20th century experiments involved a violent transition from dictatorship (Russia, Cuba) to the dictatorship of the Party. In both cases, the population base subjected to the system was already used to centralized and dictatorial abuse, ergo saw not a whole lot of change, except among the extreme lower classes (better off) and the former upper classes (worse off. In neither case did the end result really resemble Marx’s economic vision since human desires for wealth, privilege and power soon became entrenched.  A Russian serf was already miserable, so Communism, or in fact, any system which ameliorated that misery was preferable, even if that mean sweeping the streets of Moscow in winter (yeah, really) or waiting months for consumer goods nationalized industries were incapable of producing fast enough. There are areas where a national approach of a universally necessary service or commodity (like healthcare) is appropriate, but if you want a bloody revolution, tell all the power companies, airlines, auto manufacturers etc. that they're going to become government owned.

        We have too long a history of entrepreneurial business to simply reverse course. There is way too much money in far way too many hands. The best course would be the agreement that as Wilson said, Regulation in the public interest is appropriate. Theodore Roosevelt, himself a Republican, but also the first to use the Sherman Act to legally limit the public abuses by businesses of the age of robber barons (See Rockefeller, John D.) had said earlier, “ When we control business in the public interest we are also bound to encourage it in the public interest or it will be a bad thing for everybody and worst of all for those on whose behalf the control is nominally exercised.” I think there may well be a great truth in that idea. It is possible to encourage entrepreneurialism while limiting its abuses. Dodd-Frank was a good faith attempt to do that. You saw how quickly Trump backed us out of Dodd -Frank.

        The Public Interest theory of regulation explains government intervention in markets and associated regulatory rules as “responses to market failures and market imperfections.” It argues that regulation promotes the general welfare rather than the interests of well-organized stakeholders.

A reasonable position by any candidate might be to amend this to include the idea that some societal issues, benefits and possibilities are so central to successful communities that they should also fall under that umbrella. The issue then becomes, “What idea/concepts/services and in what manner.” An example of this gone “off the rails” is the Green New Deal. It proposes huge expenditures, ignores existing technology while removing incentive to private enterprise in the field. If it is desired that the nation transition to a much lower carbon footprint (a wonderful idea), then all "green" tech need be considered, including “zero footprint” nuclear power. The resistance to this is driven by ignorance and superstition. Additionally, if one wants to encourage Solar and or Wind, then make it attractive for private entities to do so. Let them raise capital, and if necessary be given tax incentives rather than creating more federal bureaucracy to do the same. If we learn anything from Denmark it should be that an all-out government wind program will drive energy costs sky high (highest in Europe and three times US average)

        Without massive social upheaval, (and I mean literally) the neutral ground would be to fairly regulate what private industry can and can't do. Sanders verges on being an out and out Socialist and, in my opinion, almost as reactionary to the left as is Trump to the right. In point of fact, based on anecdotal things from those who actually have worked (or tried to work) with him, he is abrasive and doesn't play well with others. Democrat Centrists would probably not support him.

         Asking the American public to take the kind of tax hit which a truly Socialist agenda would demand would be political suicide. Britain went that route to some extent and backed away from it due to economic failure, more than anything. Nationalized UK industries, at one time included coal, iron and steel, electricity' and gas, transport by rail, civil aviation, and some others. Note, however,  the absence of national healthcare, which does work, from that list!! The return to privatization was trying and perhaps we in the US could learn from Industrial Socialism’s failure in our closest ally, rather than reprove that it doesn’t work well.

          Denmark also has a huge marginal tax rate, as does Sweden and Norway, even with Norway producing most power by hydro. The "Green New Deal" sounds better than the unreality of funding it is, but is fatally flawed because it rejects nuclear power out of pure lack of knowledge.

        As a response to the original question re: my opinion on a realistic democratic ticket” I think a Warren/ Buttigieg ticket could win but feel Sanders would  condemn us to four more Trump years. Remember, we’re not talking to a politically sophisticated or informed country as a whole, and Trump supporters are at the bottom of that barrel. They will not be won ever by any non-rightist candidate, therefore any split in the democratic ranks will be tragic. What I find very hard to understand is why we know more about what AOC, in her relative ignorance and naivete, believes than we do about Professor Warren. She is a self-made woman of prodigious accomplishment and intellect. Like AOC, she put herself through college, unlike her, she did it as a working wife and mother. I feel it's time to make specific statements and draw firm lines disassociating herself  from the more radical socialism with which she is being labelled and the fairly and consistently regulated market economy which the majority of Americans find acceptable, even though many are so "economically challenged" that they know not what they know not. There are other socio/political/economic choices than Robber Baron or Socialist. Hell, we all thought socialism made sense when we were in college.... then we grew up and went to work for a living.

        A classic example of what I'm talking about is the electrical power industry. There is a government owned utility- the TVA. The TVA dams were built to provide power in areas of the mid-south where private utility companies had no lines. Using hydro, TVA retails power at a relatively low cost, but not really cheaper than other non-government hydro providers elsewhere. Electrical Utilities, like communications corporations, are regulated and legally restrained from rate increases which are unjustified. States do the same thing for utilities and insurers for example.

        If Orlando Utilities wants a rate increase, they must provide justification to the Public Services (or Public Utilities, titles vary) commission, which may reject such request. This is government regulation in the public interest of a private utility. Allowing a corporation to build and produce power by raising capital and then making a regulated fair profit eliminates the huge outlay of public funds such efforts would require. The cries of abuse we hear about drug pricing could be resolved by standing up to Big Pharma and using a "commission" to review pricing. It doesn't take Socialism to do that, it takes the willingness to ignore lobbyists and do the right thing. A good beginning could be had by banning all lobbyists.

My dear friend responded with: “Mike,  I understand your points but, and please correct me if I am wrong, I don't think Bernie wants total socialism; I think he wants a socialistic Healthcare System and to fight the big Pharma which has gotten way out of control. Please enlighten me.”

ME: “XXXX, that may be, but the message gets lost in the word “Socialism”. The larger issue is that while he does well with crowds, he apparently does far less well with those who he really needs - his peers. Here's a guy who has been sort of the  "cranky old uncle"" while not building any consensus with members of the organization. I just don't see him as now being able to build consensus. He's been an independent who, as president, would need support from those, some of whom he has built a career criticizing. He also supports free college and the Green New Deal which, as I said, is naive at best, and more like downright foolish.

Response: Mike, free college sounds great, but I don't know where the money will come from, but other countries do it.

ME: “XXXXX, they do it with high taxes. And yes, other countries do it, but if your taxes were as high as, say, Denmark you'd scream. The myth, however, is that “everyone should go to college.” 

       Tech schools are, for many, a better idea. The guy who fixes my a/ c starts at about the same pay as a Florida beginning teacher in many cases. 

       There will always be service sectors in various areas which require no college and which, in many cases, students can graduate high school ready to work. Another example: a starting apprentice electrician should expect to earn in the same general area as a beginning teacher (in Florida) – mid $30,000 range, let’s call it $35,000.  However, the teacher will have had to first pass four (more likely five, now) years of school and pay for that while earning nothing. In that same five years, the electrician, earned $175,000 and may well be a journeyman, (after 3 to 5 years apprenticeship) earning in the high $50ks-low $60ks depending on where they work. Even if the electrician doesn’t progress to master electrician ($83k, even in Florida) the teacher with five years of college will never, ever catch up! There were, in 2014, 628,800 master electrician jobs in the USA, requiring only a high school diploma or equivalency.

       The income is even higher for 2-year tech diploma grads in such fields as radiology tech. A licensed massage therapist in Florida with as little as 8 months to a max of 18 months training will earn, from the get-go, in the mid $45 k range and never have to grade homework.

       And finally, one last example, using my self. I entered the Navy with no college degree and remained enlisted throughout my career. A Navy enlistee today, who enlisted in 1998 and progressed as I did, would have, if a nuclear trained individual as I was, probably been paid additional $50 to $60,000 dollars (actually up to $100k in reenlistment bonus over and above salary. If that person, reached pay grade E-9 and was, as I was, career submarine and sea pay designated, they would earn well over $120,000 annually in pay and allowances, with increases for each year from 20 to 30. At 30 years of service, at say, age 48, they could retire with right at $70,000 annually for the rest of their lives. This doesn’t include premium health insurance for life, which reverts to a Medicare supplement at age 65. Pretty much means no medical bills after 65. Ever. No college required, just pass high school algebra with a C and be willing to work. The teacher, in Florida after 30 years, never having made, after about 15 years, as much annually as the enlisted man, could look forward after 30 years at say age 54, or so, to a retirement of $33,000 (yeah, that’s less than half) and pay for health care insurance.

No, not everyone needs to go to college, but if it were completely free, I’d be willing to bet that many more will try and fail

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After I finished the text, I decided to include a graphic with explanations for whomever cares.

Bogus Memes and Those Who Believe Them

There’s no shortage of incomplete knowledge driven and disseminated by partisan zealots. The meme below is a wonderful example of both.

This originally showed itself on a Facebook post. I responded:

You really have no idea, do you? Congress has had no pay raise since 2009. They are supposed to get a COLA every year and have refused it for the last 10. Meanwhile the CPI has increased by 19.59% over that period so, in essence, Congress has had a salary cut of almost 20 percent from 2009-2019. Have you seen a 20% decrease in your spending power? Did you turn down the annual Social security COLA? Even If all 535 members of Congress got no pay whatsoever until the current 22 trillion debt was paid off, it would take 236 years!

Social security isn't a "pot" of money and would take too long to explain.

The meme to the left shows the lack of understanding exhibited by those too quick to post and too slow to do the work to discern the truth.

The Congressional pay raise if accepted, would amount to a percentage (in the 2% range) based on the same index as Social Security COLAs. In other words, the legislation was passed years ago and is completely out of any individual’s hands. Meanwhile the CPI has risen 19% over the period since Congress refused the raises beginning in 2009.

As for the debt, the deficit adds to it every year. Indeed, Obama had large deficits due to the great recession. Remember, his first year was the last Bush budget with almost half a trillion of the TARP included. (not criticizing Bush, just making the point). Adjusted for inflation it is similar to the FDR issues during terms 3 and part of four. 

       It (the initial huge Obama deficit) was driven by much lower tax receipts ($400 billion less in 2009!) due to Bush 43 tax cuts and epidemic home-owner defaults and bankruptcies while spending on wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, which Obama also inherited, the deficit steadily decreased through the Obama last five years.

       What is far more difficult to grasp is why, in what Trump, himself, brags on as a "booming economy" The deficit is on track to be, in just one four-year term, 91% of Obama's total for two terms during a huge recession. Imagine, doing all this while giving huge tax cuts to the wealthy, gutting environmental protection and playing more golf in 2 1/2 years than Obama did in 8 years. In fact, Trump's golf has cost (so far) more than a year of Congressional salaries.

       Perhaps you might look elsewhere to vent? The best Trump quote on his huge "prosperity “deficit?" “We won't be here by then!" This is the same Trump who campaigned that he would "Balance the Federal budget fairly quickly". Instead he cut taxes and increased spending, aided by a Congress dominated by his own party. Tell me again why he's even marginally competent?

Not unexpectedly, the response by the original poster was:

“I think some of the additional benefits they get has helped them survive.”

       It was at this point that I realized that I was dealing with the “Congressmen get all their shit free!” fallacy as well as general lack of information.

So, being me, I leapt back into the fray:

       Not my point at all, the meme is a lie, pure and simple, and as for the "additional benefits", I suspect you don't really know what they are. They (Members of Congress) are required to pay for their own health care insurance and most are part of a federal employees group, just like a clerk in the Patent Office,  unless they buy private coverage. They can't use Walter Reed or any other hospital "free" as some have suggested. They don’t get free haircuts. Their retirement plan isn't vested until five years. A two term Representative gets no retirement at all! Under no circumstances can their retirement be more than 80 % of their "high five." They get no free housing or even housing allowance. In fact, some junior members actually sleep in their office while in DC. A USN retiree at 30 years, maybe 52 years old, gets 75% of high five and health care insurance for life, a Congressman draws nothing until 62, and it isn't portable.

         I don't love Congress either, but crap like this meme are simply lies and some are willing to believe it. In fact, compared to civilian sector individuals with comparative responsibility and authority, members of Congress are barely comparably paid. Why are you angry at Congress when football coaches are paid millions?

      As a Floridian, if you really want a righteous cause, consider that your taxes pay our 31 members of Congress (in salary) $5.4 million annually. On the other hand, your Florida state sales taxes and/or children’s exorbitant tuition, pay the top five football coaches (just football, not including all the other high-profile sports) out of more than 40 state schools, a total of just short of $15 million annually. What has a football coach done for you lately?

On Reparations

On Reparations

        I have written peripherally about this once before, but Mona Charen's column (linked to at the end of this post) seems to do a good job of discussing things which I mentioned, but not in the depth she has done in this column. This column has something to offend everyone who is close minded on either side of the issue, and gives it a superficial read without measured reflection. It also has what, I think, is a cogent analysis of an extremely complex and contentious issue.  

        It is especially noteworthy to me that the "plan" suggested by Dr. Darrity at Duke, a world-renowned economist, also has built into it the thing I stated, perhaps six months ago that I also thought was problematic. That is the fact that requiring proof of slave ancestry could become an extremely divisive issue among Black Americans. This also implies that all the hindrances faced by Black Americans were, and, are faced solely by the descendants of slaves, a blatantly false assumption. I suggested in my essay that perhaps a better way to deal with the issues, which are marginally approached by the way some native Americans were treated as well, would be to "pay it forward."

          What might that look like" For a start it would mean enforcing and applying existing Constitutional guarantees equally across the entire spectrum of our population. It could mean that rape and other crimes are prosecuted and punished without regard to the defendant's color, economic status or "potential." It could mean federal control of state redistricting to guarantee equal vote impact for all. It could mean reenacting and enforcing the voting rights act.

         The idea that a wad of money will spontaneously raise any individual or group to new heights of achievement overlooks the real issues in the matter. There actually is a sort of "test case" in this area, which was the reparations paid to Japanese Citizens who were interned during WWII. Since many of these individuals were relatively well educated and economically successful pre-war and returned to that status over time after their full civil rights were restored, the $20,000 paid to each survivor was simply, for the most part, a nice windfall.

       That said, it was a far simpler task to deal with Japanese reparations for several reasons 

first: the nature of the injustice was well defined, concrete, and universally consistent.

second: The perpetrator (there was only one) was also easily identified.

third: The victims were easily identifiable.

fourth: Many of the direct victims were still alive.

fifth: The injustice took place during a relatively short time period. (under three years, vice 1619 to the present)

        In the case of slavery reparations, it is easy to identify relatively few of the numerous perpetrators of these injustices. In fact, there are so many that it might be difficult to persuade any one perpetrator to pay reparations.

        Not only that but many millions of the most egregious maltreatments are/were person to person as in intolerant acts based on individual racists, for whom no government entity is really accountable. At minimum, perpetrators include the U.S. federal government, the governments of every state that ever permitted enslavement of African Americans, and every individual who ever treated a person of color unfairly. More broadly, they also include municipal governments (White citizen's councils?), private businesses, educational institutions and churches. Added to this is the fact that, post 1865, the maltreatment of Blacks in the Jim Crow era in the South was mirrored to a significant extent in the North to Irish, Italian and Central European immigrants. Socially it was in much the same way, but white immigrants had an edge in that they were, by appearance, not "different."

        As I said above, money will not wipe out racism in those whose hearts and minds are so tragically damaged that they see race as a determinate of human quality. We cannot legislate away individual bias, but we can acknowledge that it's illegal and morally wrong and raise our children to understand the unity of mankind. This must be a federal initiative and enforced strenuously at every lower level. And this also means you need to vote in every election for men and women of principle.  Give this article a read:

https://townhall.com/columnists/monacharen/2019/09/20/why-reparations-talk-is-harmful-n2553395

Madison redux

I’m so incredibly sick of listening to, or reading of,  the Trump evangelical sycophant fan-base laud him as a “Godly man” who, they promise, will restore….who knows, the “Good Old Days?” You know, when non-Christians were some sort of second-class citizens, yet bound to the whims of a faith they neither believed or observed?

        Modern skeptics aren’t by any stretch, the first Americans who foresaw the dangers of enforced religious belief or conformity to a free nation. The “Christian nation” bullshit is precisely that. Every Fourth of July, we see or hear, frequently from a pulpit,  cherry-picked citations from some of the founding fathers which are then extrapolated as being representative of what the framers of our national Constitution intended. As usual, those fraudulent claims are bolstered by their insistence than only a Christian nation can be moral in its actions.

Accordingly, here are some words from the Father of the United States Constitution, which all Americans of all degrees of all or no faiths really need to read and understand. This is philosophically relevant to every human being on Planet Earth who believes that their religion makes them superior and therefore fit to rule others.

“During almost fifteen centuries has the legal establishment of Christianity been on trial. What has been its fruits? More or less, in all places, pride and indolence in the clergy; ignorance and servility in the laity; in both, superstition, bigotry and persecution.”

“What influence, in fact, have ecclesiastical establishments had on society? In some instances they have been seen to erect a spiritual tyranny on the ruins of the civil authority; on many instances they have been seen upholding the thrones of political tyranny; in no instance have they been the guardians of the liberties of the people… A just government, instituted to secure and perpetuate it, needs them not."

“Who does not see that the same authority which can establish Christianity, in exclusion of all other religions, may establish with the same ease any particular sect of Christians, in exclusion of all other sects?”

James Madison, A Memorial and Remonstrance, addressed to the General Assembly of the Commonwealth of VA, 1795

       Although Madison was addressing those who then (and now to an extent) believed that the United States of America should be a "Christian nation," the thought process and the warning, is as relevant to Islam, or for that matter any government which should seek to enforce religious adherence as the price for civil equality. Theocracies like Iran and Saudi Arabia (supposedly a monarchy, but only because they suck up to their domestic Wahabi fanatics) do little to help their populations by cramming religious dogma down their throats. 

       Likewise Hindu dominated India has fostered for years a mindset toward women that they are having a terrible time reversing. Isn't it odd that Fundamentalist Christians, Hiindus and Muslims all denigrate women with respect to their freedom, sexuality and place as religious leaders? It seems to me that if any of the world's professed divinely inspired religions were so obviously just, right and beneficial that there would be no need to enforce their observance. 

       If the Taliban are right, why do they have to use terrorism and force to get others to see the rectitude of their viewpoint? If Christianity is truly God's will, why were there Crusades, Inquisitions, witch burnings and continuing persecution of various minorities in his name? Why kill people in the name of a deity who allegedly loves everyone equally? If the Taliban were fundamentalist Christians would we be in Afghanistan?

       I leave the subject for now with several additional quotes which relate to my question:

 "In Christianity neither morality nor religion come into contact with reality at any point." - Friederich Nietzsche

"It's fair to say that the Bible contains equal amounts of fact, history, and pizza." --Penn Jillette

"I refuse to prove that I exist" says God, "for proof denies faith, and without faith, I am nothing."  "Oh," says man, "but the Babel Fish is a dead give-away, isn't it?  It proves You exist, and so therefore You don't.  Q.E.D."  "Oh, I hadn't thought of that," says God, who promptly vanishes in a puff of logic. - Douglas Adams, Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy

"Those to whom his word was revealed were always alone in some remote place, like Moses. There wasn't anyone else around when Mohammed got the word either. Mormon Joseph Smith and Christian Scientist, Mary Baker Eddy, had exclusive audiences with God. We have to trust them as reporters---and you know how reporters are. They'll do anything for a story." --Andy Rooney

"It seems to me that the idea of a personal God is an anthropological concept which I cannot take seriously. I also cannot imagine some will or goal outside the human sphere... Science has been charged with undermining morality, but the charge is unjust. A man's ethical behavior should be based effectually on sympathy, education, and social ties and needs; no religious basis is necessary. Man would indeed be in a poor way if he had to be restrained by fear of punishment and hope of reward after death." - Albert Einstein

"For our Freedom?"

So, the headline says, “DOD orders troops to Saudi Arabia.” An accompanying inset than relates that, “Trump urges restraint.”

What the f**k? It isn’t the DOD which initiates such an order to deploy, but the President, who as commander in chief has the authority (but apparently not the good judgement) to do so or not.

       Does this sound familiar?

“Here we are, like the dummies of the world, because we had bad politicians running our country for a long time,” Trump said. He went on to mock fellow Republican Bush(43), sarcastically calling him a “real genius” over his decision to invade Iraq. Apparently, just like his criticism of Barack Obama for playing less golf in 8 years than Trump has in his first 2 ½, it depends on the audience and which lie he considers worth telling on any given day.

        The best way to demonstrate “restraint” would be to do nothing. The Houthi rebels in Yemen, principle motivation stems from the corruption of the previous regime (in Yemen) which, they accused of massive financial abuse and personal enrichment (you know, like the Saudi royals?). The Saudi support of that regime stems from a desire to have a co-religionist (Sunni) in power South of them and, as a result, a buffer state. This having been said, neither the former Yemeni President, Ali Abdullah Saleh, or the current one former Field Marshall Abdrabbuh Mansour Hadi, now living in Riyadh, as he is under a death sentence back home, could build consensus! 

       Houthis are predominately Shiites, which ties them more closely to Iran that to the Sunni Kingdom of the Saudis and naturally has served as a source for Iran to nip indirectly, at the Saudis through a third party, too. There is little doubt that the Iranian missile which was fired at Saudi oil production facilities was fired from Yemen, by Yemeni Houthis, but supplied to them by Iran.  

       Yemen has six regional “states” (for want of a better usage). Much of its population lies in the more mountainous westerly regions. The capital, Sana’a with a population of more than 3 million, is in a mountainous region at more than 7,000 feet elevation. As I write, the temperature in Sana’a is a comfortable 76 degrees at 5 pm! Houthi rebels took Sana’a in 2015. During the uprising Saudis bombed Houthi forces in Yemen. Then president Hadi, now exiled to the east and south, backed by the Saudis and the US, proposed a plan to form a federal republic with six semi-independent states. Sounds good, right?

        Unfortunately, most of South Yemen's oil reserves is located in Shabwah Province and is being developed by the Soviet Union. The East Shabwah Basin probably has the best long-term oil potential in South Yemen, with more than 3 billion barrels of recoverable oil. It was obvious to the Houthis, who see Yemen’s oil as a source of national, vice regional, revenue, that two of the six “states,” both oil rich but lightly populated compared to the Western highland regions, would control a hugely disproportionate share of the fragmented nation’s wealth. The fact that both the US and Saudis supported the concept also became a source of enmity beyond the religious sectarian hostility.

        So, there you have it. Another Sunni-Shi’ite based regional conflict lubricated by oil with the pot being stirred by a third nation (Iran). I’m trying to think of any good reason for the US military to get anywhere remotely near to being involved in this, but I simply can’t.

        It isn’t anything close to an Iraq situation, where we blamed the wrong country (Iraq) for 9/11 attacks, financed and carried out by Saudis and Saudi money. Nonetheless, we destabilized Iraq, primarily because we could, creating the vacuum filled by ISIS in the process.

         It’s also not like Afghanistan where the people with whom we are fighting initially shot at us with weapons we gave them in the 1980s, including billions of dollars in cash and weapons including two thousand Stinger surface-to-air missiles. If history has taught mankind anything it should be that, if in doubt, stay the hell out of Afghanistan.

        The question then becomes what should or will our esteemed leader do? I have no clue, because he doesn’t, but his words contain some interesting explanations of his “thought?” process. What follows is a September, 2019  press conference summary with quotes:

“President Trump said Friday that the United States could end the nearly 19-year war in Afghanistan “very quickly” if he chose to do so but that it would involve killing “tens of millions” of people.

Trump’s comments came at a joint news conference with Australian Prime Minister Scott Morrison as he relayed that Afghanistan — a country of about 37 million people — was among the issues that the two men discussed in their meeting at the White House.

“We’ve been very effective in Afghanistan, and if we wanted to do a certain method of war, we would win that very quickly, but many, many, really, tens of millions of people would be killed, and we think it’s unnecessary,” Trump said. “But Australia’s been a great help to us in Afghanistan.”

He made similar comments in July during an Oval Office meeting with Pakistani Prime Minister Imran Khan. At that point, Trump claimed he could win the war “in a week” but said he did not want to go that route, because “I just don’t want to kill 10 million people.”  

        Note the several references to “killing tens of millions of people.”  Am I the only person who reads “tens of millions” as “…. with nuclear weapons?”   Ten million persons is a third of the population of Afghanistan. Weapons such as this moron refers to are universally non-selective regarding who they immolate. Realizing that the Taliban are bad guys, I feel it worthy of note that they are far less genocidal than nuclear weapons. We seem unable to learn or grasp the idea that while we as US citizens are responsible for the government we have, and, at least in theory, have protections in place and a constitution which, if followed, maintains that security, there are other nations in the world which are different.

        In Korea, probably the last conflict which we can rightfully call a “just” war, we  came to the aid of a sovereign state being invaded by another sovereign state with UN sanction and participation.

        In the first Gulf war, we and others came to the aid of Kuwait, another sovereign state invaded by Iraq. Noteworthy of that is the advice given Bush 41 by SecDef Dick Cheney, namely, “Don’t invade Iraq or you’ll own it.” Oddly enough it was the same “Dick” who encouraged Bush 43 to do exactly the opposite. We’re still paying the price.

        We must maintain a strong military, as there are truly folks in the world who wish us ill. Typically, because at some level even Trump has no desire to engage in open conflict with either the Russians or Chinese, we engage in diplomacy, even when it involves Oligarchies or Monoparty dictatorships. We also continue maintaining protective forces (Submarine missiles, SAC bombers, Land based Missiles) which, while sometimes given the doomsday sobriquet of Mutually Assured Destruction, might better be called Mutually Assured Deterrence, Reflection, and Restraint. Both Russia and China are a far more real-world threat in the long term to a democratic America, but neither is driven by religious extremism. Yet… “Tens of millions” of Afghanis are even a consideration?

        The Hippocratic oath mandates, “First do no harm.”  In cases like the current Saudi-Iranian brouhaha that sounds to me like good advice. We have become so jaded regarding the use and misuses of our military that we fling around a phrase these days which, if examined, is almost nonsensical, while being parroted by millions daily.  “Fighting for our freedom” has a strident ring to it which generally belies the real reasons most of our soldiers, Sailors and airmen die. If we learned nothing from the war I haven’t mentioned – Vietnam – it should be that, sadly, almost 60 thousand Americans died there. None of them died for “Our” freedom.  

        If, Heaven forbid, any US service person should die in Saudi Arabia, it will be for someone else’s freedom and economic interest. It will also be on Donald Trump's head.

The "Alinsky Factor" - a Study in Far Right Mendacity

        A recent meme circulating in Social Media (where else??) lists the tenets of one Saul Alinsky. Some of these are radical, some are simply odd. 

The meme, however, then alleges that both Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton bought into the entire Alinsky philosophy because they researched him and agreed with a relatively small number if his statements. In fact (remember facts?) that is untrue. Mrs. Clinton even refused a job offer from the man because she considered him inconsistent and radical. Obama considered some (some, not “most” or “all”) of his ideas for organizing valid, which they are. Neither espoused Alinsky’s more radical constructs and their performance in public office proved that.

        What I find interesting is that several of Alinsky’s more radical ideas are actually being fostered much more by the right, while it denounces him. What are those?   

“Poverty: increase the poverty level as high as possible, poor people are easier to control and will not fight back if you are providing everything for them to live.” 

 This is hardly a liberal concept. The party that rails against Social welfare and health care is the Right and has been for decades.

“Debt: Increase the debt to an unsustainable level. That way you are able to increase taxes and create more poverty.”

Taxes aside, since the most recent “cut” has served purpose #1 more than this one, look at the debt (by which I mean national debt and its effect on the deficit.) Consider which party has been responsible for burgeoning deficits, not in a huge recession, (Obama), or minimal deficit (Clinton) but in a strong economy (Bush 43, Reagan, Trump). Trump is the record setter, all while proclaiming how strong the economy is. Confusing isn’t it?        

“Education: take control of what people read and listen to …”

Now, tell me the Political sentiments of the states and school boards which are the book banners and censors. All “Red.”

“Religion: Remove the belief in God from the government and schools”

Ooh, that’s a hard one, since Mrs. Clinton was a Sunday school teacher, and a regular church goer and sometime preacher while First Lady, and the Obamas attended church far more than the Reagans. Of course, the Falwells notwithstanding, church attendance is hardly a sign or religious morality. If it was, based on rare church attendance, Trump would be the anti-Christ. 

Neither Clinton nor Obama, have ever taken any remotely anti-religion stand. Both have defended the right to personal belief but balked at allowing that belief to be either nationally institutionalized or be an implement of public pressure by believers on non-believers. The difference here is that both believe that allowing one sect to force their beliefs on another is undemocratic (small “d”).

The other thing to note here is that in both cases the Alinsky “influence” (he died in 1976, in California) was that of college students reading political writings. Citing this as fostering a lifelong philosophical drive is simply arrant sophistry, implying that everything one is exposed to in college becomes a lifetime tenet. By that standard I’d still be searching for Gandalf.

So what follows is a brief analysis of how little Alinsky really influenced both Mrs. Clinton and President Obama and in what area.

While Ms. Rodham endorsed Mr. Alinsky's central critique of government antipoverty programs — that they tended to be too top-down and removed from the wishes of individuals. But the student leader split with Mr. Alinsky over a central point. He vowed to 'rub raw the sores of discontent' and compel action through agitation. This, she believed, ran counter to the notion of change within the system." In 2016, reporter Michael Kruse quoted the thesis and describes a centrist theme: “It was clear where this 21-year-old stood: "... as our 'two societies'—the establishment, the anti-establishment—"move further apart contrived conflict serves to exacerbate the polarization.

In the acknowledgements and end notes of the thesis, Rodham thanked Alinsky for two interviews and a job offer. She declined the latter, saying that "after spending a year trying to make sense out of [Alinsky's] inconsistency, I need three years of legal rigor."

 In other words, while she agreed with some of Alinsky’s broader concepts, like a just society wouldn't allow citizens to starve, she rejected most others, especially his proposed methodology. This is also clearly reflected in her continuing to teach Sunday school classes long after college. The thesis was praised by all four of its reviewers and Rodham, an honors student at Wellesley, received an A grade on it. The paper is far more character study (of Alinsky) than endorsement.

So, what did a young Barack Obama take from Saul Alinsky? Those of the right imply and have stated in Far-Right publications that both Obama and Clinton were lock, stock, and barrel believers of all Alinsky thoughts, words and deeds, although their own words and public records prove that to be a gross untruth. What the right would have us believe is that to it is impossible to believe part of someone else’s ideas without believing in and endorsing all of them.

These are the words of Barack Obama: “Organizing begins with the premise that (1) the problems facing inner-city communities do not result from a lack of effective solutions, but from a lack of power to implement these solutions; (2) that the only way for communities to build long-term power is by organizing people and the money [they raise] around a common vision; and (3) that a viable organization can only be achieved if a broadly based indigenous leadership—and not one or two charismatic leaders—can knit together the diverse interests of their local institutions [and "grassroots" people]. If one has issues with those sentiments, then they need some introspective time

        Finally, regarding Alinsky’s claim that “controlling healthcare is a step toward controlling the people:” Providing health care for all is precisely the opposite of that precept. If all have access to health care and there is no “You can’t afford it, so you have to die” (see Ron Paul) mindset, then that is a healing and uniting factor, not a divisive one.

        Oddly enough, the same Trump supporters who spread this low-grade bullshit, demanding that both Clinton and Obama bought into Saul Alinsky’s every word because they agreed with some few of his ideas, are the biggest hypocrites on the planet. Why? Simple, really. They continue to buy into the whole Trump “thing” while accepting, (apparently) that adultery while one’s wife is pregnant, and all the rest of his garbage, must be ok, because, by their own definition, acceptance of anything “Trump” is acceptance of all things Trump.  And if association implies guilt, Then Trump has some Epstein and Harvey Weinstein 'splainin' to do, huh? 

An Interesting Theory

The Children of Donor H898

This is a “cut and paste” from an article in today’s WaPo. Since some who aren’t subscribers can’t read it if just I post the link, I do it this way when I feel the article is important. I think the fallout from this may be monumental.

BARTLETT, Ill. — Danielle Rizzo’s son is screaming. He is planted in the middle of the lobby of his elementary school, clinging to rainbow-colored blocks as she gently explains that she is here — off schedule, in the middle of the day — to take him to a doctor’s appointment. But the first-grader is not listening. “Happy Meal,” he repeats over and over again. “Happy Meal!”

His little brother, who is also going to the appointment, is nearby, not moving. Rizzo is relieved that the two of them are not melting down at the same time, which happens all too often, and firmly guides them out the door.
Rizzo’s children, ages 7 and 6, were at the center of one of the most ethically complex legal cases in the modern-day fertility industry. Three years ago, while researching treatment options for her sons, Rizzo says she made an extraordinary discovery: The boys are part of an autism cluster involving at least a dozen children scattered across the United States, Canada and Europe, all conceived with sperm from the same donor. Many of the children have secondary diagnoses of ADHD, dyslexia, mood disorders, epilepsy and other developmental and learning disabilities. The phenomenon is believed to be unprecedented and has attracted the attention of some of the world’s foremost experts in the genetics of autism, who have been gathering blood and spit samples from the families.

Autism, which affects an estimated 1 of 59 children in the United States, is a “spectrum disorder” characterized by difficulties navigating social situations and restricted or repetitive behavior. Some people who have it never speak and need daily care, while others, like actress Darryl Hannah and Pokémon creator Satoshi Tajiri, are highly successful in their fields. In recent years a growing movement has been challenging the notion that autism is a disorder at all. Rather, advocates argue, it’s a difference that should be celebrated as adding diversity to human communities.

Rizzo hopes her children will cope better as they grow older, but for now, she knows they are suffering. When she first found out about their many half-siblings, she consulted a genetic counselor, who she says told her the odds of so many blood-related children with autism occurring spontaneously was akin to all the mothers “opening up a dictionary and pointing to the same letter of the same word on the same page at the same time.”

“It was the donor,” Rizzo remembered thinking. “It had to be.”

A quick online search for the donor’s profile showed that sperm from a man matching his description was still being sold by at least four companies. She called them all, asking for information about his medical history — and to inform them of the autism cluster — but she says the representatives she reached told her she didn’t have any “evidence” that his sperm was responsible for the autism cases.

She turned to health-care regulators in New York and California, where the sperm banks were based. The response, Rizzo said, was that cases like hers are not part of their responsibility. (A spokeswoman for New York State said her department had no record of Rizzo’s complaint but urged her “to reach out.” A California spokesperson said the state would consider investigating her case as an “adverse event” related to a sperm bank.)

The Food and Drug Administration told her its oversight of the sperm-donor industry is limited to screening for sexually transmitted diseases. So, after a year of fruitless phone calls and letters, she sued.

Rizzo turned to a sperm bank when she was 27 years old and a business banker at a JPMorgan Chase branch. She and her partner, who asked that her name not be used to protect her privacy, had been together for eight years. They met while Rizzo was attending community college on a softball scholarship. Rizzo was the team’s pitcher; her partner was an assistant coach. In June 2011, when Illinois began issuing civil union licenses to same-sex couples, they were the first in line at the Kane County courthouse. Rizzo says they were eager to start their family and decided that Rizzo, younger by two years, would carry the baby. For months, the couple scoured online profiles to find just the right sperm donor.

Donor H898 from Idant Laboratories looked like a winner.

He was blond and blue-eyed, 6-foot-1, 240 pounds, and appeared to be smart and accomplished. His profile said he had a master’s degree and was working as a medical photographer. His hobbies included long-distance running, reading and art.

And most important, Rizzo says, he had a clean bill of health, according to his profile — having scribbled “NA” and a strikethrough line on all but one of the more than 100 medical questions, including mental health ones, posed by sperm banks. (His paternal grandfather had had prostate cancer at age 85.)

Over the next few months, Rizzo purchased several vials of sperm. The bill came to about $500. Rizzo’s first son, conceived via in vitro fertilization, was born in September 2011, and the first year of his life was bliss. He hit all his milestones on time — sitting up, rolling over, crawling and waving, saying “hi” and “bye.” Rizzo was “mama,” and her partner “mommy.”

“He was the happiest baby,” she recalled. “We knew we wanted one more kid.” Doctors transferred another embryo, and their second boy was born about 14 months after the first.

It was around that time that Rizzo says they started noticing unusual behaviors in their first son. He had stopped looking his mothers in the eye. He no longer responded to his name. He wouldn’t interact with other children, and when he played with toys he would line things up or turn cars upside down and just spin the wheels, over and over again. She was devastated when her second child, at around age 2, began to exhibit the same behaviors.

Rizzo sought help from the state’s early-intervention services and a developmental pediatrician, and both boys were diagnosed with autism. She soon found herself thrown into the frenzied world of special-needs parenting. She and her partner took turns running the boys to therapies. But the more months that passed, the more help the boys seemed to need. Instead of one day off, she started taking two, then three.

“The screaming, the hitting, the yelling, the pinching, the punching, the pulling my hair when I’m driving,” she said, describing her days. After three nannies quit, Rizzo left her job, and her relationship collapsed.

Rizzo received primary custody, and with two preschoolers with severe needs, she says she was financially strapped. Her ex had been fulfilling her obligation to pay child support, but Rizzo says it wasn’t enough to cover the mortgage. The house went into foreclosure. Rizzo went on Medicaid, and in July 2018 she and the two boys moved into her parents’ basement.
The lawsuit

Sperm donors tend to be taller, better looking and better educated than the general population. But they have the same chance of carrying a gene for an inherited condition as anyone else. And because of their unusual role in modern reproduction, the effect of those mutations can be amplified. Popular donors can father 10, 20, 100 or even more progeny — each potentially carrying the same genetic risk factors.

Rizzo has never had contact with the donor, who is now in his early 40s and from the New York area. But two other mothers who have met him said in interviews that he is clean-cut and polite. One described him as “hot.” Another said her first impression of the donor, who showed up wearing khakis and a nice shirt, was that he is “brave” and “generous.” The parents had happily connected on Facebook and Yahoo groups for “donor siblings” — and then were shocked to discover that many of their children seemed to have the same types of developmental challenges and diagnoses.

Donor H898’s sperm was offered through multiple sources. According to the mothers, court documents and genetic testing through 23andMe and Ancestry.com, he sold anonymously to at least four sperm banks (which typically pay about $100 per visit), donated to a high-end agency that matches parents with donors they can meet face-to-face, and offered his sperm for a low fee or even free on sites such as KnownDonorRegistry.com or privately.

His profile stood out in many ways, women who used his sperm said, citing the thoughtful answers in his essays and audio interview. “I dislike dishonest and wasteful people,” he wrote in one statement. “I have my own garden and go to the Met when I can.”

Rizzo filed a lawsuit in U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Illinois in July 2017. In her complaint, she alleged that his online profile was a lie and that he was not an “appropriate candidate for sperm donation.” She sued Idant and Daxor, Idant’s former parent company, under the state’s consumer fraud and deceptive practices act.

She says in the complaint that research, based on public documents and calls to his relatives, showed that the donor had no college degrees, had been diagnosed with ADHD, and “went to a school for children with learning and emotional disabilities.” (Idant, and other sperm banks, generally do not verify their donors’ medical and educational backgrounds.) Moreover, her attorneys wrote in the filing, “Donor H898 is a prolific sperm donor who has fathered at least 12 children through sperm donation, and that each of those children has either been diagnosed with Autism, or suffers from signs and symptoms associated with Autism.” In court documents, other mothers corroborated the story.

Guidelines from the Society for Assisted Reproductive Technology, which represents fertility clinics in the United States, call for mandatory genetic testing for only one disease: cystic fibrosis. But most clinics say they test for several hundred. There is no test for autism.

Idant was one of the nation’s oldest sperm banks until it shut down around 2015 after years of legal troubles . In 2009, it was sued by a woman whose child had Fragile X Syndrome, a developmental disorder that is among the conditions typically detected in genetic tests. The suit was dismissed because the plaintiffs could not define a “legally-cognizable injury.” In 2004, state inspectors found that Idant had ignored the requirement that sperm donors be tested for genetic and sexually transmitted diseases. It was temporarily closed by New York state regulators in 1995 for failing to pass along information about “high-risk social and sexual behavior. And in the 1990s, Idant settled a lawsuit from a white mother who said it gave her the wrong sperm, from a black donor.



Officials from Daxor, Idant’s former parent company, said in a statement that Rizzo’s lawsuit was “meritless.” In court filings, Idant attorneys called the accusations by Rizzo “inflammatory, specious and dangerous,” and said her claims did not establish that the company “knew any of the alleged representations to be false.” Citing privacy concerns, the sperm banks declined to contact the donor regarding a request for an interview, and he did not respond to messages left on an online profile.

Rochester Cryobank, which also sold sperm from the same donor, has gone out of business. Manhattan Cryobank, now part of California Cryobank, said that the donor had over a dozen successful births with zero reports of any children affected by autism. It confirmed that it had refunded the payment made by a woman who had purchased the donor’s sperm but had not yet used it; she heard about Rizzo’s lawsuit and asked for her money back. But the company said the donor’s sperm was not removed from its inventory because it did not have enough information to further investigate the autism link.

As of August, Repro Lab was still selling vials, priced at $450-$525, from the donor. A Repro Lab official said they received a report from an anonymous caller regarding an increased risk of autism, but the report was “unsubstantiated,” as the donor “did not report any history of autism in his family.”

“We would deny participation to a donor in our program if he or any first-degree relative had a history of autism,” the company said.


The scientist

Desperate for help, Rizzo Googled “world renowned geneticist” and “autism” and came up with the University of Toronto’s Stephen Scherer’s name on several research papers and a YouTube video.

“I have two boys ages 3 & 4 that have been diagnosed and live with autism,” she emailed. “I have connected with other moms from the same sperm donor. We have found that 7 or 8 children have been diagnosed with autism. . . . This was a shock and devastation to say the least.”

Scherer was so intrigued that he replied at 4:36 a.m. He had never heard of such a large cluster in one generation of a biological family. “It was the perfect kind of genetic experiment,” he said in a recent interview.

For more than 20 years, Scherer’s lab, based at the Hospital for Sick Children in Toronto, has been collecting, cataloguing and trying to find patterns in the DNA of families affected by autism. It has more than 20,000 samples. A similar project, called SPARK and funded by the Simons Foundation in New York, has amassed 85,000.

Scientists know of more than 100 genes that appear to be associated with autism. Some are inherited, while others occur as new mutations. (Other factors have been linked to autism, including an older father or complications during pregnancy. A proposed link to vaccines was based on fraudulent research and has been disproved.)

Most mutations associated with autism do not definitively cause the condition; they only increase someone’s risk. But, Scherer says, an intriguing subset of “high impact” genes — estimated to be involved in 5 to 20 percent of all autism cases — appears to directly result in autism.

“We call autism one thing, but it’s different in every person. In some it’s all about the genes. Some it’s a combination of genes and the environment. Some people, it’s unknown,” said Wendy Chung, a professor of pediatric medicine at Columbia University and principal investigator of SPARK.

When researchers tested Rizzo’s older son’s blood, Rizzo says they found two gene mutations linked to autism — MBD1 and SHANK1. Her younger son has the MBD1 variant. Rizzo said all seven of the half-siblings whose parents had them tested have at least one of these mutations.

Neither was inherited from Rizzo, according to the tests, she said. While the research is still preliminary and the donor could have numerous other biological children who are not on the autism spectrum, Scherer says, “our hypothesis is that it’s something in his DNA.”

The children

Doctors diagnose autism based on behaviors — rigidity, repetitive habits, difficulty with seeing things from someone else’s perspective.

Rizzo’s sons can speak, and the older is starting to read and write. Doctors have told her they are somewhere in the middle of the autism spectrum.

Both are still in diapers, throw their hands over their ears when there is a loud sound, and have not made friends at school. The elder’s huge blue eyes light up when he’s spinning and flapping his arms. The younger gets very upset if someone stands close to him, and has trouble engaging in conversations about anything other than Super Mario Bros. The boys, who attend an intensive autism therapy program at school, have daily meltdowns.

As for the other children Rizzo discovered, one half brother around their age who lives on the East Coast is mainstreamed in school and a gentle and happy child, his mother said in an interview. But he is several years behind in school. Another half brother is very high functioning, his mother says, but is in full-time special education because of difficulties with speech and dyslexia.

Rizzo loves her children, and said she believes God gave them to her for a reason. She finds a lot of joy in simple moments such as taking them to water parks, sharing slushies and piling into one bed reading “Captain Underpants” and “Dog Man.” But she wishes things could be easier for them, and she worries for their future.

“If I knew then what I know now, I don’t know if I would have ever used a sperm bank,” she said.

On March 14, she agreed to end the lawsuit by accepting an offer of $250,000 from the company.
After the lawyers took their share, her ex — who takes care of the children one day a week and every other weekend — was awarded half of the rest. Rizzo said she desperately needed the money to pay for behavioral and social-skills therapies not covered by public assistance, to create a trust for the boys’ long-term care, and so that the family could get their own apartment.

She hopes her case will push government regulators to impose greater oversight of the sperm bank industry. “I did not sue because my children are autistic. I was suing to right a wrong.”

In late June, Rizzo heard of another mom with a boy — 1 ½ years old — who had used the same sperm donor. After agonizing, Rizzo contacted the woman and told her she had some “heavy information” about the donor and his offspring. The woman declined to hear it.




Me again:




Why might this be important? Positive determination of genetic causality of autism spectrum disorder would show the anti-vaxxers just how hoodwinked and stupid they are.

Fifteen Years After

 Forward:   After I finished and polished this piece, I decided to let it rest overnight and revisit it this morning. This was based on my concern that rehashing events of 15 years ago was a sort of retrograde finger pointing. Upon further consideration, I decided that there were too many parallels in the here and now to make that a valid objection. I further reflected that we as a national policy (apparently) are currently engaged in sucking up to both parties principally responsible for current Arab-Israeli tensions. While Trump visits the Saudis and massages what-ever the hell that large glowing orb was and calling the Prince a “nice” man (yeah, he calls Putin that too!), he supports Netanyahu’s urban removal incursions into Palestinian areas. He also chastises any and all American Jews with conscience who find Netanyahu and his militant policies objectionable. It’s as if Dick Cheyney and Ann Coulter had a mentally challenged love child.

        Consequently, while this is significantly longer than many of my opuses, it is data based and, I think, explains why we mourn on September 11, as well as pointing out that we were poorly served, security wise, then and now in the name of political expediency and personal interests. I don’t do these for personal approbation, and this may anger some, but I would welcome any constructive comments or criticisms. Having said that, enjoy it or not, here’s my best take, salted with opinion based on facts, on what happened and why. P.S. there’s a bit of a history lesson here too.  

        Mulling over all the commemorative events of yesterday (anniversary of 9/11) combined with the usual nauseating Trump bloviation and revolving door staff management, leaves me asking several questions of myself which I generally had partial answers to, while realizing that there were still some gaps.  Accordingly, let's see if we can fill some of those with facts (remember facts?) and formulate/speculate regarding motive.  This might take a while, so stay with me.

        To begin with, wouldn’t it have been far better to have spent yesterday reflecting on a thwarted attempt, than commemoration over 3,000 dead? It might, and could/should  have been, but obviously we’ll never know. What we can “know” is that there are public records which show just how badly Bush 43 and his National “security?” aides botched what was a fairly straight- forward problem in the months prior to 9/11. I’ll summarize before rather than after. I know it’s backwards, but it may help focus the reader’s appreciation of individual items.\

        Several things are factual and no longer either debated of “covered up:”

 1) The Clinton administration left the Bush White House and national security team with a full terrorist threat briefing identifying Al-Qaeda as the top threat and had, in the last year of tenure, identified anti-terrorism as the nations’ top priority.

2) The FBI and the CIA, functioning more like schoolyard mean girls than agencies entrusted with national domestic and foreign security, failed on two fatal levels.  The first was to get over adolescent turf squabbles and understand that in the 21^st century, there is, at best, an increasingly vague interface between domestic and external threats.

3) Failing to understand (or at least to act upon) (2), above led to an institutionalized aversion to interagency cooperation and even worse, refusal to share data access between the agencies. In fact, both heads of agency post WWII, FBI director J. Edgar Hoover and (first) CIA director James Jesus Angleton were frequently at odds to the point that what should have been overlapping goals such as  dealing with espionage inside the US, degenerated into interdepartmental urination derbies, each blaming the other for perceived failures.  

4) The relationship between several US Presidents and the kingdom of Saudi Arabia, while falling short of complicity in 9/11 events, fostered a less than rigorous scrutiny of its internal dynamic and external goals. This would seem to be on-going as one regards the Trump administration’s apparent blind eye to the assassination and dismemberment of Jamal Khashoggi at the Saudi consulate in Istanbul on 2 October 2018 by agents of the Saudi government. Subsequently, the Turkish government (who had apparently bugged the consulate) released a tape with Khashoggi’s last words (“I can’t breathe”) which they maintain contains evidence that Khashoggi was assassinated on the orders of the Saudi Royal Family. While the CIA has categorically concluded that the Al Saud royal family would have had to sanction such an activity, Trump has consistently refused to consider that his buddy, Prince Mohammed ben Salman could do such a thing. Here’s a quote on Trump’s keen sense of propriety.  Speaking to the press: “Trump more broadly defended his relationships with world leaders, including the Saudis and Russian President Vladimir Putin, saying he gets "along with a lot of people."

"I get along with everybody, except you people,(meaning the press)" Trump told Acosta. "I also get along with people who would be perceived as being very nice." "I get along with President Putin. I get along with Mohammed," Trump said. 

Isn’t that very nice? That’s today, but what about “then?”

        First: Why did it take 15 years for the US House to address the issue of Saudi complicity to the point of liability for the events of 9/11? What follows is based only on my assumptions based on research re: The Bush family and the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia, and my knowledge of the mentality of the (then Republican) House majority party.

        Bob Woodward in his authorized bio of "W" points out that George H.W. advised his son to contact Saudi Prince Bandar to discuss and "be advised" regarding his (as of then) possible decision to run for the Presidency. Read that again. Huh? This, as well as deep and longstanding Bush financial relations with the Kingdom should be troubling to most Americans.

        At this point let's ask and then pose answers to the original question.  Why did the Bush administration in its righteous anger in the wake of the destruction of 9/11, or at least after the Commission report, containing the redacted pages, not pose legislation critical of and citing probitive evidence or Saudi complicity? Additionally, why wait until the Obama years to push a bill allowing US citizens to sue the Saudi government for it?

         I would posit several reasons.  Primarily, the Bush administration, having taken office planning to "finish" daddy's Iraq adventure (later admitted by disillusioned staff) , saw the need to base US forces in the Kingdom as more important than holding the Saudis accountable for the funding which Osama Bin Laden derived from his family's immense wealth.  Second, the President would certainly have vetoed such a bill, since in the real world it would expose the US to similar suits from most Middle Eastern nations, Laos, Cambodia, and others.

         Jump ahead to the Obama administration, and a US Congress controlled (again) by Republicans, most of whom delighted in using the ignorance of the body politic against a President whose laundry they weren't fit to wash. The “permission to sue” bill's timing was blatantly designed to force the President to veto it (as Bush would have) and then the finger pointing started, stimulating oral frothing and finger pointing from the redneck hordes who know little and suspect less.

       Immediately the Clinton-Obama bashing ramped up. The Bill was vetoed and subsequently overridden, creating bad law after even worse poor policy.  Incidentally, this apparent pang of sympathy for 9/11 victims with all the resultant lobbying monies spent by the NFL, MLB and other public persona organizations would be far better used in helping those 9/11 first responders and escapees whose medical issues continue to emerge, largely unrecognized or compensated by the rest of us.

        Having referred to the 9/11 Commission Report, I think it reasonable to make some legitimate comparisons between this "fact" finding attempt and the investigations into other, albeit less profound in their scope, events resulting in American deaths at the hands of Islamist extremists.

       There were attacks on several US installations in Lebanon in the Reagan years. I earlier detailed the results of these events and Congressional reactions. There is no credible linkage between events in Lebanon and the Saudis, but Congressional reaction was bi partisan.

       I debated (with myself, because I trust me) regarding which "commission" to discuss next, and simply because I want the 9/11 information to remain in the reader's mind, I'll omit Benghazi, having written on that debacle at length earlier.  

        Which brings me to the 9/11 Commission. Right up front, I have no time for conspiracy theories.  No, I don't think "W" did it or intentionally allowed it to happen. I believe that those who were ultimately blamed for it, did it, more than likely with the financial support of Saudi money, albeit probably not overtly supported or contributed to by the Saudi government, but rather from other Saudi sources, coupled with institutional agreement among Saudi royals that the best way to deal with extremist, ultra Islamist, Wahabi driven elements within and without was to ignore them and their support of international terrorist activities in the interest of domestic stability at home.

         So what is this "Wahabi?" It isn't a sushi condiment even though it sounds like Wasabi.  I could write a lot on Wahabism and its impact on the kingdom, but, for a more easily understood analogy, let’s look it thus:

       Imagine one Muslim, but not especially conservative, family whose patriarch managed to survive a great war (WWI) and with the assistance of T.E Lawrence, emerge as a self proclaimed  Arab leader asserting a claim to be the ruling family of a disparate, but soon to be oil rich, kingdom. Faced with oil wealth and the desire to become more accepted by an emerging modern world, they begin allowing more secular dress and activities than their predecessors who were conservative and largely tribal.  Meanwhile, however, out in the rural areas, a far more conservative preacher (mullah) begins preaching a grass roots revival stressing a return to absolute Biblical (Quran) principles. Think Westboro Baptist Church with a liberal splash of Calvinist zeal and a dash of Amish conservatism. His (the mullah Muhammad ibn Abd al-Wahhab) 
adherents, simple people, and easily swayed to violence against any non-coreligionists, are seen by the urban and more urbane royals as a threat to their claim to power, so the royals, make a self-serving deal. They’ll support the ultra-conservative sect as the national religious doctrine in exchange for the sect’s support of their claim to power. Clubs, once frequented by both sexes in cities like Riyadh in the 1960s are closed, Burqas and Hijabs are mandated, women are relegated to second class status, etc. Enforcement is provided and mandated by The Committee for the Promotion of Virtue and the Prevention of Vice. Welcome to the 21st century Kingdom of Saudi Arabia. An even more sinister spin off of this deal with the Devil, is the blind eye turned to terrorist activities by some of their own.     

Now that we've established what history has wrought, let's look at the 9/11 commission.

         The 9/11 Commission members were appointed by President George W. Bush and the United States Congress, which led to continued criticism that the Commission was not independent. Nixon SecState Henry Kissinger initially was appointed to head the commission, but resigned just weeks after being appointed, because he would have been obliged to disclose the clients of his private consulting business. Former U.S. Senator George Mitchell was originally appointed as the vice-chairman, but he stepped down on December 10, 2002, not wanting to sever ties to his law firm. So, finally, the Commission wasn't chaired by the "opposition party" but rather by men selected by the leader of the majority, himself. Hmmm. The Commission stated in its report that their aim was "... not to assign individual blame", a rather remarkable statement in and of itself, since so many died, someone certainly was to blame, and every single identified perpetrator was a Saudi and their financial supporters were as well. The "other" blame - "why was it possible,"  was also, apparently not to be probed too deeply.

         This judgment, some critics believed, could obscure the facts of the matter in a nod to consensus politics, as directed by the White House, if not specifically the President (more likely Dick Cheney, I believe) Factually,  much of the orchestration of this was from the brains of Karl Rove and VP Cheney.     

        Some members of the Commission, as well as its executive director Philip Zelikow, had conflicts of interest. Philip Shenon, a New York Times reporter, in a February 2008 book  entitled "The Commission: The Uncensored History of the 9/11 Investigation" states that "Zelikow had closer ties with the White House than he publicly disclosed and that he tried to influence the final report in ways that the staff often perceived as limiting the Bush administration’s responsibility and furthering its anti-Iraq agenda."
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         Translate this as a desire to do what damage control could be done to shift blame to Iraq for what was a Saudi money funded and run assault on America. And boy did that work! Many Americans still will say that Iraq was responsible for events of 9/11.  According to Shenon (and uncontroverted), Zelikow had at least four private conversations with former White House political director Karl Rove, and appears to have had many frequent telephone conversations with people in the White House. Government Accountability Office (GAO) records show his frequent calls to the 456 telephone exchange in the 202 area code used exclusively by the White House. Some panel staff members have later stated that Zelikow stopped them from submitting a report depicting Nat'l Sec. Advisor, Condoleezza Rice's and President Bush's performance as "amounting to incompetence or something not far from it". 

       According to Shenon, Rove always feared that a commission report that laid the blame for 9/11 at the president's doorstep (such as when Bush terrorism "czar" Richard Clarke could no longer be prevented from testifying about his urgent warnings over the summer of 2001 to Condoleezza Rice about the imminent threat of terrorist attack on US soil)  was the one development that could most jeopardize Bush's 2004 re-election. As early as Jan. 25, in a memo only subsequently declassified, Clarke was very specific in warnings to Rice that "Al Qida" (sic) was a serious domestic threat and shared his concern that the administration wasn't focused on it 

        In contrast to the Benghazi hearings in which all the relevant persons were summoned, sworn and examined at the will of the panel, President Bush and Vice President Cheney did ultimately, but after considerable stalling, agree to testify. They did so only under several conditions: They would be allowed to testify jointly, They would not be required to take an oath before testifying, The testimony would not be recorded electronically or transcribed, and that the only record would be notes taken by one of the commission staffers. These notes would never be made public. Plainly stated, they didn't want to testify, but would do so if they could lie (or dissemble or mislead) and not be held accountable.

        To further hinder and filter the flow of information, The Commission was forced to use subpoenas simply to obtain the cooperation of the FAA and NORAD (Federal Aviation Administration and North American Air Defense Command) to release evidence such as audiotapes. The agencies' seemingly systematic and apparently White House “encouraged”  reluctance to release tapes, and subsequent, e-mails, erroneous public statements and other evidence led some of the panel's staff members and commissioners to believe that authorities sought to mislead the commission and the public about what happened on September 11. Later, in an August 2006 interview former New Jersey Atty. Gen. John Farmer, who led the staff inquiry into events on September 11, stated, "I was shocked at how different the truth was from the way it was described," said.

       A significant number of former FBI, NSA and other federal intelligence experts, claim the 9/11 Commission report was fundamentally flawed because the Commission refused to hear, ignored, or censored testimony about the many pre–September 11 warnings given to the FBI and US intelligence agencies. (Again, because it lent credibility to the Bush/Rice incompetence theory.) These former operatives claim that in an effort to avoid having to hold any individual accountable, the 9/11 Commission turned a blind eye on FBI agent-provided evidence before September 11 regarding the 9/11 plot. Note, this may be taken with several grains of salt because it also smacks of “ass-covering” by the FBI.

       Able Danger: A far less publicized intelligence unit involved in pre-9/11 threat assessment was a military unit designated "Able Danger."  Most Americans have never heard of it, and even fewer had knowledge of it pre-9/11. One reason was that by custom, tradition and, in fact, law, US military resources are forbidden from engaging in any sort of domestic surveillance, some of which Able Danger came very close to doing. That said, several members of this unit have, in the wake of the Commission report, made some significant statements which have bearing on this essay. The existence of Able Danger was revealed by Congressman Curt Weldon (R-Pa) in 2005, after the 9/11 Commission report began to look to him like a "cover up" (his characterization) for intelligence failures. During the summer of 2005, Weldon, vice-chairman of the House Armed Services Committee, revealed the existence of a secret Pentagon counter-terrorism operation codenamed Able Danger, which he claimed had identified Mohammed Atta, alleged, and later confirmed,  ringleader of the 9/11 attacks, as early as 1999.

        It has been widely reported in Europe that Atta was known to US intelligence agencies and was actually under FBI surveillance in Germany as early as 1999, which seriously  undermines  Bush administration claims that the 9/11 attacks came out of the blue and that the US government had no idea before September 2001 that Al Qaeda terrorists were in the United States planning terrorist attacks.  This information has been largely suppressed in the American media, and the existence of Able Danger was omitted in the official 9/11 Commission report in order to sustain its whitewash of the role of US military and intelligence agencies in permitting and even facilitating the attacks. Secret or not, Congressman Weldon stated in committee that Able Danger had also identified three other future 9/11 hijackers as Al Qaeda loyalists: Marwan Al-Shehhi, Khalid Almidhar and Nawaf Alhazmi. He also claimed  that he had been in possession of a “link chart” tracing the connections of various individuals connected to Al Qaeda, and containing Atta’s photograph and name, and had turned it over to deputy national security adviser Stephen Hadley at a meeting in the White House on September 25, 2001. Both Hadley and another Republican congressman, Dan Burton of Indiana, have confirmed the meeting with Weldon on that date and the handover of the link chart. The chart itself "disappeared", according to the Bush White House. Convenient, huh?

         After Weldon's assertions were disputed and he credibility of Able Danger impugned, Lt. Col. Anthony Shaffer, a member of the Able Danger team, identified himself as Weldon's source. Shaffer stated categorically that he alerted the FBI in September 2000 about the information uncovered by the secret military unit (Able Danger), he further alleged that three meetings he set up with bureau officials were blocked by military lawyers. Shaffer, who at the time worked for the Defense Intelligence Agency, claims he communicated to members of the 9/11 Commission that Able Danger had identified two of the three cells responsible for 9/11 prior to the attacks, but the Commission did not include this information in their final report.

        Shaffer specifically stated that in Jan 2000, Able Danger datamining revealed the existence of a 'Brooklyn' Al-Qaeda cell connected to the "Blind Sheik" Omar Abdel-Rahman, as well as two other cells overseas. Shaffer was soon after placed on paid administrative leave for what he called "petty and frivolous" reasons and had his security clearance suspended in March 2004, following a dispute over travel mileage expenses and personal use of a work cell phone. These allegations are claimed to have been pursued in bad faith & breach of process, in relation for Shaffer talking to the 9/11 Commission.

         Congressman Weldon asked for a probe into the activities undertaken to silence Lt. Col. Shaffer from publicly commenting on Able Danger and Able Danger's identification of the 9/11 hijackers, calling the activities "a deliberate campaign of character assassination." The Army agreed, Army investigations subsequently found these claims to be without merit and cleared his promotion.

        Shaffer also told the story of Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) opposition to Able Danger, prior to 9/11, based on the view that Able Danger was encroaching on CIA turf. According to Shaffer, the CIA representative said, "I clearly understand. We're going after the leadership. You guys are going after the body, but it doesn't matter. The bottom line is, CIA will never give you the best information from 'Alex Base' (the CIA's top-secret database) or anywhere else. CIA will never provide that to you because if you were successful in your effort to target Al Qaeda, you will steal our thunder. Therefore, we will not support this." This lack of inter-agency cooperation as well as the "Information Wall" (previously illustrated as existing since the 1950s which existed between the FBI and CIA at the time has been held by many interested parties as a critical failure to protect the nation because of petty inter-agency turf wars.

            If Schaffer/Weldon were the only ex- Able Danger  voices crying in the night, it might be easy to dismiss their claims. However, this is far from true. Navy Captain Scott Phillpott, another Able danger member, confirmed Shaffer's claims. "I will not discuss this outside of my chain of command", Phillpott said in a formal public statement. "I have briefed the Department of the Army, the Special Operations Command and the office of (Undersecretary of Defense for Intelligence) as well as the 9/11 Commission. My story has remained consistent. "Mohammed Atta was identified as a threat by Able Danger in January/February 2000".

           Shaffer's claims were also confirmed by James D. Smith, a civilian contractor who worked on Able Danger. In a later interview with media personnel, Smith reported that the project had involved analysis of data from many public sources and 20 to 30 individuals. He stated that Atta's name had emerged during an examination of individuals known to have ties to Omar Abdel Rahman, a leading figure in the first World Trade Center bombing – a failed underground garage car bomb.

         Finally, regarding Able Danger, and the massive intelligence failure leading to 9/11: Operation Dark Heart by Anthony A. Shaffer, released in September 2010, includes memories of his time reporting to the 9/11 commission about Able Danger's findings. The 10,000 copies of the books have not been released yet. The DOD's Defense Intelligence Agency reviewers identified more than 200 passages suspected of containing classified information. "Specifically, the DIA wanted references to a meeting between Lt. Col. Tony Shaffer, the book's author, and the executive director of the 9/11 Commission, Philip Zelikow, removed." There can, in my opinion, be only one explanation for such concerns, that being that it casts the shadow of "cover up" on the entire proceeding if the man responsible for the investigation knew of Able Danger and omitted it (by directive) from the final version.  DOD took the highly unusual step of purchasing all available copies of Shaffer's book at a cost of $47,000 and destroying them to deny the public the ability to read the book.

           At this point is valid to ponder the (apparent) sense of necessity to not publicly acknowledge the existence of Able Danger. While it is wholly conjecture on my part, I think there are several probable factors. The first, relatively straightforward, was the level of classification of the operation at the time, and the sometimes slavish sacrifice of public “need to know” on the National Security altar. We have previously seen Nixon attempt to obfuscate evidence of Oval Office condoned malfeasance under that same umbrella.

           More valid, I think is the hesitance to reveal the existence of a security operation which was neither fish nor fowl. The FBI is entrusted with domestic enforcement and, if appropriate, surveillance. The CIA is charged with intelligence gathering, but not domestic enforcement, and its mandated focus is overseas. The US military, unlike in some other nations, traditionally has no role, barring extremely exigent circumstances, in domestic issues, be they security, criminal prosecution, or espionage. Able Danger, however, comprised of (non-CIA or FBI) civilian and active duty military representatives from all services represented a clear departure from this tradition. I feel there was some concern for what the general reaction to discovery of its mission might have been. Regardless of that fact, rejection of its findings and warnings by National Security inner circle entities including FBI, CIA, and the White House is puzzling to say the least. As more corroboration emerged of Able Danger information, the harder this question is to answer with any reasonable conclusion.  

        There is one final oddity here on I wish to comment. Bush National Security Advisor Condoleezza Rice strenuously dug in her heels, like her boss and Cheney to avoid testifying to the committee. She at first claimed she was a civilian employee of the administration, ergo was immune to subpoena, but was finally persuaded to do so. Here (because they are informative) are just a sampling of the questions she was asked under oath and when appropriate, some elucidation related to the veracity of her responses:

(Where it says "CLAIM" what follows are Ms. Rice's precise words. The statements after "FACT" are actual verified data)

CLAIM: "I do not remember any reports to us, a kind of strategic warning, that planes might be used as weapons."

FACT: Condoleezza Rice was the top National Security official with President Bush at the July 2001 G-8 summit in Genoa. There, "U.S. officials were warned that Islamic terrorists might attempt to crash an airliner" into the summit, prompting officials to "close the airspace over Genoa and station antiaircraft guns at the city’s airport." [Sources: Los Angeles Times, 9/27/01; White House release, 7/22/01]

CLAIM: "I was certainly not aware of [intelligence reports about planes as missiles] at the time that I spoke" in 2002.

FACT: While Rice may not have been aware of the 12 separate and explicit warnings about terrorists using planes as weapons when she made her denial in 2002, she did know about them when she wrote her March 22, 2004 Washington Post op-ed. In that piece, she once again repeated the claim there was no indication "that terrorists were preparing to attack the homeland using airplanes as missiles." [Source: Washington Post, 3/22/04]

CLAIM: There was "nothing about the threat of attack in the U.S." in the Presidential Daily Briefing the President received on August 6th.

FACT: Rice herself later admitted that "the title [of the PDB] was, ‘Bin Laden Determined to Attack Inside the United States.’" [Source: Condoleezza Rice, 4/8/04] Sounds a little threatening, huh?

CLAIM: "One of the problems was there was really nothing that looked like was going to happen inside the United States…Almost all of the reports focused on al-Qaida activities outside the United States, especially in the Middle East and North Africa…We did not have…threat information that was in any way specific enough to suggest something was coming in the United States."

FACT: Page 204 of the Joint Congressional Inquiry into 9/11 noted that "In May 2001, the intelligence community obtained a report that Bin Laden supporters were planning to infiltrate the United States" to "carry out a terrorist operation using high explosives." The report "was included in an intelligence report for senior government officials in August [2001]." In the same month, the Pentagon "acquired and shared with other elements of the Intelligence Community information suggesting that seven persons associated with Bin Laden had departed various locations for Canada, the United Kingdom, and the United States." [Sources: Joint Congressional Report, 12/02]

CLAIM: "If we had known an attack was coming against the United States…we would have moved heaven and earth to stop it."

FACT: a year later, Rice admits that she was told that "an attack was coming." She said, "Let me read you some of the actual chatter that was picked up in that spring and summer": "Unbelievable news coming in weeks", said one. "Big event — there will be a very, very, very, very big uproar. There will be attacks in the near future." [Source: Condoleezza Rice, 4/8/04]

CLAIM: "The Vice President was, a little later in, I think, in May, tasked by the President to put together a group to look at all of the recommendations that had been made about domestic preparedness and all of the questions associated with that."

FACT: The Vice President’s task force never once convened a meeting. In the same time period, the Vice President convened at least 10 meetings of his energy task force, and six meetings with Enron executives. [Source: Washington Post, 1/20/02; GAO Report, 8/03] What a “Dick!”

CLAIM: "The decision that we made was to, first of all, have no drop-off in what the Clinton administration was doing, because clearly they had done a lot of work to deal with this very important priority."

FACT: Internal government documents show that the Clinton Administration officially prioritized counterterrorism as a "Tier One" priority, but when the Bush Administration took office, top officials downgraded counterterrorism. As the Washington Post reported, these documents show that before Sept. 11 the Bush Administration "did not give terrorism top billing." Rice admitted that "we decided to take a different track" than the Clinton Administration in protecting America. [Source: Internal government documents, 1998-2001; Washington Post, 3/22/04; Rice testimony, 4/8/04]

CLAIM: The Bush Administration has been committed to the "transformation of the FBI into an agency dedicated to fighting terror."

FACT: Before 9/11, Attorney General John Ashcroft de-emphasized counterterrorism at the FBI, in favor of more traditional law enforcement. And according to the Washington Post, "in the early days after the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks, the Bush White House cut by nearly two-thirds an emergency request for counterterrorism funds by the FBI, an internal administration budget document shows." And according to a new report by the Congressional Research Service, "numerous confidential law enforcement and intelligence sources now challenge the FBI’s claim that it has successfully retooled itself to gather critical intelligence on terrorists as well as fight crime." [Source: Washington Post, 3/22/04; Congressional Quarterly, 4/6/04]

CLAIM: "The FBI issued at least three nationwide warnings to federal, state and law enforcement agencies and specifically stated that, although the vast majority of the information indicated overseas targets, attacks against the homeland could not be ruled out. The FBI tasked all 56 of its U.S. field offices to increase surveillance of known suspects of terrorists and to reach out to known informants who might have information on terrorist activities."

FACT: The warnings were "feckless. (def: lacking initiative or strength of character; irresponsible.) They didn’t tell anybody anything. They don’t bring anyone to battle stations." [Source: 9/11 Commissioner Jamie Gorelick, 4/8/04]

CLAIM: "I think that having a Homeland Security Department that can bring together the FAA and the INS and Customs and all of the various agencies is a very important step."

FACT: The White House and Ms. Rice, initially at least, vehemently opposed the creation of the Department of Homeland security. Its opposition to the concept delayed the creation of the department by months.

        It should be noted that Ms. Rice was compensated about the same as a U.S. Senator for her work here and in helping push the US into Iraq, thus facilitating the creation of ISIS.

        And last, what is in the redacted pages of this report? Who will it further embarrass? Beats me, but I'll bet the gist of it is that some prominent Saudis were complicit in helping Mohammad Atta and his band of one-way pilots obtain entry in the US under other than legitimate pretense. I wouldn't anticipate finding out much more about the incompetence of the Bush administration of the inadequacies of the 9/11 Commission report, because that's been done. 

        Fifteen years on, we are again treated to the spectacle of a US President toadying to the Saudis in Riyadh and, later overlooking the real perpetrators of the butchery of a reporter in a third country, referring to the Princes as “nice people.”  While we remember and mourn the deaths of thousands of Americans, and while we, to varying degrees, apportion blame to the Kingdom, which certainly is culpable to a great extent, let’s also remember that some people we elected to office and to whom we entrusted our safety, failed us miserably for various reasons, among them financial concerns, access to oil, and, sadly, just plain incompetence. Tragically, it seems we’re little better off at present.