Anti-science, Anti-life and My Vote

Anti-science, Anti-life and My Vote

     Time magazine reported that in May 2018, a year and a half before the coronavirus began in Wuhan, China, President Trump authorized his national security adviser, John Bolton, to eliminate the National Security Council’s (NSC) global health security unit and demote its pandemic experts.  This unit or council was focused on pandemic preparedness.  Bolton claims that he simply reorganized the NSC and it did not impair country’s bio defenses.  Bolton is a Trumpster, so I will leave it there except to say that after this pandemic is over, the Congress should hold hearings and get to the truth because, Dr. Anthony Faucci told the present Congress that, “It would be nice if the office were still there.” Let me put words in his mouth, “If it was still there, we would be better prepared”.

      The Center for Strategic & International studies [CSIS] a respected think tank in the US, sponsored a two-year commission, which just a month before coronavirus was reported in China, rang the “now hear this warning”, and recommended the White House restore health security leadership at the NSC.  In short, the seven recommendations were a response to the conclusion that we are not prepared for a global pandemic.  Despite the fact that this distinguished CSIS Commission on Strengthening America’s Health Security included six members of Congress, health experts, and US government and military officials it was ignored by the Trump administration.   The CSIS Commission included Kelly Ayotte, former Senator (R-NH) who had chaired the Armed Services subcommittee on Readiness, Julie Gerberding, MD.,MPH and former president of Merck Vaccines, Congressman Ami Bera (D-CA), who  before being elected to Congress practiced medicine, served as Chief Medical  Officer for Sacramento County, and taught medicine at the University of California, Davis.  Also, Ambassador Mark Dybul, faculty director of the Center for Global Health and Quality at Georgetown University Medical Center, and Admiral Jonathan Greenert, former US Navy and Chair of the National Security Studies at the National Bureau of Asian Research; plus Christine  Wormuth, director of the International Security and Defense Policy Center at RAND Corporation,  to name just a few. [see healthsecuritiy.csis.org/members/] for complete list of outstanding experts.

     Worst of all, President Trump continues to mislead the public by discrediting the scientists.  Epidemiologists stress that social distancing is critical in saving lives by slowing the transmission of the virus, and that such measures must be in place for weeks to show results.  Trump tweets that, “We cannot let the cure be worse than the disease”. Perhaps he doesn’t even believe that white lives matter.  Meanwhile, outbreak information from New York City shows accelerating increase in cases and hospital beds being hastily dispersed at the Javits Convention Center and naval hospital ships rushing to both coasts to add a thousand beds each.

      My conclusion: I am voting for Joe Biden.  He was a Boy Scout and knows what being prepared is all about.

March 25, 2020

White House: Post-Impeachment Statement by President Trump

Feb. 6, White House:

Post Impeachment Statement by President Trump. 

“If we didn’t win, [the 2016 election] stock market would have crashed,” was an opening comment.  “I did nothing wrong” states the President.  “We were treated unbelievably unfairly, referring to the impeachment.  Thanks Speaker McConnell. Kudos to Senator Chuck Grassley for what is not clear.  Says he is sorry for Mitt Romney.  “The Russians, the Russians was all bullshit”, referencing the Mueller Report which is replete with evidence of Russian interference with the 2016 election. “Democrats are vicious as hell “. Slams Hunter Biden for being corrupt. Claims “Total Acquittal”.  “Nancy Pelosi doesn’t pray for me”. We are putting up the wall.  “There is more support for the republicans around the country than ever before.  “Democrats can’t count votes and they want to run the health system”, was a quote.  Went on to announce and name the “warriors”, who were people who were part of the House and Senate defense.  “We went through hell”. He had his legal defense team stand for applause.  There was no remorse nor recognition of the truth nor discussion of the constitutional issues at the center of the impeachment process.  Trump indicated that he was the victim. 

     Rambling in front of Republican cheering section for over an hour demonstrates the extent of his mental illness, a flight from reality and extreme narcissistic behavior.  What is worse is this question. Have we witnessed the solidification of a cult replacing the Republican Party?  My sad answer is yes. No doubt about it. This is now the reality. 

     What are the characteristics of a political cult?  Generally, they are:

     1. Led by a charismatic leader, who demonstrates deterioration in        critical thinking.   The leader claims to have done no wrong. The leader claims to be “perfect”.

     2. Members demonstrate oppressive loyalty to their leader and willingly isolate and disparage non-believers.

     3.  The leader demands a high level of adherence and single-minded thinking of an extreme ideology.

     4.  Members often end up “drinking the Kool-Aid”.

     For observers of the recent impeachment proceedings, it is easy to see the final evolution of the process in the president’s “Celebrations” today.

     All but one member of the Republican Senate drank the Kool-Aid.

Maybe so, Maybe no !

     I have had a recurrent nightmare over the past few months.  I dream that on the first day after Donald Trump is elected to a second term, he announces the opening of his presidential campaign for a third term. I wake up in a sweat, heart pounding believing that the era of the elected dictator is here-Democracy is dead!   But all of a sudden, I have been sleeping much better for the past week.  A new scenario is taking shape.  My meletonin level has shot back up to normal

     What if the House of Representatives impeaches the president and by constitutional directive, the senate must conduct a trial to determine if Trump is to be removed from office?  Up until this week, I have believed with the rest of the country, that our republican controlled senate would never vote the president out of office. But not so fast Kowalski! Maybe so. Maybe no.   Who could have imagined that Senate Majority leader  Mitch McConnell would lash out so vigorously at his president for his pig-ignorant foreign policy blunder in Syria? Or that former republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney would lead a rebellion pronouncing his own vision of the Republican Party and blasting Trump's withdrawal of troops in Syria as a "bloodstain on the annals of American history".  Even Sen. Lindsey Graham, genetically an [RR] representing South Carolina tweeted, "Pray for our Kurdish allies who have been shamelessly abandoned by the Trump Administration".  All of a sudden the party leadership sees a possibility to  recapture the leadership.  Who would of thuk it?

     With a two-thirds vote needed to convict and remove the president, it gets down to about 20 votes in the senate.  Are they there?  Maybe so, Maybe no.  But the question is now on the table and it may not go away.  The enormous collective embarrassment of true republicans, who believe in the integrity of the office, who believe in fiscal restraint, who believe in an intelligent and measured process of developing policy, who decry payoffs to prostitutes,  may prove to be a force yet to be unleashed.  Yes, the Republican Party may find an electorate that has been lied to every  day of the Trump Administration a mighty force. 

     The thought of coming to the 2020 election with a new ticket, with the possibility even of adding an electable women may be suddenly electrifying, particularly facing a Democratic candidate list that may not gel from their dissension and divisions.  Finally, the leadership of the Republican Party should look upon this opportunity as one that may not come around again. A third term by a sick narcissist will likely result in the destruction of whatever restraining  political institutions remain and whatever international alliances and common allegiances we have built over the past three-quarters of a century, including the UN. Throw in a global warming crisis and the extinction of global fisheries while you pray for your grandchildren.  

     Yes I am sleeping a lot better.  Will it continue?  Maybe so.  Maybe no.  Depending on a Republican Party solution is its own nightmare.     

The Case Against Legalizing Marijuana in the State of New York.

1. Legalizing marijuana will generate in new users an addiction rate or 7-8% in adults and 13-15% in teenagers.  A single most damaging argument is that fewer teens finish college.

2. Increased availability will affect the workplace by blunting cognitive abilities and produce negative effects on physical and mental health.

3. Studies have linked marijuana use to increased risk of psychiatric disorders including schizophrenia, suicide and criminal behavior.

4. Arguing for legalizing leisure use of marijuana based on a medical argument is invalid since three cannabinoids are already approved by the FDA.

5.Pregnant women who use marijuana have 2.3 times greater risk of stillbirth.

6. The experiences of other states have not been sufficiently studied to determine the direction of any legalizing legislation.  This argument may be the most important. More research is needed before any further decisions are made.   The FDA has never done a study on leisure use of marijuana.

7. As pointed out in JAMA (Journal of the American Medical Association). 2015 Jan 20; 313(3): 241–242.,

Edible products are responsible for the majority of health care visits due to marijuana intoxication for all ages. This is likely due to failure of adult users to appreciate the delayed effects of ingestion compared with inhalation. Prolonged absorption complicates dosing, manufacturing inconsistencies lead to dose variability, and the appealing product forms lead to unintentional ingestion by children.

     This is unconscionable. Furthermore,

Manufacturing practices for marijuana edible products are not standardized. This results in edible products with inconsistent THC concentrations, further complicating dosing for users. According to a report in the Denver Post, products described as containing 100 mg of THC actually contained from 0 to 146 mg of THC

8. There is an increase in collision claims in Colorado.

After retail marijuana sales began in Colorado, the increase in collision-claim frequency was 14 percent higher than in nearby Utah and Wyoming, according to the report. Washington’s estimated increase in claim frequency was 6 percent higher than in Montana and Idaho.

9. There aren't adequate parameters to police marijuana use.

10. There are long term effects of chronic use.  According to the British Journal of Psychiatry (2001-178:101-106),

There is considerable evidence that performance in heavy, chronic cannabis users remains impaired even when they are not actually intoxicated.  These impairments, especially of attention, memory and ability to process complex information, can last for many weeks, months or even years after cessation of cannabis.

11. The conclusion; “Cannabis is not, as widely perceived, a harmless drug but poses risks to the individual and to society.”

12. The argument that the majority of the public wants legalization should be re-framed to state what the majority of an informed public prefers. Certainly, the majority of the public wanted pain relief, but they did not bargain for an opioid epidemic.

13. Currently, the drive for legalization of marijuana is being driven by powerful Wall Street forces that do not have the health of the public as a prime objective.

Alternative plan to legalization:

1. Legislate monetary penalties rather than incarceration.

2. Use the funds for education on addiction.

3. Request the federal government to address the status of marijuana as a Schedule I drug in view of the three cannabinoids approved by the FDA.

4. Urge the funding of the FDA to do a long needed independent study.

5. Wait until we have more definitive information.

[This was submitted to the Democrat & Chronicle as an op-ed topic].

After Two Years of Trump Presidency--A Diagnosis

    

After Two Years of Trump Presidency—A Diagnosis

        According to the Mayo Clinic, a person who has an inflated sense of their own importance, a deep need for excessive attention, troubled relationships, fragile self-esteem, vulnerability to the slightest criticism, a lack of empathy for others, and a mask of extreme confidence, suffers from a mental condition known as narcissistic personality disorder [NPD]. Symptoms and signs of NPD may include:

1.     Have an exaggerated sense of self-importance.  Example, exaggerating the number of people at your inauguration or claiming you could be president of the US and run your business at the same time. (Recall that statement before the election in 2016).

2.     Have a sense of entitlement and require constant, excessive admiration. Example, claim that you, could pardon any number of people including yourself of any crime.

3.    Expect to be recognized as superior even without achievements that warrant it. Example, claim that you are a multi-billionaire, but refuse to cough-up your tax returns.

4.     Be preoccupied with fantasies about success, power, brilliance, beauty or the perfect mate.  Example, if president, claim a national emergency when one is not, claim that you know more than “the generals” in your military, sport an outrageous hair do, and accumulate trophy wives.

5.   Monopolize conversations and belittle or look down on people they perceive as inferior.  Example, govern by Twitter and label people who oppose you with degrading names.

6.   Expect special favors and unquestioning compliance with their expectations. Example, walking out of summit meetings and downgrading NATO members for not paying their dues rather than working patiently with those struggling to comply.

7.   Take advantage of others to get what they want. Example, holding 800,000 of your own government workers hostage in uncompromising stand-off with Congress for a wall.

8.  Behave in an arrogant or haughty manner, coming across as conceited, boastful and pretentious. Example, any signing of a Presidential Order or disparaging sport figures who kneel for the national anthem.

9.     Take advantage of others to get what they want.  Example, lying in public every single day you are in office.

10.   Become impatient or angry when they don’t receive special treatment.  Example.  Behavior when meeting in the Oval Office with congressional leaders, Pelosi and Schumer.

     Do you recognize any one that demonstrates those symptoms?  You got it, Donald Trump! Our president displays a mental disorder [NPD], and is getting worse every month.  He needs a doctor which is out of the question because any person with NPD, as part of the disorder, cannot think that anything is wrong. 

     Therefore, the only solution is an act of congress, which is politically unlikely (frequently followers of those with NPD also suffer from it), or patiently wait to vote him out of office in 2020 with the hope that he will not get us all killed in the meantime.  

     What is the lesson here?  Pay a little more attention to mental status of the people you elect to public office.

Have We Lost Democracy?

     De Tocqueville's observation during Andrew Jackson's presidency was, "The nations of our time cannot prevent the conditions of men from becoming equal, but it depends upon themselves whether the principle of equality is to lead them to servitude or freedom, to knowledge or barbarism to prosperity or wretchedness".  My contention, after events on Charlottesville, VA is that servitude, barbarism and wretchedness are winning.  We may have already lost our democracy and simply  do not know it!

     The crisis in our democracy extends to our foreign relations, being degraded by our own president, whose right wing fringe of supporters have no problem with entertaining first strike policy in dealing with North Korea.  As Edward Luce points out in The Retreat of Western Liberalism, "we have put arsonists in charge of the fire brigade".  I can only conclude that the origin of this absurdity is a president who does not understanding the meaning of the term "nuclear winter". But there is precedent here, is there not?  Witness Lyndon Johnson conspiring with Robert McNamara and the US Navy to start the infamous Vietnam war, staging a phony  attack in the Gulf of Tonkin. The erosion of democracy is not a sudden single event.

     One of the greatest forces in this erosion is money. The Supreme Court in Citizens United case (5-4) five years ago decreed that, "Spending is speech, and is therefore protected by the Constitution — even if the speaker is a corporation" This led to creation of the super PACs, which act as shadow political parties accepting unlimited donations from billionaires, corporations and unions and use it to buy advertising that buys elections.  Couple this with the enormous concentration of wealth in the 0.1% and it spells control of democracy by the super-rich, not the people. It means corruption of the legislative branch of government at all levels.
     One of Luce's central contentions is that an example of our failing democracy was the financial crisis of  2008, specifically due to failure of the regulators.  This was coupled with a degradation of corporate treatment of employees, indignity and lack of respect.  Certainly the desire to take back control of their lives was a theme in the recent presidential election. Luce notes that nearly 60% of the workforce is now paid hourly. The disparity in incomes and the contraction of the middle class is a critical failure of the rich.  He sums by saying that the rich need to emerge from their post-modern Versailles. The failure of  democracy to maintain a balanced income between haves and have-nots is why the people have lost faith that their system can deliver.
     We know there is no way to measure the health of a democracy-- no litmus test, but we do know what forces are at work to destroy it.  The concentrated power of lobbies for example.  We the people seem powerless in the face of the NRA [National Rifle Association] and the big Pharma lobbies. Even after the killing of  20 children and 6 adults at the Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown, Connecticut, the senate refused to pass even the most common sense gun control legislation.  The power of big Pharma is evidenced in the congress preventing the government bargaining the price of drugs.
     The most egregious example of loss of democracy and polarization is gerrymandering--the practice of fixing district boundaries to protect the political interests of incumbents.  "Fixed seats" means no compromise and is the core of the Tea Party.  This condition together with the effort of Republicans to infringe upon voting rights of blacks and minorities may prove irreversible. Indeed, the Republican Party as Thomas Mann and Norman Ornstein note in  It's Even Worse Than it Was, has become ideologically extreme; contemptuous of the inherited social and economic policy regime; scornful of compromise; unpersuaded by conventional under-standing of facts, evidence, and science; and dismissive of legitimacy of its political opposition, all but declaring war on the government."
     Let me stress that neither party is without blame.  The tampering with senate rules by playing majority voting against 2/3s, the dissolution of process--witness absence any healthcare reform hearings in this congress, and the poor record of congressional oversight of intelligence and national security agencies is sickening.  But the crowning force tearing down democracy is the lack of constructive effort by the two party system.  The Republican Party is primarily to blame. As David Brooks pointed out in a recent editorial in the NewYorkTimes, (Aug 29th) "..the Republican Party has changed since 2005. Their party has become a vehicle for white identity and racial conflict".  "It's ironic that race was the issue that  created the Republican Party and that race could very will be the issue that destroys it".
     It has been said many times that democracy is an experiment, which like any experiment may very well fail.  More depressing is the  absence of a force that will turn it around.  At this point in time, I just don't see it happening; not while the Koch brothers are running the show.
     

     

     

     

What is Extreme Vetting and What Does It Mean?

     The Executive Order temporarily banning immigration from seven Muslim countries,which has ignited a major legal skirmish, was based on a campaign pledge to prevent immigration of Muslims who are national security risks.   In candidate Trump's words, to be placed, "Until we know what the hell is going on".  Translated, this clearly inferred to the public that we are unsafe now under current vetting procedures, and that what we needed was to find security against Islamic terrorism by developing "extreme vetting".  Putting aside the hasty incompetence of the White House legal staff in the preparation of the order and fast forwarding beyond whatever legal outcome evolves, the question remains. What is extreme vetting and what will it mean to national security?

     "To appraise, verify, check for accuracy, authenticity, validity etc." is the given definition of vetting.  I can only assume that extreme vetting is pressing the current level of effort to some exertion of both in time and effort that provides a level of security deemed better or where we as a nation want to be.  Set aside again the adequacy of the present level of vetting and how well it has been working and go to the heart of the issue.
     
      The central question is this:  How can the vetting process be upgraded to prevent entry of any radical Islamic believers?  I do not know what they are doing now, so this is pure speculation but it must have to do in part with their religious beliefs.  So what religious beliefs do they have that are a security threat?  The answer must be the radical beliefs that threaten us.  And where are they found?  They are found in Koran--the extremist passages often cited by the Islamic terrorists obligating them to violet jihad or holy war. No need to quote them as any Koranic scholar can point them out.

   So the extreme vetting questioning goes like this;  Are you from (fill in the blank of which of the seven countries cited in the order are you coming from)?  Then are you a Muslim (mark yes or no)? If yes, then you believe in the Koran (confirm yes or no).  If the answer is yes then the next obvious question is do you believe in all of the Koran (mark yes or no).  If the answer is yes, then are we to believe that since there is no repudiation of the Koranic verses that are offensively radical, that exclusion is automatic?  Could be. But this is unlikely to hold legal challenge on constitutional grounds (First Amendment).  

     Lets proceed assuming the answer to the last question is no, then the respondent must detail those verses in which he or she is not a believer.  Any answer is threatening to the respondent's conscience because any believing Muslim believes that the Koran is the sacred word of God and cannot be changed or deleted.  He cleverly conceals his true beliefs and  then where does the extreme vetting go? Do we pull a Guns of Navarone (movie) and break out the scopolamine?  Time for a little water boarding Mr. Trump? No! The situation is clear.  There is no degree of vetting, extreme or otherwise that does not come down to word against word. Future behavior can only be pledged, never guaranteed.

       This is why laws governing separation of church and state are so critical.  When words are broken then the law and the constitution come in to restore the boundaries.  So the conclusion is simple.  Extreme vetting is nothing more that a scare tactic aimed at deceiving the electorate that they are unsafe and that this noxious nothing called extreme vetting is going to make them safe.  Didn't we learn anything from Senator Joe McCarthy?

      So Mr. President, you want to know what the hell is going  on!  I'll tell you.  We are paying attention!