Year: 2018

The “Future” Party

Dave Davis Commentary, Policy, The Future Party, Uncategorized

The funeral of Barbara Bush, the matriarch of a preeminent Republican family illuminates just how broken things are.  While former Presidents of both parties attended there was a notable no-show, the present Republican President Donald Trump.  Now sitting presidents don’t always go to first lady funerals, but who wouldn’t want to be seen paying his respects to “America’s Grandmother,” especially a publicity addict like Trump. He didn’t go simply because he wouldn’t  have been welcome.  Think about it.  The leader of the Republican Party wasn’t welcome at the funeral of the wife of one Republican president and the mother of another.  If this doesn’t alert the nation to a major split in one of our two major parties nothing will.  In fact, most of the Republican attendees must feel they no longer have a party.  Rolling over for the present President would mean surrendering their values.  According to recent polls, they are a minority in their party, with the President viewed favorably by at least 70-80% of Republicans.   As the Senator  from Arizona, Jeff Flake, found there is no  room for those old Goldwater-Reagan people in the present party.

A move to the other major party offers no welcoming home either.  If you’re a free market Republican strongly favoring trade agreements such as the Trans Pacific  Partnership (TPP) you might find kindred souls among the Democrats. After all, it was negotiated by the then Secretary of State Hillary Clinton under the Obama administration.  Surely on this issue at least these Republicans could join with Democrats.   This would be way off base.  To placate the dominant progressive wing of that party, Clinton simply ran away from her own handiwork.  Bernie Sanders and the progressives didn’t want any part of TPP so she caved.  Odd, the dominant Trump wing of the Republicans had exactly the same position on TPP as the dominant progressive wing of the Democrats. On closer inspection this isn’t odd at all .  On major issues these supposed blood rivals are in basic agreement or have symbiotic relationship. Continue reading →

China

Dave Davis Policy, Uncategorized

If the Russian situation isn’t enough to keep you up at night, our “policy” in the Far East should do the job.  North Korea threatens us with nuclear tipped missiles it hasn’t quite perfected  and we agree to a summit that can do nothing but enhance the prestige of that country’s dictator.  We are counting on China. to apply pressure on the  North Korean Dictator Kim to give up his Nuclear weapon systems, at the same time we are on the verge of a trade war with them over their predatory trade policies. Seems China is in a fortuitous of position to get a pass on trade if they help us on North Korea.  How did China get in this position and we ended up on the horns of the dilemma?

Now, North Korea is a Chinese Satellite much the same as Belarus is to Russia.  Both look to their masters before taking any action. What if Belarus President Alexander Lukashenko was determined to undertake a nuclear program to threaten its NATO neighbors especially Poland, Lithuania and Latvia. Would our President meet with him to get him to give up his program? Of course Putin would  offer to mediate the problem if we would remove our sanctions on Russia for his good offices. One would like to think we wouldn’t fall for this and would properly hold the puppet master Putin responsible . and go right after him.

Yet this is the same as our East Asia Dilemma. If Kim didn’t know his master he wouldn’t have been on the next train to Beijing when Xi whistled. Don’t be fooled with the reports China has been taken aback by North Korean actions.  If China didn’t want North Korea to have Nuclear missiles it would never happen. Kim would get the message and stop the program or he would be gone and someone more obedient would take his place  After all China is the only country providing anything of value to North Korea. There would be no collapse sending millions of starving Koreans into China, just a quiet military coup.  Those that have profited so handsomely from  North Korean Stalinism only have to be assured of their positions with the new boss. So why doesn’t China make the move?  Simply because this situation serves China’s purpose.  Think about it. China threatens major trade routes counter to our and our allies interests. They steal our and other’s intellectual property along with other unfair trade practices.  Without the North Korean situation, we would be taking a much more adversarial attitude towards China. Yes we’ve threatened put on some tariffs but those will probably go in payment for any help China gives in halting the North Korean Nuclear program.  You just can’t punish someone when you’re simultaneously begging for their help.  China has us just where they want us.

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A State of Confusion

Dave Davis Uncategorized

With the seemingly endless amount of news tumbling out of the administration orbit, it’s hard to keep things straight.  This could be because we seem to be headed in two directions at once on so many things.  A terror nerve gas attack takes place in the United Kingdom that is traced back to Putin’s Russia.  While officially we backed our NATO ally , our President called Putin to congratulate him on his re-election that virtually everyone saw as rigged.  Trump never even mentioned the attack to Putin.  When pressed, the administration fell back on the old saw “we need good relations with Russia.”  Surely the leader of our close ally Theresa May wasn’t amused. While his administration takes some actions against Russia, Trump himself refuses to take Putin to task.  Down deep, what is our real policy towards Russian aggression?  Our allies must be wondering, especially, those on the front lines.  Of course, when you threaten your allies with stiff tariffs at the same time we’re telling them you’re with them all the way you can understand their confusion. Wars often start with miscalculations, think August 1914.

The recently passed Omnibus Spending  Bill tossed the idea controlling our national debt out the window.  The credit people at Moody’s and economists from all sides warn this irresponsibility can’t go on forever. Some small government  and/or fiscally conservative Republicans were appalled and even the President threatened to veto it at the last-minute. Trump caved, saying he had to sign in order to get desperately needed money for our military.  So what do hear now? He wants to take money from the military to build his wall.  With estimated to cost over $25 billion that’s quite a few planes , tanks and ships. Maybe we didn’t need these after all.  Is the military budget there to protect us or is it a Presidential slush fund?

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Do We Ever Learn Anything?

Dave Davis Uncategorized

Suddenly, the widening Republican split over trade and tariffs is all over media.  If people had bothered to look, this should come as no surprise.  Back in January a year ago we looked at these potential problems, foreseeing Trump’s long-held positions on trade, immigration and the world indicated a less than enthusiastic for US support for classical liberal values. A year ago January we tackled these looming clashes in our posts AND THEN THE REPUBLICANS and Reasons for Hope-or Not.  Trump’s first year was spent  achieving Republican goals favored by virtually all his primary opponents.  Tax cuts, regulatory relief and the appointment of conservative judges were jointly achieved.  Healthcare where there was no real Republican or Trump Plan  only nicked Obama care rather than ending and/or replacing it.  Now we’re at the moment of truth.  Will Trump cave and change his long-held view the rest of the world has taken advantage of the US and become a free trader at the risk of losing his base or stay true to the positions that won his following.  The recent steel and aluminum tariffs indicate he’s where he always been, a 16th century mercantilist.

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Criminal Minds

Dave Davis Commentary, Policy, Uncategorized

Another mass murder resulting  the usual running off in all directions.  Ban the type of weapon used.  No fortify and arm the schools. Someone dropped the ball.  What we seem to overlook is normal people don’t commit mass murderer.  Abnormal people do.  Further, in most cases the perpetrators have exhibited behaviors that gave us clear indications they were capable of acts most wouldn’t even entertain.  What we don’t have is a method to connect the dots necessary to prevent them from acting.  Millions of people watch “Criminal Minds” a TV series that follows a team of FBI profilers tracking down people who commit horrific crimes.  The idea is to use characteristics to create a profile of the criminal in order to make an identification.  In other words, mass murders have a different set of traits that set them apart from the general populace.  Indeed, if you went to the FBI and asked them for a general profile of those capable of mass murder they could provide it. What is needed is a way to reverse the procedure of using the profile to catch the bad guys after the committing of crimes to a way to fill in the profile before the crimes take place.

The FBI with a comprehensive profile based on the idiosyncrasies of mass murderers refined and combined with a super data collection system would give us the basis to identify them before they act.  We already have tip lines but these would be far more effective with a questionnaire filling in the blanks on a profile.  Extended to the internet, someone who sees abnormal behavior such as cruelty to animals could log on to the FBI tip site and find the questionnaire to be filled out. A person conflicted by what they had observed would see cruelty to animals is something needed to be reported.  The questionnaire could alert observers to the kinds of behavior we need to know about.  At the same time they would be assured the information provided would be correlated with other reports. This is where big data comes in.  With the proper algorithms all reports would be in one place to be aggregated and ranked.

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