Friends, make no mistake -- I am pro-sun. Where would we be without the sun? In the dark, for sure, and very, very cold. That's why it's a good thing that scientists are studying the sun more intensely, and more intimately, than ever before. No sign yet, though, that President Trump has any intention of annexing the sun, although I suspect it's only a matter of time...
https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/cgrwdxpljyxo
In other news, Germany's government has collapsed and new elections are coming in February. The "far-right" AfD looks likely to finish a strong second to the establishment conservatives. Will a coalition government arise between the two parties, therefore? One assumes not, because all the mainstream parties in Germany seem obsessed with giving the cold shoulder to the "far-right". The more things change, the more they stay the same?
In a sign of CNN's abject humiliation and growing irrelevance, the rising star of conservative journalism, Newsmax, frequently beats it in the ratings. Wow! Imagine that! CNN used to have a monopoly on cable news. Now it barely has an audience at all.
https://www.newsmax.com/newsfront/newsmax-defeats-cnn/2024/12/26/id/1192992/
Finally, a tempest is brewing in the MAGA-verse regarding the desirability of importing highly skilled immigrants to fill some of America's most desirable jobs, particularly in the tech sector. Musk and Ramasawamy argue that America needs the world's best and brightest, whereas some conservatives feel that we should always hire Americans first and foremost. The two views are not necessarily incompatible, but finding the right balance in our legal immigration policy won't be easy.
https://www.breitbart.com/immigration/2024/12/27/white-collar-migration-splits-trumps-maga/
Dr. Waddy from Jack: I also highly approve of the sun although I sometimes resent its overbearing and presumptuous presence, say, in the dog days of August.
ReplyDeleteThe beyond fascinating exploration of our Solar System continues apace. Imagine, we actually have a star within now relatively easy distance and for which our technology has crafted a vessel capable of carrying sensitive instruments to heretofore unimaginable proximity to its hellish heat. This is a golden(so to speak) age of exploration of which we are privileged to witness!
Dr. Waddy from Jack: I expect that DJT's interests will soon be, in the main, of a nature so mundane as to mostly rule out thought of sovereignty over the Sun.
ReplyDeleteDr. Waddy from Jack:Perhaps what we are seeing in Germany, UK and US is not only present or promising defeat of the left but of as much popular disgust with it as to prompt rejection even of "establishment conservatism" as its antidote. MAGA and perhaps Farage in the UK and the "far right" in Germany may well be seen as the means necessary to return the obnoxious far left to the deserved cold.
ReplyDeleteThe incipient totalitarians may have presumed and pushed too far and in doing so, made obvious to an increasingly alarmed common sense majority the injustice and fantasy their unfettered rule would manifest.
Oh, Jack -- if only it were so!!! The Reform Party in the U.K. and the AfD in Germany are, thus far, a long, long way from achieving majority support. Of course, in the U.K., one doesn't need majority support to achieve a majority in Parliament, so "Prime Minister Farage" is not a completely delusional notion. An AfD Chancellor??? Don't hold your breath!
ReplyDeleteDr. Waddy from Jack: I stand deservedly moderated. These days its easy to wax overly optimistic. Still, a wave of common sense could be gathering and that alone is much to celebrate compared to the despair with which we could have been engulfed.
ReplyDeleteDr. Waddy from Jack:Sounds to me like Musk has the better idea. In our understandable high motivation to undo the immigration mess the dems have promoted, lets not discourage the legal immigration of prospective citizens from settings in which positive, constructive living which rewards merit is extolled. Our country offers material well being which makes it very competitive in attracting such people.
ReplyDeleteDr. Waddy from Jack: I remember the Phil Donohue days when broadcast news and commentary was dominated to the point of suffocation by far left wingers convinced of their unimpeachable justice and wisdom. Their success in hamstringing our Vietnam war effort and in destroying unbearably ordinary Nixon emboldened them.
ReplyDeleteFox and Rush Linbaugh courageously confronted them and their deserved discreditation continues apace now. They have only their hubris and unalloyed hatred of America to blame for this.
RAY TO JACK
DeleteNixon destroyed himself by covering up for a bunch of fools in the wake of Watergate. He should have thrown them to the wolves instead of resigning.
Their disempowerment should encourage us to persist in attack ing others of their cultural citadels. Jack
ReplyDeleteDr. Waddy from Jack: Again, I've always thought it possible that this counterintuitive cultural ordeal we have labored through since the fantastic '60s would one day prove to have been but a bizarre interlude. Creditably perceiving this will take some distancing from it and that is not at hand yet, BUT. . .
ReplyDeleteWhen the radical maxim that "social change" is by definition positive and that conservation of the worthy verities always present in great civilizations like that of the West against sweeping "fundamental transformation"is automatically dismissable code for resistance to always laudable "progress" ,is put to intellectually responsible objective evaluation, then this far leftist carnival will begin to fly apart. It is based in empirically unverifiable , infinitely malleable, very tyrannically defended principles (eg. wokeness) and cannot stand up to the light of honest debate and dialectic.
We may, after this momentous year, be approaching within sight of the entranceway to the return of objectivity, respect for time proven tradition and for so long reflexively despised common sense. Once there of we may say "this is the beginning of the end of this '60s theretofore undreamed of abomination".
I would add; totalitarian far left principles are also based in unfettered, irresponsible speculation on the future, for which no objective confirmation is presently possible.Jack
ReplyDeleteRay fromJack: I think nobody , including canny Nixon, could have realized the extent of the viciousness manifested by the left in '73-74. They had been denied by Nixon in their AQUARIAN year of '68 and he , despised Nixon himself, had buried them in '72. So when they saw a serendipitous chance to savage him, they jumped at it. It was an unprecedented direct, ruinously intended assault on a President and it had to be experienced to be believed by anyone, I think.
ReplyDeleteRAY TO JACK
DeletePresident Nixon did not do our country, or the world, any favors when he started the move to recognize the most ruthless Communist dictatorship in the world, The People's Republic of China. It was a stupid move engineered by Nixon's Secretary of State, the late Henry Kissinger, who knew nothing much about China. Kissinger was an arrogant "intellectual" whose specialty area was Europe, and that in the 19th Century. So look at where the world is today because of what Nixon did? Nixon is way over blown! Carter was far worse, but that does not let Nixon off the hook for what he did.
I meant "experienced by us back then to be believed by us" Few of us would have predicted the way it is now known to have transpired. Jack
ReplyDeleteDr. Waddy from Jack: Re encouraging immigration of highly qualified profess: a commentator on Fox cited a plausible arguments against it. Immigrants from some countries are sometimes willing to work for much less than are similarly educated and skilled Americans. The balance between competing interests which you mentioned may well be the best way to go.
ReplyDeleteDr. Waddy from Jack: Well, "Jimmy" Carter has passed. His ascension to the Presidency was astonishing; I think he pioneered the 2 year campaign. He was a very decent and capable man but I think the Presidency overwhelmed him.
ReplyDeletePolitically, he appeared to be set on apologizing for the genuine conservative values which made him a good naval officer. I don't he could have been disingenuous about that while working closely for the perceptive and intensely acerbic Adm. Hyman Rickover in the vital nuclear program in the early '50s. His daring for 1976 haircut (which did matter), his outspoken rebuke of racial prejudice in 1970 in Georgia (which was entirely sincere) and his redemption of Vietnam draft dodgers bespoke liberal intent and it didn't work for some who at first thought him a refutation of 1972 McGovernism (which he was in effect) and a reason to give the Dems another chance. Also, it was virtually inevitable that the GOP would have to pay for Watergate.
But he had an aversion to making hard decisions at that supreme world historical level and it was easily perceived internationally. His admission that he had not fully realized the Soviet menace probably cooked him there. And the contrast between him and Reagan during the shameful Iranian hostage crisis (something the Iranians would never have attempted against the Russkies) was proven when the Mullahs freed the hostages immediately upon Carter's departure. They KNEW full well what to expect from Reagan!
I think his apparent sympathy for those who wish ill of Israel was unredeeming and he proved out of office to be a thoroughgoing liberal. That alone does not condemn an individual; many persons of good will hold the convictions of a doctrine which, nonetheless, can be reasonably, arguably construed as having worked great damage and being worth resolute opposition from honorable people.
He certainly deserves the reverence he will receive in a Presidential funeral.
RAY TO DR. WADDY AND JACK
ReplyDeleteJimmy Carter has done what millions of human beings all over the world do when they get old, they die! With that said, he has passed into eternity, and God will judge him, and absolutely nothing else matters but that.
A fleet of historians will write more books about him, which will be read by a minority of human beings in the world, because the majority of human beings have other things to do and worry about, above and beyond reading U.S. President biographies.
Let me repeat, What God thinks of Jimmy Carter now is the only thing that matters. In fact, what God thinks about anyone at any time, which is all of the time, is the only thing that matters, and Jimmy Carter is no exception.
With that said, I wish the both of you, Dr. Waddy and Jack, a Happy New Year. May both of you live to be 100.
Ray from Jack: And as fortuitous a year as this one has been to you also.
ReplyDeleteDr. Waddy from Jack:I've gone back and looked at discussion at this site early in last January. We knew we were entering a critical year but that it should have been decided by an inadvertent turn of DJT's head and by a few millimeters of projectile? Fantastic!
ReplyDeleteDr. Waddy from Jack: Looks like cars are becoming the favored means for loony copycat mass killers. The solution is obvious:
ReplyDeleteSince driving is not a right, licensing of it must be reserved only for those of demonstrated "good character"who can pass strict , frequently reviewed background checks, undergo demanding training and who can prove a compelling need for ownership of such dangerous devices. Such laws will guarantee denial of access to such murderous machines to those of such terribly unlawful intent.
Prescient and Promethean Al Gore was of course justified and dutiful in emphasizing yet another "inconvenient truth". "The automobile is the greatest threat to modern civilization". And of course, long overdue suppression of it will hasten the dominance of "public" transportation. And since that is workable only in urban areas this will hasten the depopulation of the "flyover country" which has so insolently imposed its "bitter" convictions upon our America of late.
As da, da, da, daaaah, precocious Presidential candidate Rahm Emanuel declared long ago: "never let a good crisis go to waste".
Dr. Waddy from Jack : An article in RealClear Politics today speculated , with almost frivolous prematurity, about the Presidential possibilities of several people. Still. . . .
ReplyDeleteLongtime Dem House Pelosi deputy Steny Hoyer was quoted, concerning AOC: "She's a wonderful talent and the caucus really likes her. Something will come along because she is so dynamic and such a wonderful communicator".
Understandably, AOC has up to now been very widely perceived as a radical bomb thrower impossible to take seriously as a candidate for national nomination or even office. But she did get her definitively radical "Green New Deal" officially adopted by the far left captured Biden administration, a precocious victory. The venerable Stoyer has not been the only one bidding us take her seriously.Former Biden Press Secretary Psaki recently suggested we pay her heed.
One could see her as the 2028 nominee of a rump far left Dem party shorn of its finally fed up common sense faction.In that setting she would lose. But I would not put it beyond her to disingenuously position herself as one who can not only restore integrity to the terribly discredited , once mainstream Dem party but lead it to the kind of facile "centrism" so well worked by carnival huckster Slick Willy in '92 and "95 . In '94 he got "made" for his obvious advocacy of the leftist policies championed by his "wife" and made a thereafter classic preemptive move to the center in promoting support for the police (for whom he was understandably no friend) and of "small government" .
AOC, with her youth , energy, ambition and a ferocious disdain for America frankly demonstrated in the time when her image before the American public was of no interest to her, is now , on the cusp of her maturity, a , potentially very formidable and consequential demagogue who is already being taken with some creditable attention. Should she ever achieve the Presidency we could count on her return to radicalism, either covertly or with opportunistically overt determination. Who knows what circumstances may obtain then?
I agree with Jack that Nixon's (forced) resignation was in many respects the high water mark of leftist journalism in this country, although the media's progressive bias would become much more naked in the years to come. I agree with Ray that Nixon gave the media and the Dems the rope with which to hang him. He made some very dumb moves.
ReplyDeleteHmm. Could the age of airy-fairy (progressive) utopianism be drawing to an end? I guess anything is possible, but it seems to me that, the richer and more technologically advanced civilization becomes, the more we can uncouple ourselves from reality and cultural "verities", as Jack puts it, and the more we can indulge ideological claptrap. From this perspective, I wouldn't have much confidence that the demon has been slayed.
Ray, you may not like Nixon's China policy, but it was extremely popular at the time, and it had absolutely nothing to do with the leftist coup against him -- unless I am very much mistaken.
Jack, yes -- only foreign "experts" and geniuses who are essentially impossible to find here in the U.S. (in sufficient quantities) should be permitted privileged terms of migration.
Jack, I would have you expand on Jimmy Carter's haircut, if you please! I would also remind all foolhardy enough to listen that Carter won in '76 because he was a Southerner. He bucked (and essentially inverted) the Southern Strategy of Richard Nixon, and that was the difference in the election. In other words, he thoroughly hoodwinked his fellow Southerners, and they wisely reconsidered matters in 1980.
Ray, may we all live to be 100, and may we get there in much better shape than Carter was.
True, Jack -- Trump's decision to turn his head was undoubtedly the most fateful thing to occur in 2024, and who knows but that something equally implausible may define 2025...
Jack, I know you were bring ironic, but I think there's an argument to be made for raising the bar with respect to driver's licenses. We let an awful lot of people get behind the wheel who have no business being there.
I just don't know nearly enough about AOC to evaluate her chances in '28. I would observe, however, that physical attractiveness could easily be a liability for her rather than an asset.
Dr. Waddy from Jack: That part of his hair which covered the tops of his ears; honestly, it was considered quite daring for a politician then. It I hinted: "yeah I'm with 'it' ". I was still a liberal then but not strongly so and I saw him as a compromise between center right and center left . But certainly many southerners thought themselves toyed with and they flocked to Reagan (as I did in '84) as soon as they had the chance.
ReplyDeleteDr. Waddy from Jack: Washington came very close to being killed at least 3 times in his life before being the fortuitously chosen President of the Constitutional Convention and then of course an astoundingly self effacing first President. Without him, what? President Arnold, Benedict I ? Of course it worked the other way too. A second Lincoln term; that might have worked a far different south.
ReplyDeleteDr. Waddy from Jack: As a 77 year old I must consider the possibility of maybe being unable to drive in the foreseeable future. It would be disheartening. Senior citizens may make up somewhat for physical impairment by exercising their often characteristic caution and courtesy. But you are certainly right in your view about drivers' licensing.
ReplyDeleteDr. Waddy from Jack: One thing the "progressives" have long demonstrated is the near certainty of their being swept up by their emotionally charged righteousness into hyperbole and overreach. Even people who have always been solidly on their side are finally moved to doubt about them and eventual resolve to oppose them. I think some of that obtained in Nov. Will antiamerica wise up? They did after '88. But 32 years of presumptuous incipient totalitarianism, including the exercise of Presidential power by such "fundamental transformers" as Hillary and Obama and the capture of a pathetic factotum Biden by the far
ReplyDeleteleft may be very hard for these fanatics to renounce. And if that is so, more and more Americans will react decisively against it. That could be its self inflicted and just maybe unavoidable undoing.
Dr. Waddy from Jack: Normally meant attractiveness: AOC has it and I could see it being offputting to some for various reasons. But I'd say she has a striking countenance and mien and people with those features are sometimes capable of extensive mesmerizing.
ReplyDeleteI very much hesitate to employ the nazi analogy the far left so casually deploys in its ideological onslaughts but I must say I think AOC does have some of Adolf's demagogical capabilities . Granted, our country has not experienced the trauma which opened the way for him but she may be able to reassure a significant portion of the "fundamental transformation " crowd that it is a dire necessity and that she can requite their anxieties. She might well still have an uphill battle for election but nomination? Not inconceivable I think. If there is a drawn out battle for the soul of the dem party, antiamerica may well prevail and punish its heretics with the empowerment of a person inimical to America. It nominated Hillary , simply because she was a nominally qualified woman, though many perceived how unlikeable she is. AOC is liked by many.
Boy, I never would have guessed that a presidential candidate's hairdo could be so consequential. Didn't everyone in the 70s have big hair? Guess not.
ReplyDeleteNo doubt about it: assassins play an outsized role in history. One could argue that their successes and their failures are the engines of history.
Good news, Jack: by the time you won't be able to drive, your car (or truck) will be able to drive itself.
Hmm. AOC has Hitlerian charisma??? Now I'm determined to find out for myself! (Minutes pass.) Okay, I just watched a clip of her speech at the DNC. Eh. I'm not impressed. She's vaguely competent, but her voice is somewhat piercing and she looks like a little girl trying to be a politician. And those crazy eyes! No, I say, if the Dems want to nominate AOC, then let them. She isn't the pick of the litter.