Author: wrongologist

Are Smartphones Destroying Teens?

The Daily Escape:

Sunset, September 2017, near Granite Bay CA – photo by David Dodd

The Atlantic’s article, “Have Smartphones Destroyed a Generation?” makes the point that teens today are:

…less likely to date. The initial stage of courtship, which Gen Xers called “liking” (as in “Ooh, he likes you!”), kids now call “talking”-an ironic choice for a generation that prefers texting to actual conversation. After two teens have “talked” for a while, they might start dating. But only about 56% of high-school seniors in 2015 went out on dates; for Boomers and Gen Xers, the number was about 85%.

The decline in dating tracks with a decline in sexual activity. While websites showing sexual content such as www.tubev.sex are only becoming more popular, research appears to show that fewer young people are having sex of their own. Fewer teens having sex has contributed to what many see as one of the most positive youth trends in recent years: The teen birth rate hit an all-time low in 2016, down 67% since its modern peak, in 1991. When they can see the hottest Scottish pornstars from their phones, can you blame them?

The article was written by Jean M. Twenge, a professor of psychology at San Diego State University. The article can be summarized as these teens are more comfortable online than out partying, but they’re on the brink of a mental-health crisis.

More from Dr. Twenge:

Even driving, a symbol of adolescent freedom inscribed in American popular culture…has lost its appeal for today’s teens. Nearly all Boomer high-school students had their driver’s license by the spring of their senior year; more than one in four teens today still lack one at the end of high school…In conversation after conversation, teens described getting their license as something to be nagged into by their parents-a notion that would have been unthinkable to previous generations.

Quite a difference from Wrongo’s growing up in pre-boomer times. The idea of having your mom drive you to an event was as close to being humiliated in front of your friends as you ever wanted to be, so everyone got a driver’s license as soon as possible.

But today’s teens are less likely to leave the house to see friends. Twenge says that the shift is stunning: 12th-graders in 2015 were going out less often than eighth-graders did as recently as 2009.

We have seen this kind of alienation in Japan, where these people are called hikikomori, a term the Japanese use to define those who haven’t left their homes or physically interacted with others for at least six months. Japan has virtual high schools for teens who can’t leave home. Virtual high school is a thing in the US as well.

Add smartphones and video games together, and you can slow or pause social development and engagement with the real world. The real trouble is in the separation of virtual from lived experience that becomes physical separation and alienation. They’re more likely to visit this website, rather than want to experience the act themselves. This creates a generation of socially awkward, dependent, soon-to-be adults who have had a lack of sexual experiences. It is true that they could look for escorts local to them on https://www.escortdirectory.com/escorts-zurich-241/ to give them experience of being with a woman, but the lack of social interaction will surely always hinder them.

No doubt there is a large group of teens who seem to live primarily through social media, some in Wrongo’s own family. Smartphones have made social media much more accessible, but are smartphones in and of themselves the causal factor? Hard to say. Wrongo has had a smart phone for a long time, still sees friends and family, and gets things done.

And the current crop of teens have the tools to be the best informed generation yet. OTOH, they have to be curious enough to perform in-depth search on those smartphones.

So, blaming the smartphone is using correlation to indicate causality.

In fact, this article may describe primarily an upper middle class phenomenon, not something that is society-wide. The kids being coddled are from families with enough money to do it. The intelligent ones among them are opportunistic harvesters of their parents’ resources, and perfectly capable of adaptation.

The genuinely alienated kids exist, but probably not in any larger numbers than the problem kids of earlier generations. But their problems manifest differently than in earlier generations.

If we believe our kids and grandkids are not prepared to face the reality of life, the fault lies with us, as it is our job to prepare them. The responsibility of any parent is to figure out how the world works, and to teach their children how to survive in it – this is true for all mammals.

BTW, today’s photo was shot by Wrongo’s grandson on his smartphone, on the way to his job, after his day at college.

Here is the Who doing “The Kids Are All Right” from their 1965 album, “My Generation“:

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Sunday Cartoon Blogging – September 17, 2017

(There will be no Monday Wake-Up Call this week, as Wrongo is visiting family on Cape Cod)

A rich harvest of cartoons this week. Hillary’s book signings, Bernie’s health insurance bill, Trump’s new deal with the Dems, Equifax, and the hurricanes!

Hillary lets Bernie know what she thinks of his Medicare for all bill:

Equifax tries to minimize their gigantic fail:

Equifax creates more losers than Irma:

GOP makes their priorities about disasters clear:

Trump’s dealing with Dems may hurt the GOP:

Bipartisanship deal making cuts both ways:

Why is Bannon on the left wing? Seems wrong:

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Saturday Soother – September 16, 2017

The Daily Escape:

Old Prison, Annecy, France. This 12th century prison sits in the middle of the river Thiou. Because of the canals in the town, Annecy is called the Venice of the Alps.

Yesterday, Wrongo said that we needed a special tax to be used solely to rebuild the economies and infrastructure of states hit by Irma and Harvey. It didn’t take long to hear that millionaires already pay enough taxes. In one way, that is correct. From the Atlantic:

Forty years ago, the richest 1% paid about 18% of the country’s federal income taxes. Today, they pay about 40%.

While 40% seems high, we need to look harder at the arithmetic: The number of million-dollar-earners in the US has grown rapidly since Y2K. According to the IRS, the number of households with an adjusted gross income greater than $1 million more than doubled between 2001 and 2014, the last year with complete data. And no group has grown faster than the super-rich; the number of households earning more than $10 million grew by 144%.

Between 2001 and 2014, income earned by millionaires grew twice as fast as income earned by the rest of us. In 2001, million-dollar earners and above collectively reported income of about $600 billion. In 2014, they reported $1.4 trillion, more than double the amount in just 14 years. And the top 10% of wealthiest families in this country control 76% of our country’s total wealth.

So, we shouldn’t feel guilty about taxing them for a specific need, for a time-limited period.

If you’re a millionaire, it’s not just because you worked hard. It’s because you worked hard, and you live in a country where the government provides a well-developed infrastructure, stable institutions and markets governed by a strong commercial code.

Rich people need to stop griping and pull their weight, just like the rest of America’s tax-payers.

So Wrongo says again, we all need to pay extra taxes into a special fund for redevelopment of Florida and Texas. As the libertarian Joseph Tainter asserts in his book “The Collapse of Complex Societies” (don’t read it), when a society no longer has the reserves to help offset what might otherwise be a recoverable disaster, collapse can’t be far off.

Increased revenues will absolutely increase our reserves. And they will help us recover from this current disaster.

It’s Saturday, and we need to relax. Today Dr. Wrong prescribes a double Hayes Valley Espresso (whole bean is $ 17/lb.) from Oakland, CA’s Blue Bottle Coffee. Get it now, Blue Bottle has just agreed to be acquired by Nestle.

Brew it up, put on the Bluetooth headphones, and listen to the Flute Quartet No.1 in D major by J. J. Quantz, flute maker and Baroque composer. Quantz was extremely prolific. He wrote six flute quartets that were discovered in 2001 by American flutist Mary Ann Oleskiewicz in archives of the Sing-Akademie zu Berlin. Here is Quantz’s Flute Quartet No. 1:

Those who read the Wrongologist in email can view the video here.

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Tax Cuts Won’t Pay for Irma and Harvey

The Daily Escape:

Talking Heads Decision Wheel

It’s time to question how we pay for disasters. The estimated costs of Harvey and Irma are $290 billion. That might turn out to be high or low, it is still early days in assessing total costs. The insurance industry says that they expect to take a $70 billion combined hit for Irma and Harvey.

That leaves $220 billion to be funded by individuals, or taxpayers. Where will that money come from?

The president and his GOP buddies want to cut taxes on corporations and the wealthy, but they call it tax reform. They’ll throw some chump change at the middle class, so that their base feels they got something for their vote last November, but at best, their tax plan will be revenue-neutral. That will provide nothing new for the rebuild of Texas and Florida.

We shouldn’t accept the usual “revenues can’t be increased” mantra when we know cities and people may not be able to afford rebuilding on their own. There are many costs that need to be considered, for example victims of the flood will have to contact some of the roofing companies austin has to offer in order to get their roof fixed, or they will have to find a roofing service closer to their home. They will also have to pay for all new furniture, and decorating services. Getting their lives back on track will be extremely difficult and costly, but with the help of donations they’ll get there. We could also raise revenues. It’s time for a specific and time-limited National Recovery Tax. And everybody has to chip in. This can be a unifying moment. Nobody wants to pay more, but the job must be done.

Think for a second about the Hand In Hand benefit. The idea was that celebrities would induce the average person to donate to disaster relief. The minimum donation that Hand In Hand asked for on their web site is $25. The average US Net worth for 45-54 year olds is around 84k. $25 is .0003% of the average US family’s net worth.

Celebrities should ask us to open our wallets, but that can’t be the way we raise the billions necessary to fund this recovery. And we can’t count on the corporations. Apple gave $5 million, that’s nice. Apple is worth about $850 billion; $5 million is .0000058% of Apple’s net worth. They gave less proportionately than the average American. Apple pays very little tax relative to their profits, most of which are kept overseas. Here is a link to how Apple’s income is sheltered.

Think about where Apple’s money comes from. You bought the iPhone, iPad and maybe a MAC computer. You were the source of their money. The same is true for Michael Dell’s $36 million donation to Harvey relief. He gave a heroic amount, but it’s a pittance when we need $220 billion.

Disasters happen. We need a fund to make people whole, and it has to come from increased revenues. Some could be from state-level taxation in the states impacted, but other states won’t do that voluntarily. That assessment has to come from a new federal tax assessment. Congress should work out the details.

We need to wave off any discussion of additional tax breaks for corporations or for the wealthy, until we rebuild Texas and Florida.

We are all beneficiaries of living in America, including those companies that keep their money offshore. We all should be in this together. If we don’t look out for each other, we’re screwed.

There are other questions, such as, should we be rebuilding in the “bathtub” parts of Houston or Florida? Should we continue allowing coastal homeowners access to federal flood insurance when they tap into it every few years? Maybe we shouldn’t build on waterfront. The NYT had a piece about St. Augustine, FL. They routinely have sunny day flooding caused by rising sea water. What do we need to do to protect historic sites like St. Augustine? Should we protect them?

Can we even ask these questions? Can we agree to do a study? Views differ. But the truth doesn’t travel far in America, because the truth hurts. So, we never ask the big questions, or seek answers to them. We just occasionally donate a little to the disaster of the moment in order to feel a little better.

How can we keep America great if we fail to fund the recovery from disasters? A temporary tax on everyone is the best answer to what just happened in the South.

Here are the Talking Heads with “Once in a Lifetime” from their 1980 album, “Remain In Light”:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I1wg1DNHbNU

Those who read the Wrongologist in email can view the video here.

Takeaway lyric:

Letting the days go by, let the water hold me down
Letting the days go by, water flowing underground
Into the blue again after the money’s gone
Once in a lifetime, water flowing underground

And you may ask yourself
What is that beautiful house?
And you may ask yourself
Where does that highway go to?
And you may ask yourself
Am I right? Am I wrong?
And you may say to yourself, “My God! What have I done?”

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Commission on Election Integrity Hears a Whopper

The Daily Escape:

DUMBO, NYC – photo by Kelly Kopp

President Donald Trump’s Presidential Advisory Commission on Election Integrity met Tuesday in New Hampshire, amid controversy generated by its vice chairman Kansas Secretary of State Kris Kobach’s unproven contention that illegal voting in NH swung the state’s US Senate and presidential elections in November 2016.

There is no evidence to support Kobach’s position, and there was no one bussed in from Massachusetts to vote in NH, as Donald Trump contended.

Clearly, the commission wants to make it as difficult as possible for certain Americans, in particular, poor, elderly, and young Americans to be able to vote without overcoming the kinds of hurdles we haven’t seen since the Jim Crow era.

Curiously, the commission will hear a proposal requiring a background check before a person can register to vote, using the same check as gun buyers.

John Lott, the president of the Pennsylvania-based Crime Prevention Research Center, and a Fox commentator, will present the concept during the meeting. Lott’s PowerPoint presentation, which was posted on the White House’s website in advance, would check for criminal history as well as immigration status. According to Lott, this would allow authorities to “check if the right people are voting”.

Lott, who published a book called “The War on Guns: Arming Yourself Against Gun Control Lies,” said that Democrats have praised using background checks for guns, and suggested they couldn’t oppose using the same system for voting when it’s already up and running.

Lott told the WaPo that Democrats have long said that the federal background check system doesn’t infringe on people’s ability to own a gun, so they shouldn’t have a problem using it to combat voter fraud. He thinks it’s a cool “gotcha” idea for the GOP.

In politics, there is no easier gig than pitching an idea to the shrinking GOP Base.

It’s an argument made by a guy who thinks the background check system doesn’t work. According to WaPo, Lott has repeatedly criticized the background check system as ineffective, arguing, that it “only makes life easier for criminals” and that the background check databases are “rife with errors.”

 WaPo quotes Adam Winkler, a constitutional law specialist at UCLA: (brackets by the Wrongologist)

The [Lott’s] idea is “patently absurd”…Given the previous criticism of the background check system by John Lott, and the fact that the structure of voting regulation is entirely different than the regulation of guns, it’s hard to believe this is a serious proposal.

WaPo also quotes Justin Levitt of Loyola Law School, who said that the selection of presenters at Tuesday’s commission meeting:

Seems to mirror the selection of commissioners — this is not the group you’d assemble if you were serious about real research into real solutions to real problems with the voting system.

Kristen Clarke of the Lawyers’ Committee for Civil Rights Under Law told NPR:

It’s a commission that is about promoting this false and dangerous narrative that vote fraud is something that’s widespread across our country, and we know that that’s just not the case.

The object of the exercise by Mike Pence, the commission’s chair and Kris Kobach the vice chair, is to make registering to vote difficult, exactly the opposite of what a democracy should support.

And they talk like these are reasonable proposals, put forth by responsible people.

The reality is that they are framing an argument that our elections cannot be trusted. And in the background, Pence, Kobach and company will come up with policies that exclude many Americans who otherwise would have the right to vote.

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Trump Nominates More For Federal Judgeships

The Daily Escape:

Road in Chongqing, China – photo by Reuters

We have been watching Trump clap Pelosi and Schumer on the back, as Democrats declared victory. But in background, the administration was busy announcing their seventh Wave of Judicial Candidates, including three appellate judge nominations, and 13 district court appointments. All are to vacant judgeships.

These are lifetime appointments, and most will serve long past Trump’s tenure as President. Business Insider quotes Sen. Chris Coons (D-DE):

This will be the single most important legacy of the Trump administration….They will quickly be able to put judges on circuit courts all over the country, district courts all over the country, that will, given their youth and conservatism, will have a significant impact on the shape and trajectory of American law for decades.

Coons went on to say these appointments will lead to “a wholesale change among the federal judiciary.”

Part of the reason Trump’s been able to nominate so many federal judges is that an unusually large number of these positions were unfilled. From Business Insider:

The furious pace of nominations come as Trump faces an impressive number of vacancies to fill. As of [July 27], the federal bench had 136 vacancies
. In August 2009, Obama faced 85 vacancies on the federal bench.

It is possible to attribute the big discrepancy in vacancies to obstruction by Senate Republicans during the last few years of the Obama administration.

Democratic senators have started using a 100-year old procedure to block some Trump nominees. This process is called the “blue slip”. Since 1917, the Senate has followed a process whereby a state’s senators traditionally must return a blue slip of paper, endorsing any federal judicial nominee from their home state, in order for the nomination to proceed. If the senator fails to return the blue slip, or does so with some indication of disapproval, the nomination may be delayed, or possibly, blocked.

This system is old, but it isn’t absolute. Some Senate Judiciary Committee chairs won’t schedule hearings without receiving positive blue slips, while others think they do not necessarily disqualify a nominee. In recent years, the blue slip has given individual senators virtual veto-power over a federal judicial nomination, if the individual was from the state the senator represents.

Will this tradition continue? Last week, Sen. Al Franken (D-WI) did not return a blue slip for David Stras, a nominee from for an open spot on the US Court of Appeals for the Eighth Circuit.

Politico quoted Franken:

 Justice Stras’s professional background and record strongly suggest that, if confirmed, he would…reliably rule in favor of powerful corporate interests over working people, and that he would place a high bar before plaintiffs seeking justice at work, at school, and at the ballot box… I fear that Justice Stras’s views and philosophy would…steer the already conservative Eighth Circuit even further to the right.

Later, Senators Ron Wyden (D-OR) and Jeff Merkley (D-OR) wouldn’t return blue slips for Ryan Bounds, a nominee for a seat on the US Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit, because they will not green-light any candidate that had not been previously approved by the state’s bipartisan judicial selection committee. More from Politico:

Unfortunately, it is now apparent that you never intended to allow our longstanding process to play out…Disregarding this Oregon tradition returns us to the days of nepotism and patronage that harmed our courts and placed unfit judges on the bench…

So, will Republicans end the blue slip process? Sen. Charles Grassley (R-IW), chair of the Senate Judiciary Committee, reportedly thinks the blue slip process is less important for district court judgeships than for appellate positions.

But, nobody knows if Grassley will schedule hearings on appellate court nominees who do not secure blue slip approval. Republicans have majority control of the Senate and could confirm judges even over strenuous Democratic objections.

OTOH, tradition is strong. While the denial of a blue slip does not legally restrict a judge from being approved, Business Insider reports that:

No circuit court nominees have been confirmed over objection of one (or two) home state senators — including under Obama.

Even if the blue slip process remains in place, Democrats aren’t in a position to stop more than a handful of Trump’s nominees. Most will probably soon be confirmed, since it is relatively easy to pick nominees that are not in a state with a Democratic senator.

Another example that elections matter.

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Monday Wake Up Call – September 11, 2017

The Daily Escape:

On September 8th 2017, a full moon passed through a test of the Tribute in Light at the National 911 Museum. By Gary Hershorn

Sixteen years post-9/11, we are mostly healed, but it was difficult to get here. Before 9/11, we had the luxury of dealing with one domestic disaster at a time: The San Francisco earthquake, the Chicago fire, the Galveston hurricane, Mt. St. Helens, and hurricanes Andrew and Sandy.

With the collapse of the twin towers, the Shanksville PA crash and the Pentagon attack, we had to find the ability to process the enormous shock and grief of three simultaneous events. That wasn’t easy, particularly since the media constantly reinforced the scale of the disaster, and how things would never be the same.

But most people grieved, and some helped those who were more afflicted. The government helped by shifting our focus to the foreign enemy who had committed these terrible acts.

Now on 9/11/2017, we have had two hurricanes back-to-back in the east, and have more than 100 wildfires are burning in the west. How do we process all of the shock and grief? Now our sole focus is on how to dig out, resume our lives, and rebuild. Where will the resilience come from?

And where will we find the money?

In retrospect, 9/11 helped to show us the way to heal when these unspeakable disasters happen. That’s a pretty thin smiley face on an awfully grim day in our history, but it’s true. Some healing began that very day, and time and distance from it is still (slowly) bringing people to a better place.

Some healing has yet to occur. Many still mourn family and friends who died on that day 16 years ago. Wrongo has adult children who worked in Manhattan at the time, who still will not ride the NYC subways.

The NPR show “Here and Now” had a brief segment with Rita Houston, the program director and an on-air personality for WFUV, Fordham University radio. They discussed the station’s most-requested songs on 9/11, and in the days and months afterward.

Surprisingly, the top tunes requested were those that referenced New York in a sentimental way. Mostly, they were songs that took listeners back to an earlier, more innocent time. Not many requests were for patriotic songs, or “pick us up by the bootstraps” messages. Rather, people wanted to hear songs of sweetness and emotion. Amazingly to Wrongo, the most requested song was Elton John’s “Mona Lisas and Mad Hatters” from his album “Honky ChĂąteau”, written in 1980.

But for music as a healer, the October 20, 2001 “Concert for New York” can’t be beat. It was a highly visible and early part of NYC’s healing process. It has been described as one part fundraiser, one part rock-n-roll festival, and one part Irish wake.

One of the many highlights of that 4+hour show was Billy Joel’s medley of “Miami 2017 (seen the lights go out on Broadway)” and his “New York State of Mind”. Joel wrote “Miami 2017 in 1975, at the height of the NYC fiscal crisis. It describes an apocalyptic fantasy of a ruined NY that got a new, emotional second life after he performed it during the Concert for New York. 

The concert brought a sense of human bonding in a time of duress. It isn’t hyperbole to say that the city began its psychological recovery that night in Madison Square Garden.

Joel now plays it frequently. Here he is with “Miami 2017” and “New York State of Mind” from the October, 2001 Concert for New York:

Those who read the Wrongologist in email can view the video here.

Most of the visible scars of 9/11 are gone, but America still lives in persistent fear. We fear Kim Jong-un and his missiles. We distrust Russia. We are afraid that ISIS will attack us on our streets.

We worry that our budget deficit will bankrupt us. We fear for our kids’ safety if they walk to school alone. We fear the mob outside our gates. We fear the immigrants already inside the gates.

So today’s wake up call is for America. We can never forget the heroes and the victims of 9/11, but we have to stop letting fear drive our actions.

Check out the audience reaction to Joel’s songs. That doesn’t look like fear, and that’s where we all need to be emotionally in 2017.

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Sunday Cartoon Blogging – September 10, 2017

Sending good wishes to people in the path of Hurricane Irma.

On to cartoons. GOP reacts to Trump’s political course change:

Some storms are unpredictable:

One possible reason behind the six month delay in ending DACA:

Kim’s real strategy:

(Christo Komarnitski is from Bulgaria)

China’s fees for the therapy sessions are yuuge:

Climate change requires concrete evidence:

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Saturday Soother – September 9, 2017

The Daily Escape:

Stepwell, Rahasthan India – photo by Victoria Lautman. Stepwells were carved to make it possible to bring water up from deep wells. Only about 250 stepwells remain.

Big week. Trump cozies up to Schumer and Pelosi, earning the enmity of Ryan and McConnell. Hurricane Irma slices through the Caribbean, and is making landfall in Florida as Wrongo writes this. The Wrong family offers its best wishes to those who are still in the path of the storm.

But, there is another storm brewing over at Equifax, who was nailed by a breach that could have essentially exposed everyone with a credit record in the US:

Equifax, a provider of consumer credit reports, said it experienced a data breach affecting as many as 143 million US people after criminals exploited a vulnerability on its website. The US population is about 324 million people, so that’s about 44% of its population.

Equifax said:

Criminals exploited a US website application vulnerability to gain access to certain files…

Probably yours, 143 million credit records were exposed. Equifax is offering free credit monitoring to anyone affected, but that’s a cheap make-good for compromising the credit information of almost everyone in the US with an Equifax credit file. That includes anybody who ever had a credit card, or completed a loan application in the past 25 years.

Needless to say, consider your identity compromised, and take steps before Equifax strikes again. If you’re wondering whether heads will roll at Equifax, don’t fret. It looks like they knew what was coming, and acted in their own self-interest:

Three Equifax Inc. senior executives sold shares worth almost $1.8 million in the days after the company discovered a security breach that may have compromised information on about 143 million U.S. consumers.

Equifax says that it discovered the intrusion on July 29.

Regulatory filings show that three days later, Chief Financial Officer John Gamble sold shares worth $946,374 and Joseph Loughran, president of US information solutions, exercised options to dispose of stock worth $584,099. Rodolfo Ploder, president of workforce solutions, sold $250,458 of stock on Aug. 2. None of these transactions were listed as part of 10b5-1 pre-scheduled trading plans, so they most likely were spur-of-the-moment.

In other words, these titans of capitalism knew for over a month, but didn’t tell anyone, and then sold shares before revealing the breach. BTW, Equifax’s stock crashed on the news. We used to call that insider trading, but we no longer expect corporate America to pay for its mistakes.

In a society that respected its laws, these guys would be already in jail. Not only have they hidden the attacks, giving people less time to react, but they have also sold their shares using privileged information.

The corporate rats always jump ship before the boat sinks.

In honor of Hurricane Irma, and to help those who have boarded up, filled the tank and moved out, we have two pieces of music today. For the fans of popular music, here is “Ridin’ The Storm Out”, from the 1973 album of the same name, by REO Speedwagon:

Takeaway Lyric:
The wind outside is frightening

But it’s kinder than the lightning

Life in the city it’s a hard life to live

But it gives back what you give

Those who read the Wrongologist in email can view the video here.

And for those who wish to be contemplative while experiencing the devastation, or awaiting news of it, grab a hot steaming cup of Georgio’s Colombia Pink Bourbon Los Cedrol coffee. Now, put on your headphones, and listen to Rossini’s “La Tempesta – VI Sonata a quattro in D major” for two violins, violoncello and double bass. Rossini wrote this in 1804, when he was 12 years old. Go ahead, eat your heart out, you’re unlikely to be that good, ever. This version is performed by Orchestra Atalanta Fugiens, conducted by Vanni Moretto:

 

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America’s Negotiations With North Korea are Similar to Israel’s With Palestine

The Daily Escape:

Lake Waramaug, Litchfield County CT. It is the second largest natural lake in the state.

Our problems with North Korea (NK), and the impossible negotiating position we have with them, brings to mind Israel’s relationship with Palestine. Both NK and Palestine:

  • Had their borders drawn by other powers after WWII
  • Had been invaded many times by their neighbors
  • And they have fought wars with them ever since
  • Are anti-US, and anti-Israel
  • Are allies
  • Have a large benefactor that props them up economically. Iran in the case of the Palestinians, and China in the case of NK

And both countries appear unwilling to negotiate with their sworn enemies towards a peaceful solution. We officially ended the Korean War in 1953. The parties to the Armistice tried to negotiate a withdrawal of foreign forces from the peninsula and settle the question of who would rule a reunited Korea. Talks took place in 1954, but broke down over how to hold fair elections for a unified government.

The Armistice specified that no new weapons would be introduced on the peninsula, but in 1957, the US informed NK that it would no longer abide by that part of the Armistice agreement. In January 1958, the US deployed nuclear missiles capable of reaching Moscow and Beijing, in South Korea.

We kept them there until 1991, and tried to reintroduce them in 2013, but South Korea refused. NK conducted its first underground nuclear test in 2006.

NK has very close relationships with many Arab countries. From the Diplomat:

North Korea…actively supported Arab countries in their military operations against Israel. During the 1973 Yom Kippur War…North Korean pilots staffed Egyptian MIG-21s…During the 1980s, North Korea shifted [to] arms…sales to Israel’s enemies in the Middle East. The DPRK exported missiles to Iran, Syria, and Libya and assisted both Syria and Iran in their attempts to develop nuclear weapon capabilities.

NK’s relations with the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO) began in 1966. NK today recognizes the sovereignty of Palestine over all territory held by Israel, except the Golan Heights, which NK considers Syrian Territory. The Diplomat says that NK helped Hezbollah build underground tunnels in Lebanon.

Quartz reports that NK helped Syria build a nuclear facility (that Israel destroyed in an air raid in 2007). In 2014, Syria asked NK to help monitor its presidential elections. In 2016, NK sent two units to fight in the Assad regime’s civil war.

Al-monitor reports that NK also cooperates closely with Iran. Israel believes that Iranian scientists were present at most of NK’s nuclear tests. Iran’s Shahab missiles were developed with the assistance of NK, and are based on the NK Nodong missile.

Where do we go from here? After 63 years, we have failed to successfully negotiate with NK. Even Steve Bannon gets it:

There’s no military solution [to North Korea’s nuclear threats], forget it…Until somebody solves the part of the equation that shows me that 10 million people in Seoul don’t die in the first 30 minutes from conventional weapons, I don’t know what you’re talking about, there’s no military solution here, they got us.

KAL’s cartoon captures the problem:

We are stuck in the moment, and we can’t get out of it, just like Israel and Palestine.

Our history with NK tells them that we are not trustworthy. Barack Obama replaced direct engagement with pressure tactics, called “strategic patience.” He also rejected negotiation with NK without a prior commitment to denuclearization.

And here we are. We won’t talk to them unless they give up the bomb. They already have the bomb, so they won’t be giving it up. We can’t move against them without huge damage to Japan and South Korea. Would we sacrifice either country to save the US homeland from a NK nuclear-tipped missile?

What should we do now? Will we accept the fact that NK is a nuclear power? Will we continue to rely on sanctions?

Would we commit to a no-first-strike policy that might reduce tensions with NK?

Would we agree to stop the provocative war games?

What will the Trump administration do to avoid nuclear war?

Nobody knows. Here is U2, live in Boston in 2001 with their Grammy-winning “Stuck in a Moment You Can’t Get Out Of” from their 2000 album, “All That You Can’t Leave Behind”:

As you sing along, remember the song was written to persuade someone that suicide wasn’t the answer.

Takeaway lyric:

You’ve got to get yourself together
You’ve got stuck in a moment
And now you can’t get out of it
Don’t say that later will be better


Now you’re stuck in a moment
And you can’t get out of it

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