Star Trek, U.S. Space Travel, and UFOs

I grew up with Star Trek. My favorites were The Next Generation and Deep Space 9. 

            Without going into detail, the main thrust of Star Trek, as envisioned by its creator Gene Roddenberry and his successors, is that Earth becomes politically unified after the Eugenics War and the Third World War (seven hundred million dead was the casualty toll mentioned in Star Trek: First Contact) and then forms an alliance with the Vulcans, which eventually evolves into the United Federation of Planets.  Starfleet serves as the Federation’s exploration and defense force.  All is well, at least within Federation territory, most of the time. 

            To put it mildly, this is unlikely. Set aside the technological miracles, such as warp drive and transporters, which were addressed in The Physics of Star Trek.  Politically speaking, a United Nations (or League of Nations, or some other name) with real political sovereignty -- not the current United Nations which is not a world government, but rather a forum for speechifying and obfuscation by national governments that are not interested in giving away their independence, preachy non-governmental organizations (NGOs), self-serving globalists, and the occasional virtue-signaling celebrity – is impossible.  Robert Heinlein noted in his speech to the 1973 graduating class of the U.S. Naval Academy that “the seeds of war are everywhere; the conflicts of interest are real and deep and will not be abolished by pious platitudes.”  It’s safe to say that this hasn’t changed.  And no, it’s not all the fault of the United States, or of President Trump.  The European nations have, to some extent, given up some sovereignty to the European Union – but note that the European Union excludes non-European countries. The members of the European Union are not about to give up their sovereignty to China or Russia or Turkey. 

            The United States started as a federation of sovereign states. Now, sovereignty is vested in the U.S. government. The states are allowed some autonomy, but that autonomy has decreased.  The current sharp-edged political conflict in the United States might be reduced if federalism was embraced again.  In other words, the federal government should be limited to national defense, foreign affairs, immigration, monetary policy, and interstate infrastructure. Everything else should be left to state and municipal governments. Each state and municipal government would find its own way to run its own affairs – which is the point.  Instead, many on the left, and some on the right, want the federal government to impose their vision on everyone else.  That is one reason why the political debate in the U.S. is so angry – each camp regards the other as a threat to its freedom and ideology. 

            If people in the United States can’t understand and accept federalism, even though it is designed into the U.S. Constitution, how could there be a world government, whether called the United Nations or something else? A world government would include countries which do not have a tradition of limited government, individual rights, and federalism – in other words, most countries.  The only real way of making a world government work would be if a) one country was able to totally subjugate all the others – a tough task, to say the least – or b), to have a federal republic in which national governments would be stripped of their armed forces but be allowed to order their own affairs within their own borders as much as possible.  Again, the problem of whose vision would rule would be paramount. Will it be the Western version – individual liberty, limited government, a mostly free market with some government oversight? Or will it be a theocracy, as would be wanted by many people of various religions?  Or will it be Communism, the current governing ideology of China and North Korea? 

            Star Trek and other science fiction has influenced and inspired real space travel – but not as much as might be hoped. Carl Sagan once noted that a senator (he did not say which one) told him that despite Star Trek and Star Wars, there was no significant public lobbying for major NASA projects. This might be because Star Trek and Star Wars show technology that is way too far ahead to be something that the public would lobby for. Most people will justifiably dismiss what is portrayed by both series as nothing that is likely to happen in their lifetimes, and will see little justification in NASA’s various space probes.  A TV series or movie which depicts something that is within human technical capacity now might lead to more public support for NASA. For example, one could create a sitcom about colonial life on the Moon or Mars – or a show about a crew mining the Asteroid Belt.  Instead of Star Trek: Deep Space 9, there could be a show about a space station in Earth orbit, with the crew members discussing stuff like the Van Allen belts, space or lunar mining, comets or asteroids that are coming close to Earth, or many other possibilities.  Or emphasize relationships – what if lovers break up on a confined environment such as a space station or domed colony?  I’m well aware that many good books, fiction and non-fiction alike, have been written about these topics, but the fact remains that many people prefer to watch rather than to read.   

            There is a lot out there – resources, energy, room for colonies great and small.  A few examples of good fiction describing this are Kim Stanley Robinson’s Mars trilogy, or Robert Heinlein’s Red Planet and The Rolling Stones.  It’s time to start turning that fiction into reality. It will take lots of money and effort; this money can be found through less intervention abroad, ending the war on drugs, streamlining the military procurement process so that we have more good-quality weapons systems instead of fewer gold-plated weapons systems that take too long to develop and produce, and having the federal government, as well as state and municipal governments, get out of the way and let people make their own economic decisions.  One of the great disappointments of modern times is that of the West turning inwards – focusing on cancel culture, political Itchy-and-Scratchy fights, foreign interventions – instead of turning outwards and getting back to the can-do spirit of the Apollo missions.  A nation that is currently living in fear of the coronavirus and is engaged in political witch hunts over not wearing masks in public or for having too many Thanksgiving guests is not a can-do nation.  If the United States does not make the most of space, China might – and the results would be dangerous to the United States and the West. 

            Beyond energy, resources, and geopolitics, there is one more reason to revive the moribund space program of the United States – to answer the age-old question of whether there is another intelligent species somewhere out there.  There has been a good deal of speculation about this, some of it sober, some of it ridiculous. I’ll try as much as possible to lean toward the sober side. 

            Let’s state the obvious – our galaxy is very large.  There are many stars, most of which are likely to have planets.  Some of these might harbor intelligent life.  Where are they?  Some say that aliens have visited Earth for a long time, and that aliens are responsible for helping or encouraging the building of various large ancient monuments.  Why aliens should go to the trouble of flying across the galaxy to teach technical primitives how to build monuments that would do nothing for the aliens has not been adequately explained.  No remnants of alien ground bases or satellites? Really?  More recently, there is the intriguing gun-camera footage from some U.S. Navy F/A-18 Hornets.  There have been various other reports.

In The Demon Haunted World, Dr. Carl Sagan also explored this question. He wondered why there were no reports of flying saucers prior to 1947, the year of the incident at Roswell in New Mexico.  (An episode of Star Trek: Deep Space 9 entitled “Little Green Men” offered its own explanation for what happened there.)  The answer, just possibly, is that nuclear weapons were developed in 1945.  It is possible to monitor a planet for nuclear weapons detonations – the United States has had such satellites since the 1960s. It might be possible for an alien culture to place such a probe sufficiently close to Earth to watch for nuclear weapons detonations, but far enough away so that the satellite would not be noticed by Earth-based radar or telescopes.  We must then ask how the probe would notify the species that left it there in a timely manner?  Radio waves move at the speed of light; sending a message to the nearest star system would take four years.  The Roswell incident happened two years after the first nuclear weapons detonation in July 1945.  That brings us back to science fiction – either the probe was able to report directly back to its creators, which implies a faster-than-light drive, or it was somehow able to send a message that moves faster than light. The Star Trek term is subspace radio. 

            But why these mysterious encounters, such as those reported by the U.S. Navy recently, and various others? If aliens want to send a message to Earth, why not simply contact the governments of Earth openly – say, by landing in front of the United Nations complex in New York City, or by taking over TV or radio broadcast frequencies?  One frequently proffered answer for this is that the aliens don’t want to cause panic on Earth.  (If people can be panicked by a coronavirus that is nowhere near as lethal as the bubonic plague, then maybe there’s something to this idea.)  This sounds suspiciously like the Prime Directive of Star Trek. Why aliens that evolved in a completely different environment and in different directions than humanity can be expected to obey a notion that hasn’t been obeyed by humans with each other has never been properly explained.  Some other answers are available here.

            Another answer is that these objects are not alien, but something created by a hostile foreign government.  There are two which might be capable of such a thing: Russia and China.  So why aren’t they openly dictating terms to the United States? Why, given the tensions between Russia and China and the United States, aren’t these craft completely wrecking the ability of the United States to fight, such as destroying military bases, power plants, communication centers, etc?  China and Russia certainly aren’t holding back out of any humanitarian consideration for the people of the United States.  These countries, as well as many others, would like nothing better than to see the United States trashed, its cities turned to rubble, its citizens reduced to poverty.  Yet it hasn’t happened.

            The question of whether UFOs are a creation of a hostile foreign government on Earth or an alien species is worth pursuing, if for no other reason that the various reported intrusions into U.S. and allied nations represent an invasion into the sovereignty of these nations.  So far, nothing major that cannot be ignored has happened, but these reported incidents point out both technical weaknesses (an inability to capture, shoot down, or otherwise determine the nature of these incidents), and an unwillingness by governments to discuss the matter openly for fear of appearing weak in front of their own citizens or other governments.  For more, click here and here.

            If there are aliens out there, they would certainly notice a serious attempt to exploit Earth’s solar system through mining and colonization of other worlds.  Perhaps that would inspire them to contact our species.  A real space program would give us opportunities for more monitoring of the galaxy – for example, a large radioastronomy array on the dark side of the moon (free from terrestrial radio interference), or the possibility of setting up a free-floating observatory on the edge of the Solar System to take advantage of gravitational lensing.  All of these monitoring systems could be used to look for evidence of alien life.

            The future won’t be Star Trek.  But it could be better than what we have now.  And there might really be someone out there.  Let’s get off our duffs and find out!

For further reading:

Carl Sagan, Pale Blue Dot

Carl Sagan, The Demon Haunted World

Jerry Pournelle, A Step Farther Out

UFO Data Project

Center for UFO Studies

Review of The Case for Space, by Robert Zubrin

            Robert Zubrin, founder of the Mars Society, and president of Pioneer Astro, wrote this excellent book about why space travel and exploitation need to be taken much more seriously.  He published this in 2019, when the United States was more stable; it seems unlikely that space travel can be taken seriously in the United States when the country is thought by many to be on the verge of civil war. 

That’s too bad, because going into space would solve many problems. Jobs would be created on Earth and in orbit, or even on Mars or in the Asteroid Belt. Planetary defense against incoming asteroids and meteors would become possible.  Zubrin goes into detail about how this would be done.  He gives technical descriptions on how mining the Moon and Mars would work, discusses the main problem of space access (cost of launch), and discusses the possibility of orbital solar power. Zubrin also explores different methods of propulsion, such as nuclear fission, nuclear fusion, plasma sails, laser sails, and antimatter. I appreciated Zubrin’s rigorous but understandable explanations about different sources of energy and different methods of propulsion.

            Zubrin also discusses whether humans going into space will meet space aliens.  It’s nice to read something sober but optimistic on the subject.  He cites recent discoveries of many extrasolar planets but pours cold water on the notion of alien invasions.  It is possible that there are other civilizations out there – there have been some tantalizing hints lately.  Space-based astronomy, both radio and visual, would make it easier to find out by listening in on frequencies likely to be used, or to be able to look at star systems which might have spacefaring civilizations.  (In Pale Blue Dot, Carl Sagan noted that an observatory in space near the edge of the Solar System would be able to take advantage of gravitational lensing for radioastronomy.)

            The most important matter that Zubrin discusses is the human need for a frontier. “Can a free, egalitarian, democratic, innovating society with a can-do spirit be preserved in the absence of room to grow?” he asks.  He describes the stagnation of the United States: the endless proliferation of laws and regulations, an out-of-touch bureaucracy, a reluctance to engage in major projects, the shallowness of pop culture, and the loss of national confidence.  Zubrin states that opening space will allow many different cultures to evolve and flourish on many different colonies in the Asteroid Belt, the Moon, Mars, and even in the Oort Cloud – a cloud of comets outside the Solar System.  The key points here are that the colonies will be far enough away from Earth so that governments and bureaucracies cannot easily interfere, and that there is enough space for many colonies, each with its own outlook, to be founded.

            He’s partly right. Different colonies on different worlds with different requirements will inevitably evolve different cultures.  People could move to colonies where they feel at home.  But they might not all be free, egalitarian, or democratic.  For example, a thriving dictatorship such as China might very well be able to set up a few colonies – and those will not be free.  We cannot expect that dictatorships will magically be transformed into democratic republics simply because space travel becomes cheaper.  Furthermore, the difference between the American frontier (or other frontiers on Earth) and the space frontier is this: no sophisticated equipment was needed. An American settler who did not like his surroundings could simply hit the trail. The air was free to breathe, the water was free to drink, the plants and animals were free to eat. None of this will be true on Mars or in the Asteroid Belt.  It’s hard to escape the colonial government when lots of sophisticated equipment is needed to do so. 

            Similarly, Zubrin believes that a major push into space would put an end to warfare. After all, many wars are fought over resources.  (For example, why fight over oil when fusion or orbital solar become the main providers of energy?  Why fight over rare earth elements when they are available in the Asteroid Belt?)  He’s right that the United States should spend more effort on space and less effort on foreign military adventures here on Earth.  However, resources aren’t the only reason for war.  Political, religious, and national conflicts wouldn’t magically disappear if more resources were available. Furthermore, resource wars might not end; it’s easy to imagine a war over who gets to mine an especially valuable asteroid, or over who gets to colonize a given part of the Moon or Mars.  Similarly, long-standing conflicts (such as who gets to control Jerusalem) will not be resolved by a major push into space.  Lastly, it seems unlikely that a major push into space will not solve the current racial and political splits in the United States.

            With all that said, however, Zubrin is right. Going into space would help a lot.  Establishing space colonies, either in orbit or in the Asteroid Belt or on Mars, would provide jobs, energy, knowledge, and physical resources – four of the keys to prosperity.  (The fifth is liberty.)  It would also provide different colonies with different cultures for people to choose from.  Providing these choices would serve as a safety valve to prevent conflict – go join those who look like you, think like you, or pray like you.  The United States had something like this once; it was called federalism. The idea was that the fifty states would be allowed great latitude to decide their own laws.  Nowadays, much more is decided by the federal government. Hence the bitter hatred and distrust between left and right – each fears that the other will use the power of the federal government against it.

This book is a needed dose of optimism in these pessimistic times.  Zubrin encourages us all to be space activists, whether through joining his Mars Society, or other groups, or lobbying your political representatives on your own. Better yet, don’t just write to your representatives – if you’re wealthy enough, offer a large campaign contribution to get them to take space more seriously. Politicians are always more interested in those than the knowledge and expansion that Dr. Zubrin advocates.  Let’s be cynical and say that buying off some politicians in exchange for a vastly improved space program might be a long-term bargain for our country.

The United States and Lebanon: Disturbing Parallels

The explosion in the port of Beirut on August 4, 2020, was certainly an eye-opener.  (USA Today’s collection of videos of the explosion from different angles is available here.)  Approximately 2750 tons of ammonium nitrate exploded.  The stuff had been hanging around in the port after being seized in 2013. The explosion obliterated 85% of Lebanon’s grain supply. 

The cause seems to have been corruption and negligence.  Despite multiple warnings from various officials, nobody bothered to move the ammonium nitrate out of the port, which is known as “The Cave of Ali Baba and the Forty Thieves.” Since the ammonium nitrate had been seized by the Lebanese government, there would have been nothing wrong with distributing it to Lebanese farmers to use as fertilizer, or selling the stuff to other countries. That would have provided some hard currency for Lebanon, which needs all the hard currency it can get thanks to the rapid inflation of the Lebanese pound, which was caused by – you guessed it – corruption and negligence. 

The economic crisis plus the explosion have put the Lebanese public in a string-‘em-up mood. There were protests before the explosion. Now there are more protests; a mob of protesters, including veterans of the Lebanese military, stormed the Lebanese Foreign Ministry before being expelled by Lebanese security forces.  If this goes on, people will believe they have nothing to lose – and those who believe they have nothing to lose are the most dangerous fighters. 

At first glance, there wouldn’t seem to be any parallels between the United States and Lebanon.  The United States is not dependent on grain imports; we have enough territory to feed ourselves and to export food worldwide.  And even if there was a large explosion at a U.S. port, there are many other major ports in the U.S. which could take up the slack. The tap water is safe (mostly), and the power is usually on 24-7.  Such is not the case in Lebanon.

Geography isn’t the problem here. Corruption exists, but it is not completely out of control the way it is in Lebanon.  Nor is sectarianism, which paralyzes Lebanon.  The Lebanese government apportions positions based on religion.  The Lebanese president must be a Maronite Christian; the Lebanese prime minister must be a Sunni Muslim, and the speaker of the Lebanese parliament must be a Shi’ite Muslim.  By contrast, Article VI of the U.S. Constitution forbids religious eligibility tests for public office. 

The problem in the United States is political paralysis.  The United States is not split on religious lines; the United States is split on racial and political lines.  Take the Covid-19 situation: If you wear a mask most of the time (even when driving by yourself in your own car!), you are probably a liberal. If you only wear it when you have to, you are probably a conservative.  If you voted for President Trump, you’re a racist; if you didn’t, you’re woke – the new way of being virtuous.  There is a noisy screaming match about whether hydroxychloroquine is, or is not, a cure for Covid-19.  (Free advice – eating healthy food and getting enough exercise and sleep will do a lot more to keep you healthy than waiting for a Covid-19 vaccine or waiting for the government and its corporate masters to make up their minds about hydroxychloroquine.)  People are impoverished because they are told that their jobs are “not essential” by overzealous state and local officials – just sit at home and collect “stimulus” checks that are funded by recklessly adding to the already huge national debt. (If stimulus checks are supposed to stimulate the economy, how can that happen with so many restrictions on what can be open?) People are even being encouraged to tattle on each other for running their own businesses.  Anyone who says anything which deviates from what is considered “woke” is branded racist, or sexist, or some other sort of –ist or –ism, and is mercilessly hounded and cancelled by zealous social justice warriors fighting the good fight via social media.

Meanwhile, the national debt grows, the dollar inflates (which makes it harder for people, especially those who were cynically and insultingly deemed “nonessential”, to buy anything), the roads are crappy, and the U.S. is absurdly vulnerable to a natural or artificial electromagnetic pulse.  Nothing has really been done to address this.  An electromagnetic pulse frying the infrastructure which all of us – gay or straight, religious or secular, liberal or conservative, woke or sleepy – depend on would require people to quickly learn to fend for themselves.

So is the United States like Lebanon?  Not quite, but there are some disturbing similarities. We have work to do. 

Open Letter to Los Angeles County Board of Supervisors

To the Los Angeles County Board of Supervisors:

It is time for you to end the lockdown.

The people of the County of Los Angeles (your constituents!) are not criminals for going to the beach, or going to parks, or hiking.  It seems to have escaped you and your colleagues that sunshine, fresh air, and exercise are a great way to prevent COVID-19, or any other virus such as the flu or the common cold.  Jogging around the neighborhood is not the same thing. 

The people of the County of Los Angeles (again, your constituents!) are not criminals for wanting to work. While I am an essential worker, many people I know are not considered essential. Their jobs and their livelihood are in danger.  Wealth can only be created through work. Government redistribution checks are not the same thing at all. Those can only be funded by drawing down on wealth that was already created, or by going into debt.  That is not sustainable. I don't know how you expect to address the homelessness crisis by telling people that they can't work.  Poverty is a public health problem as well, in case no one ever told you, and locking down the County is creating poverty by government fiat.

If you persist with the notion that only some people (such as yourselves) are essential workers, and if you persist with the notion that creating a police state and teaching people to live in fear is the proper way to respond to COVID-19, the people of the County of Los Angeles might decide at the next election that you aren't essential workers either.

Regards,

Michael Jabbra

An Open Letter to Governor Newsom of California

Governor Newsom:

It was with interest that I read of your roadmap and your plan to appoint a blue-ribbon panel to decide when to reopen the state.

Frankly, you don’t need all these people shuffling papers, speechifying, and grandstanding.  You just need to get on with opening the state.  You just need to get out of our way.  Let us work and live our lives as we see fit.  The California Dream that you pretend to favor cannot be created by forced obedience to stay-at-home-and-hide-under-the-bed orders.  It can only be created by all of us being free to work and live our lives as we see fit – not as you or other officials see fit.  Not everything can be done by telecommuting.  We are not criminals for hiking, or going to the beach, or working. I did not think that I would live to see people walking around with bandannas on their faces like desperadoes from a bad Wild West movie.

There is no such thing as zero risk, whether in regards to the coronavirus or anything else.  However, in the attempt to get to zero risk, it’s easy to get to zero freedom. That is where California and many other states are going – unless you end the lockdown now. 

Many Californians are out of a job right now.  That includes some of my friends. I don’t know how you think you can address homelessness without allowing people to work. Everyone must be allowed to go back to work and to visit family and friends, or enjoy California’s beautiful outdoors, without fear of being fined or imprisoned by law enforcement officers who are working at the behest of overzealous officials like you.  If the lockdown does not end, the people of California may decide at the next election that you do not need your current job either. 

Freedom is more important than safety.

Leave us alone.

Sincerely,

Michael Jabbra

Coronavirus Madness

It really took off. From Wuhan, China, to most of the world.  Thanks a bunch, People’s Republic of China!  People are fighting over toilet paper. Now every day is Black Friday, at least at grocery stores. Wonderful.  

It gets better.

Now Governor Newsom of my home state of California has imposed a lockdown, as have governors of some other states.  City mayors have done the same thing.  Small businesses of all types and their employees will suffer, while big corporations such as Amazon, Target, Walmart, and FedEx will laugh their way to the bank. 

I was greatly amused to read Los Angeles Mayor Eric Garcetti’s lockdown order and find that marijuana dispensaries are exempt.  In other words, I’m a criminal for wanting to get a haircut, and my barber is a criminal if she gives me one – she told me that if her shop remains open, it will be stripped of its business license.  But hey, if I want to toke up, the government is on board with it – as if going to a marijuana dispensary is magically lower risk than getting a haircut, or buying groceries or gasoline.  As a character in Kurt Schlichter’s hilarious dystopia parody People's Republic snarked, “Hey, they don’t ration booze or dope, at least not yet.  You want to see a freaking revolution, tell people they can’t drink or smoke.”

Mayor Garcetti certainly knows which side his bread is buttered on. 

Some cities and counties have closed their beaches, Los Angeles included. Spring breakers and other beach fans (like yours truly) “don’t seem to care about viruses,” whined Miami City Manager Jimmy Morales. Yay, municipal governments – keep people from doing something healthy such as getting exercise in fresh air and sunshine.  Instead, make people go back to hotels, dorms, and homes – close quarters where the evil coronavirus, as well as other diseases, are much more likely to spread.  If young people on spring break are getting the coronavirus, it has more to do with bad habits such as too much partying, too much booze, and not enough sleep – as if this is anything new for young people.  The only way to keep young people (or the rest of us) from enjoying themselves is to resort to China’s brand of tyranny.  Sadly, it seems that many public officials here in the United States regard the People’s Republic of China not as an existential threat to the United States, but rather as a role model. Gotta monitor and control those darn citizens – how dare they make their own decisions without some politican or bureaucrat telling them what to do!

Even more dishonest is the notion that the coronavirus can be spread through handling cash.  In other words, use something that governments, advertisers, and others can use to spy on you – your credit card and various online systems.  Going to a totally cashless society would also allow money-hungry governments to implement negative interest rates, which punish people for saving money.  (This just happened – briefly – in the United States.) Oh yes, credit cards might spread coronavirus as well.  Furthermore, cashless payment systems are computerized and vulnerable to cyberattack or just plain power failures.  I guess none of this occurred to the anti-cash crowd. I’ll keep on using cash; I can always wash my hands!

Some good might come of the coronavirus madness: First, people who have suddenly been sent home to telecommute may not want to go back to the office. If you can work from home (and yes, we must all guard against the temptation to do house chores or goof off while working from home), why put up with the aggravation of a commute?  To be fair, that isn’t possible for every job, but it is time for telecommuting to be taken much more seriously.  Old-time managers who are used to having people in one location to boss around need to get with the program.  Less traffic, less pollution from vehicles, lower demand and thus lower prices for gasoline – what’s not to like?

Secondly, now that people have stood in line and fought for a year’s supply of toilet paper, they may discover the virtues of being prepared for pandemics or other disasters before they happen so that there is no need for long lines and fights over toilet paper or other supplies.   Folks, we’re all lucky if government does the heavy lifting such as law enforcement and national defense and maintaining infrastructure. The rest is up to us.

Last, it is time to encourage more manufacturing of medicines and masks, as well as other defense-critical items, here in the United States.  President Trump recently invoked the 1950 Defense Production Act to make this happen. Well done, Mr. President. The lack of U.S. manufacturing of such items is dangerous.  Suppose China decides to wait until the coronavirus gets worse in the United States and then embargoes medicines and masks?  If that does happen, let us all hope that the advocates of outsourcing are the first to get sick. 

The coronavirus is real.  People have died of it.  I do not deny its existence.

But it’s not the coronavirus which will bring us down.  It’s the hysteria, fanned by politicians who want to use this opportunity to attack the U.S. Constitution – see here and here.  The enemies of freedom are everywhere, like fleas and rats, and crises are when they are most likely to pop out of the woodwork.  They respond to public hysteria by cracking down on freedom, or by pushing their pet agendas.  Once freedom is lost, it is hard to regain.

This hysteria must stop.  Really, it isn’t that bad. Take a look around:

The aircraft are still flying.

The lights are still on.

The water is still flowing.

The trucks are still rolling. 

The Internet is still alive and well, so that we can telecommute, download funny videos, post our blogs, and proposition and slander each other.  (The Internet has something for everybody!) 

Our industrial infrastructure and our farms are still intact.  The food and goods that we all need will still come through, even if it’s not as fast as we’re used to.  (Waiting an extra day or two for an online order – horrors!!)

We are still a sovereign nation, unoccupied, unconquered, and unbowed.

And the key to defeating the coronavirus is in our hands. We do not need to wait for government to help us. Nor does clamping down on freedom of movement and freedom of association. We don’t need that kind of despotic “help”.

All we have to do is the same stuff that we do to prevent colds and regular influenza, aka the flu:  Wash hands often, eat a healthy diet, get some exercise, sunshine, and fresh air, and get enough sleep.  That will help a lot! 

With apologies to Prime Minister Winston Churchill: “Let us therefore brace ourselves to our duties, and so bear ourselves that if the American Empire and its Commonwealth last a thousand years, men will still say ‘This was their finest hour’.” 

Frankly, I prefer the advice of that old British lion to that of the doomsters in politics and in lamestream media and social media alike.  

We will get through this! 

An Open Letter to President Trump

Mr. President, you want to Make America Great Again. Frankly, I agree. There’s a lot that needs to be done: eliminate the national debt, fix our infrastructure, improve space access, be ready for trouble with hostile nations, and most importantly, restore the trust of American citizens in each other and in our government.

There is one action you can take which will go a long way to addressing these problems: End the war on drugs. 

The war on drugs, inaugurated by President Nixon, has been a colossal failure. Despite billions of dollars wasted (various estimates here and here) and increased mass surveillance, both of which fly in the face of the principle of limited government which you and the Republican Party claim to support, drugs are still being produced and imported because people want them.  I’m not one of those people; I simply recognize that government cannot eliminate the demand for drugs, or alcohol, or commercial sex, or anything else.  The key lesson from the Prohibition era is that attempting to eliminate the demand by interdicting the supply just drives the supply underground – into the hands of violent criminals.  This does not serve public safety or national security. It undermines both.  Ending the war on drugs would go a long way to achieving one of your stated goals: ending illegal immigration. The chaos and violence caused by the drug war is a major driver of illegal immigration.  Ending the war on drugs will go a long way to restoring peace in Latin America.

Why should law enforcement officers – brave people that I was privileged to serve with in a civilian capacity for about six years – be made to risk their lives for attempting to squash demand for something that people want? 

Much is made about minorities (aka nonwhites) being arrested in disproportionate numbers for drug possession, sale, or distribution.  Ending the drug war would take a major talking point away from the Democratic Party – and you need every vote you can get.  Some people who are Democrats because they believe that the war on drugs is a Republican concept designed to harm them might decide to #WalkAway. Ending the war on drugs would also return the Republican Party to the concept of limited government.   

Mr. President, it is time for you to strike a blow for limited government. It is time for you to drain the swamp. End the drug war. Call for the legalization of all drugs today – not just marijuana.  If shutting down the DEA and other drug interdiction agencies (state and local as well) becomes a political problem because people don’t want to lose their jobs, offer those displaced employees first crack at jobs in other law enforcement agencies or a “golden handshake” retirement package.  Let drug use be regulated by state and local governments.  Instead of wasting money on interdiction, let local and state governments, as well as the federal government, make money on drugs through modest taxation.  Money that is no longer wasted on the fool’s errand of drug interdiction can be used to pay down the national debt, fix our infrastructure, and improve our security.  Call a summit of the Latin American heads of state and ask them to get on board with legalization; I’m sure most of them would be delighted to agree to a bold new initiative from you that would help their countries.  That would be a message that your opponents here could not ignore. 

Thank you, Mr. President.

Regards,

Michael Jabbra

New Year's Resolutions for Uncle Sam

Many people like to make New Year’s resolutions for themselves. Sometimes it’s diet; sometimes it’s about money; sometimes it’s about changing some aspect of personality or personal conduct.

I think it’s high time our government did the same thing. 

So, Uncle Sam, listen up. Here are some resolutions for you.

·         Pay down that damn national debt. $23 trillion, and the resulting $574 billion per year interest, is as mind-boggling as it is unsustainable.  This problem for the government is just like that of individuals – wanting to have it all, without having to pay anything or make tough choices.  That won’t work.  Unfortunately, the Democrats don’t want to cut any civilian spending, and the Republicans don’t want to cut any military or law enforcement spending.  So they compromise by voting for each other’s unlimited spending programs.  This must stop.  Uncle Sam, you can either stop this on your own by making the tough choices, or your citizens and foreign governments might lose confidence and stop using your dollars. The next step would be someone else, such as the United Nations or the International Monetary Fund or the World Bank making the choices for you.  You won’t like that at all.  Cut up your credit card before someone else does it for you.

·         Clean up the military procurement process. Right now, Uncle Sam, you’re like a boxer with a beer gut – you can throw a formidable punch, but that beer gut is slowing you down a lot.  It really shouldn’t take decades to field new weapons systems. It’s time to consider simpler and cheaper (and made in the United States as much as possible) weapons systems rather than gold-plated weapons systems that do more to enrich military contractors rather than to win wars. Pay more attention to defending the United States rather than foreign adventures which usually cost much more blood and treasure than they are worth. For more, click here and here.

·         It’s time for a really serious space program -- not just military surveillance or communication satellites. Bring back the spirit of Apollo.  Return to the Moon. Go to Mars. Start mining the Asteroid Belt.  The Space Force is a good step in this direction – make sure that it’s not strangled by government and corporate status-quo types.  The good news is that space ventures are being handled more and more by the private sector.  Space mining won’t pollute Earth’s environment, and will provide jobs.  Uncle Sam, if you don’t get out to the High Frontier, someone else will seize control of it – and you won’t like that. For much more on this, read A Step Farther Out, The Case for Space, or Pale Blue Dot.  Spacefaring America is a good read too.

·         Return to your roots of limited government and federalism.  Throw out a lot of laws, most of which were passed before big data, smartphones, and the Internet. You’ve changed a lot; you can’t turn back the clock.  Your old ways of doing things won’t work anymore; you need new ways.  Return as much power as possible to state and local governments. The point of federalism is to allow for state and local differences. Trying to make everything a federal matter is one reason why there is so much political hatred – each camp fears that the other will use the power of the federal government against it.  “Don’t make a federal case of it” was an old saying. Nowadays, you hardly hear that.  Less laws – less law enforcement – less prisons – less spending – less debt – more liberty. Sounds like a winner to me!

It’s a new year. There are lots of possibilities. Uncle Sam, it’s time for you to turn over a new leaf.

Review of The New Road to Serfdom, by Daniel Hannan

In these times of general dislike of the United States, both by foreigners and by many Americans, it's refreshing to read a book by a foreigner which points out some items that can be improved in the United States, but without snobbery and disdain.

Daniel Hannan is a British Member of the European Parliament (MEP). His esteem for the United States comes through on every page of this very readable book.

Daniel Hannan makes two main points: That we Americans don't realize how lucky we are to live here, and that we should not permit our government to become bloated and centralized like that of Europe.

He's right on both counts.  When you consider how bad many other countries are, for various, reasons, it is clear that we are lucky to be Americans. One of the reasons we are lucky is that the solution to the European problems he describes are here too.  Hannan explains why primary elections keep politicians closer to the people that they claim to represent. He explains how our Founding Fathers (all those darn heterosexual white males) provided a system which allowed great liberties, even if not everyone was eligible for those liberties from the beginning.

Hannan is at his best when denouncing those who only focus on American sins. "If we want to bring up slavery, we must refer also to the anti-slavery campaign, and to the huge price its adherents were prepared to pay, including death on the battlefield...If we want to discuss racism, we can hardly ignore the fact that in 2008, Americans elected a mixed-race president."

Nail on the head, Mr. Hannan.  Strangely, there are few voices in American academia or the American mainstream (lamestream) press who will say these things. Likewise, as Hannan points out, one is unlikely to find positive coverage like this in the European or other foreign press.

Hannan also discusses the growth of the size of the U.S. federal government. This is not an early twenty-first century phenomenon; the federal government has been growing in power since the Civil War. The various wars, as well as the Great Depression and the more recent Great Recession, have all done their part to make the federal government more bloated, more distant, and less interested in liberty. Hannan points at quasi-autonomous non-governmental organizations (quangos) in the United Kingdom and in Europe; here in the United States, we are saddled with the various regulatory bodies to whom Congress has outsourced much of its work.

Diversity, in modern liberal use, has come to mean skin color and sexual preference. However, within certain limits, the Constitution's embrace of federalism permits great diversity of government and of lifestyle. Want to live in a very regulated area? Find a major metropolis in New York, California, Washington, or Oregon. Want to be left alone? Find a rural area. Want to live a Protestant Christian lifestyle and be surrounded by those who do? Try the Bible Belt. More importantly, federalism allows states and cities to try their own programs and to learn from each other. Taking that away through more and more federal control will stifle that learning, which is hugely important in these times of rapid technological and social change.

Part of the political anger in the United States can be traced to the fact that many on the left, and some on the right, have chosen to ignore federalism. Abortion is a prime example. To lower the political temperature, shrieking feminists in California and New York will have to realize that abortion is regarded with horror in the Bible Belt; conversely, hellfire-and-damnation preachers and their followers in the Bible Belt will have to realize that abortion is regarded as the cat's pajamas in California and New York.  Because each side wants to impose its vision on the other nationwide, we end up with spectacles such as the screaming protesters barging into Congress to stop the nomination of Supreme Court Justice Kavanagh.  Hannan, unlike the bureaucrats and quangocrats of Europe and the United Kingdom (and their admirers in American academia) gets this; an entire chapter of Hannan's book is devoted to what he calls "the retreat from federalism."

Hannan's examination of the undemocratic nature of the European Union ("A Tale of Two Unions") is also well worth reading.  Hannan starts by contrasting the sizes of the U.S. Constitution and the European Constitution, and notes that the U.S. Constitution"is mainly about the liberty of the individual. The EU Constitution is mainly about the power of the state." Hannan is right to note that the U.S. Constitution was written at a time when there was "maximum emphasis on the freedom of the citizen." By contrast, the European Union was designed to tie governments together so that there would be no repeat of the World Wars. Individual opinion was, and is, regarded as an annoyance by the European governing elite. Hence Brexit and the gilets jaunes (yellow jackets) riots in France.

American democracy works, said Hannan. Despite the differences between the U.S. and the European Union, I wish I could share his optimism. Big business and big government are frequently in bed with each other, to the detriment of individuals.  Homelessness is completely out of control on the West Coast.  Upward social mobility, though not gone entirely, is more difficult than it was for previous generations. The national debt is at $22 trillion and rising, and the U.S. government is contemplating the issue of 100 year bonds, just like that other paragon of fiscal discipline and political stability: Argentina. Does anyone, left or right, really want all of this? I hope not!

I believe that this sorry state of affairs exists because any attempt to put it right would trample upon the political identity of many people at a time when political identity is becoming the most important form of identity for Americans.  The national debt offers a good example. Want to reduce the national debt? The best way to do this is for the federal government to stop spending like a horde of crack addicts.  So what to cut? Social spending? Watch Democrats scream bloody murder. Military spending? Watch Republicans scream bloody murder. For my take on military spending, click here.   

Daniel Hannan writes in a very readable style, unlike the government bureaucrats and politicians that he skewers in this book.  I recommend Hannan's book to everyone, especially those who, like me, are losing faith in the ability of government to function, and losing faith in the value of most government agencies.

74th Anniversary of V-J Day – A National Defense Retrospective

It’s been 74 years and one week since Imperial Japan threw in the towel and ended the most destructive war in human history. 

Since then, the West has glorified those days. Politicians in the United States love to pontificate about how we’re number 1 – as if international politics and national defense are nothing more than some inconsequential sports game. 

However, platitudes don’t stop adversaries.  Hard power and the brains and will power to use that power properly are what stops adversaries, either through deterrence or through the use of that power to so thoroughly whip that adversary that it is unable to pose a threat to the United States.

Uncle Sam has been falling down a lot on the hard power and will power factors lately. Let’s have a look.  Many people have written full-length books; this is only a blog post, so I won’t be able to cover everything.

The proposed fiscal year (FY) 2019 military budget is $686 billion dollars – which fits the definition of money attributed to Senator Everett Dirksen. What are we getting for all of this?  

Let’s look at gold plated weapons systems: The U.S. Navy’s newest aircraft carrier, the USS Gerald Ford, cost $13 billion -- $2.4 billion over budget. An F-35 JSF costs $95 million apiece – staggering, but at least an improvement over the initial cost for the first few aircraft of $297 million apiece.  Why must these cost so much and take so long to bring to the battlefront?

Yes, modern weapons systems are more technologically advanced than older systems.  That’s part of it. There’s also a learning curve in building cutting-edge technology.  There will, inevitably, be mistakes and failures.  But why did it take only four years to bring the mighty USS Iowa from design to deployment and yet it takes modern weapons over a decade to go from design to deployment? Is this difference really caused by working out bugs in high technology, or does it have more to do with lots more red tape, laws and lawyers, frequent design adjustments, and choosing contractors and subcontractors with an eye toward keeping politicians happy rather than rapid production?

It is also time to acknowledge that national security is not just guns, tanks, and warships.  Population growth is a big destabilizing influence in many countries, and that inevitably affects the U.S. or U.S. allies.  One tank’s worth of contraceptives may, in the long run, make the U.S. more secure than an entire armored division.  After all, you don’t have to deter or fight or arrest someone who isn’t born. 

Why isn’t the U.S. doing this? I say it’s a toxic mix of pork-barrel politics and religion. That is, politicians would rather bring a multimillion dollar defense contract that will last several years to their constituents than making contraceptives available to foreigners. After all, those aren’t as flashy and don’t take as long to manufacture.  In addition, many religious people and leaders have a hang-up about contraceptives, because they might (gasp!!) lead to sex between people who aren’t married – as if this never happens in the absence of contraceptives. I ask religious people the following question: if your God hasn’t stopped war and crime and corruption, why do you think your God will object to contraceptives?

One last thing to point out about gold-plated weapons systems: they’re mostly offensive. That is, they are designed to destroy the other side’s warships, tanks, bases, and other infrastructure. However, national defense is also about the home front.  On that, we are failing too. 

Let’s start with infrastructure at home. Everyone, whether regular citizens or government agencies or the big defense contractors depend on regular power, utilities, and telecoms.  A team of hackers, whether nation-state varsity or criminal groups, can wreak the kind of havoc that previously was only possible through sabotage or all-out ground or air attack.  Security breaches, whether in the private sector or in government, are as frequent as traffic collisions in major cities.  Perhaps it’s time for more cybersecurity and less gold plated weapons systems. Helpful hint for policymakers and corporate executives: Better cybersecurity means that the gold-plated weapons systems will be more survivable on the battlefield, because it would be harder to steal the plans of those weapons systems.

Next, specifically military infrastructure.  Bases were closed with great enthusiasm at the end of the Cold War.  In some cases, this may have been justified; for example, a moth-eaten old base with decrepit infrastructure left over from the World Wars may not have been necessary any longer.  However, closing bases with too much enthusiasm means that our eggs will be concentrated in fewer baskets.

Here we come to the conflict of the accountants and the MBAs versus the generals and logisticians.  The accountants and the MBAs think only of cutting costs, especially labor costs – the sort of attitude regularly lampooned by Scott Adams.  These people take healthy infrastructure for granted. They can’t be bothered to give any thought to the need for redundancy, for backup, for resilience. It does not cross their minds that the continental U.S. may be threatened, either by hostile powers or by the forces of nature.  Generals and logisticians, on the contrary, must think in those terms – or lose a battle or a war.  It is, perhaps, time to have more medium-size bases, each with tight security, anti-aircraft and anti-missile point defenses, and plenty of fuel, ammunition, water, food, and other supplies on hand, instead of fewer large, sprawling bases.  Having more bases isn’t for creating employment or allowing politicians to buy votes at public expense.  It’s about resilience.  It’s better to have an asset and not need it than to need it and not have it. Neither nature nor enemies of the United States are forgiving. 

When the U.S. itself is threatened, it is not enough to look to the military.  The people must also be involved. This can range from encouraging basic household preparedness to community training to armed, trained home defense forces.  Traditionally, military and disaster planners tend, with some justification, to regard the public they have to assist as fairly useless. Many people are physically unfit, not always through any fault of their own, and many people seem not to have thought about preparedness at all.  However, Reginald Bretnor pointed out in his essay “Fear and Survival” (available in There Will Be War, Volume IX) that if the United States had a citizen-soldier program equivalent to that of Switzerland, it would be possible to mobilize twenty million armed, trained personnel – more than the twelve million which were the peak of the U.S. armed forces during World War II.  As Bretnor pointed out, this would make the United States much more resilient against attacks or natural disasters.  The common experience of training and the empowering effect of learning how to handle trouble might help to reduce some of the present-day political and racial anger.

Why hasn’t this happened? First, again, there is the addiction to gold-plated weapons systems and foreign adventures. Second, there is a good deal of distrust of the idea of the citizen-soldier.  The Second Amendment of the U.S. Constitution, which protects the right to keep and bear arms, is, to put it mildly, frowned upon by many. For some, the right to bear arms is bad because of the various mass shootings that have occurred; for some in government, the right to bear arms is bad because it makes it harder to control the citizenry.  While the U.S. political system is predicated on distrust of government – hence checks and balances and federalism – a lack of trust between government and people makes it harder for the U.S. to be ready for trouble at home.  When the 2018 National Defense Strategy Summary states that the U.S. homeland is no longer a sanctuary, then it’s time to prepare and mobilize the population.  Invaders or rioters will be stopped by guns, not by candlelight vigils.

National defense is also about financial strength. It’s hard to be strong when you’re the world’s biggest debtor. Weapons, logistics, personnel, infrastructure, energy – all of this costs a lot of money.  In World War II, the U.S. was the world’s biggest creditor.  That happy state of affairs continued for a while afterwards, mainly because the U.S. industrial base remained intact while that of other countries had been devastated.  That is no longer true. Not only do other countries, including hostile ones such as China, have their own industrial bases, it is also easier to outsource work that was once done in the U.S. to other countries.  All of this makes the U.S. economy weaker.  There has been talk recently of the U.S. buying Greenland from Denmark, but how will the U.S. afford this with a $22 trillion national debt? Maybe this is why the U.S. Treasury Department has been talking about issuing 100 year bonds – just like Argentina, that other paragon of fiscal discipline.

The United States can only be strong as long as the U.S. dollar remains the de facto world currency – and doing that requires a strong economy.  Free advice for policymakers: Prosperity comes from cheap energy and freedom, not from financial gimmicks such as quantitative easing.  Freedom to set up businesses, small and large, and energy to power them, and selling physical products, not just services, are the key to prosperity.  “Woe unto the nation that does not weave what it wears, nor plant what it eats, nor press the wine that it drinks,” warned Kahlil Gibran.  If other countries stop needing the U.S. so much, and stop buying so much U.S. debt, then interest rates will go up and that $22 trillion national debt will suddenly weigh a lot more on the U.S. economy.  This is beginning to happen:  Russia, China, and the European Union are making various efforts to set up their own financial links and their own deals so as not to have to go through the U.S. financial infrastructure.  The private sector is also charging ahead with new ways to create and transfer money that will leave legacy banks and plodding government bureaucracies in the dust.  Economic and military strength are closely linked. Lose too much of one, and pretty soon the other will be lost too. That’s why Admiral Michael Mullen, when he was the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, warned that the national debt was one of the biggest threats to U.S. national security.  It’s disappointing but not surprising that many members of Congress noisily claim to revere the military but didn’t bother taking the national security advice of a senior military officer. 

Lastly, in World War II there was more national unity.  To be sure, it wasn’t perfect (Jim Crow). There was more trust in government; that started to go down during the 1960s and has not come back up.  More importantly, people trusted each other more.  These days, political polarization, fueled in large part by social media, have made any kind of unity difficult to achieve. People move to be among those who share their political beliefs, which makes national political bargaining much more difficult.  Kahlil Gibran again: “Woe unto the nation in which each tribe regards itself as a nation.”  None of these problems can be solved by more military spending. 

So, how to clean all this up?  Sadly, the political paralysis caused by the current racial and political anger may make it impossible to clean up the defense procurement process, or to mobilize and prepare the population, or to really think outside the box by promoting more use of contraceptives in high-fertility countries. Nor will there be other outside the box thinking, such as not being so eager to get involved in the disputations of other countries, or in creating more trust between citizens and government – and saving money and manpower for real trouble – by ending the drug war.  The only solutions I can offer are for individuals to lobby for the solutions I outlined here, and to be prepared for trouble.