And now, for something different (or it should be)

 

A shortened version of a post I made in a different blog....

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The war with Iran has been going on for several months now, and what do we have gotten for it?  As I write this, we got 18 service members coming home in body bags, a depleted munitions stock, an aircraft carrier coming to port due to an under-supplied, emotionally exhausted crew, and hundreds of billions of dollars deeper in dept.  We did not get regime change in Iran.  We did not eliminate the potential nuclear threat Iran poses.  And we did not vanquish our "enemy".  Instead, we have shown that the US is a paper tiger, and that Iran has the power to shut off 20% of the world's oil supply.

If you ask our president, he'll say we're winning the war, and that the Strait of Hormuz is open for shipping.  Yet, he'll act like a little child when someone asks him a question which holds him to account for his mistakes.  His ego is so fragile, that by not admitting any of his failings, he is unable to learn from his mistakes.  As a result, he keeps doubling down on his lies, and no one trusts him anymore.  Yet, people are afraid of him due to his ability to rally members of his cult to attack his enemies.

America is now $40,000,000,000 in debt.  For the first time in history, we are now paying more in debt service than we pay for defense.  This can not last for long.  This president would cut social spending in order to preserve our war machine.  But what good would that do?  We can't even defeat an enemy like Iran.  Our military is not nimble.  We still act as if we need to fight the wars of the 20th century, instead of those we need to fight now.  Instead of retreating into 1940's military technology, as our president would do with our aircraft carriers, we should be at the forefront of 2020's military technology, as Ukraine has exhibited with its use of drone technology.

Unmanned vehicles (air, land, and sea) are the future of warfare, as they can enable militaries to fight wars while keeping their service members well behind the scenes in relative safety.  For those near the front lines of battle, they can provide the tools for defense that older, more expensive military tools and weapons can not provide.  Unmanned vehicles are cheaper and more effective than older military technology.  They have allowed Ukraine, a nation without a navy, to defeat the Russian navy and make it an almost useless asset.

Given the cost of proven drone technology vs. the cost of our overpriced military technology, I see a potential to kill several birds with one stone.  First, we can no longer afford to enforce a "Pax Americana" as we did for the second half of the 20th century.  So, let's wind it down to areas we can defend, and have other nations form healthy regional alliances for defense.  Second, let's take she savings from winding down the "Pax Americana" and do three things with it: (a) develop drone technology with Ukraine and build up stockpiles which both countries can use, (b) plug up holes in our social safety net (especially in healthcare, and (c) pay down our national debt.

The British empire fell because it couldn't afford to maintain it.  America is well on the same path to a similar national failure that could cripple us for generations.  And yet, our president's incompetency has given us an opportunity if we are wise enough to seize it.  Things are so FUBAR (F'd up beyond all recognition) that radical change may just be possible.  Licensing Ukrainian drone technology might help our military become more nimble and cost effective.  It may help America rebuild its industrial logistics, so that we can again build civilian products in the US, as we did with the aircraft and space industries.  We can learn from the past, and choose to take a different path than those who preceded us.

The big question is:  Will we learn the lessons of the past and make good choices.  I'm hoping that America will follow the lead of a wise woman (Mae West) who said: "Whenever given the choice between two evils, I'll choose the one I haven't chosen before."  It's time for something new, and even a bad choice of something new is better than the continued choices of something old we have been making as of late. 

I'm a little concerned about supply chain issues getting worse.

 

Several months ago, I mentioned that it took forever for me to get this replacement head unit for my air conditioner. Supply chain issues prevented it from being manufactured and delivered in a timely manner. Today, I watched a video that makes me think that this incident may just be the tip of an iceberg...

One of the things I've noticed when I went to the beach with FH last years was the presence of cargo ships sitting outside New York harbor.  They had yet to cross under the Verrazzano Narrows Bridge and enter the Ports of NY/NJ for unloading. Today's video came from someone who seemed to be a survivalist by nature, but had a valuable insight to what's happening on the West Coast.  His most salient point in the video had nothing directly to do with the problems with world shipping.  Instead, it had to do with the Russia-Ukraine war.  Even though Russia is not well integrated into the Western economies, we lose a lot by cutting off trade with Russia, and he focused on their fish and fertilizer exports.  He also noted that Ukraine being a bread basket for the world.  Couple these factors with supply chain issues at major ports, and we likely will soon see major food shortages - even in the USA.

I feel that we will have to learn how to live with sudden short term periods of scarcity as supply chain issues work themselves out.  Smart people will need to learn how to maintain inventories of things they need, so that they have reserves for when selective items are temporarily scarce and hard to find. Strangely enough, this will pump up our economy while making things worse.  America has always been a land of plenty, and this period of temporary shortages will be a hard thing for Americans to get used to. It will likely cause major social disruption, as our culture defines America as THE land of plenty (for a price) when we're not in the middle of a world war.

You may ask, what does this have to do about being transgender?  The answer is simple.  When times get bad, people become more conservative and prone to populist insurrections.  January 6, 2001 was just the start of a problem for us transgender people, as people in "Red States" now feel free to enact laws regarding what we can and can't do with our bodies (think of abortion laws and transgender participation in sporting events).  As things get worse for the general population, politicians will make minorities like us sacrificial lambs to deflect attention from the fact that they aren't getting anything done to solve the problems average people face.

I can still remember the name calling that FCP did after the unfortunate dissolution of our friendship. In many ways, it showed the true nature of what she felt inside about me.  (Just drop the words of anger, and focus on internal definitions...)  We will see a lot of that in our friends as things get hard for them.  They will be saying that there are more important things to worry about than gender identity, expression, and preference.  And from their perspective, they may be right.  But from our perspectives, it reaches deep into our identities of self - and this could be a live or die issue for many.  I am lucky NOT to have severe gender dysphoria.  But what about those who do?  Can they live, much less, prosper in stealth mode?  I don't know.

As the fictional Margo Channing once said: "Fasten your seatbelts; it's going to be a bumpy night." I'd change that to say it's going to be a bumpy year or two at best....

It's nice to know that some governments are giving citizens a tax break

 

Tax free if you want it - just go out and get one!

😁

 

Being serious, you will likely read this entry 2 weeks after I wrote it.  A lot of things could happen in those 2 weeks.  Yet, as I write this, Russia has not been able to conquer Ukraine as quickly as once thought.  And that's a good thing.  Given Russia's attitudes towards the LGBT population, we don't need the Russians to expand their territory to satisfy Putin's ego.

When I read the headline on a Newsweek article I read on the phone this morning, I had to laugh - what government in the middle of a war would have the time to consider the tax implications of enemy military equipment captured in battle?  But to be serious, I am concerned about what has happened, what is happening, and what will happen in Ukraine.  

A coworker of someone I know has family in Ukraine.  Her mother is safe with her brother in upstate New York.  But her father is near the Polish border. He's in the middle of the area from which refugees are fleeing into Poland.  Hopefully, he will survive the next few weeks.  Another person I know (she used to go to our game nights) also comes from Ukraine.  I should check on her to see if her family is OK.  I'll bet that most of us know at least one person who has family in the conflict area.  Hopefully, their family members will all be safe....