tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-32931256.post6954944489735552175..comments2024-03-22T05:20:44.167-07:00Comments on The Disaffected Lib: Well, He Does Know a Thing or Two About Divorce.The Mound of Soundhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09023839743772372922noreply@blogger.comBlogger5125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-32931256.post-2778401308940142412017-01-17T08:51:58.449-08:002017-01-17T08:51:58.449-08:00Toby, it's telling that of the three existenti...<br />Toby, it's telling that of the three existential challenges you've referenced, the global community isn't even addressing two.<br /><br />The population bomb that currently consists of Africa and much of Asia is not going to be defused. It will run its course to near certain catastrophe.<br /><br />Over-consumption, well we're still snarled in the perpetual, exponential growth paradigm. In the developed world the rate will decline somewhat but it will remain both perpetual and exponential at the very time we should have it in reverse, retreat. We have set the example for Africa and Asia to follow. Not only are we living unsustainably, far beyond our planet's ecological carrying capacity, but we have allowed ourselves to become mortally dependent on continuing what is unsustainable.<br /><br />I've never felt that a global consensus on climate change would work. To begin with, it would be dependent on a high degree of political and economic stability among the participating nations. That's a far less robust condition than we might think. Impacts that we were told just 10 years ago might occur by the end of the century if we didn't mend our ways are already upon us yet, like the first little piggy, our house remains built of straw. Even the wealthiest, most advantaged nations have done next to nothing by way of adaptation and, on mitigation, we toss out lofty ideas like carbon pricing.<br /><br />Globalization, the beating heart of the neoliberal order, is likewise failing and not just at the hands of populists. How could it not fail when it is constructed on the perpetual, exponential growth model. And the same degree of global political and economic stability required for climate change is even more essential to globalism.<br /><br />Trump, like most populists, may be a symptom of a malaise that will be greatly worsened by these three threats but how this will all play out, from one nation to the next, and when, is the subject of informed guessing at best.<br /><br />We are looking at unprecedented challenges and, as you point out, leadership of no great willingness to address them.The Mound of Soundhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/09023839743772372922noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-32931256.post-25772186315063693262017-01-17T08:27:56.118-08:002017-01-17T08:27:56.118-08:00Cap, there can be no doubt that Trump's pre-in...<br />Cap, there can be no doubt that Trump's pre-inaugural musings indeed seem to play to Putin's interests. Your list - Brexit, Ukraine, sanctions, the notion that Article 5 of the NATO charter may not be honoured by Trump's Washington, Trump's disparagement of NATO and the European Union - all sounds like someone other than Trump won this election.<br /><br />Trump has acknowledged that Putin meddled in the election - in Trump's favour. Trump knows he's suspect by his own intelligence/security agencies and by America's allies from Europe to Asia Pacific. Yet he pursues policies that can only reinforce his critics' doubts and suspicions.<br /><br />The most remarkable thing is that Trump seems to believe his rampage won't have consequences for the United States and his presidency. He can't get his mind out of his reality show studio.The Mound of Soundhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/09023839743772372922noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-32931256.post-29983765592940582132017-01-16T20:39:22.450-08:002017-01-16T20:39:22.450-08:00Thanks for sharing...nice postThanks for sharing...nice postdivphttp://www.cygnet-infotech.com/noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-32931256.post-15135468631865420462017-01-16T19:30:13.189-08:002017-01-16T19:30:13.189-08:00Mound, I think your big three - global warming, ov...Mound, I think your big three - global warming, over-population and neo-liberalism - are stressing everything. Globalization is coming apart due to too large a work force and automation. Desertification, high water and melting ice are driving people out of their home environs. In places that means wars. Etc. You have talked about all of it. They are all worsening. <br /><br />Brexit and Donald Trump are symptoms as much as anything. They can both cause untold damage but it is your big three pushing. Collectively, we are noticing the symptoms but are either not seeing the causes or unwilling to deal with them. My suspicion is that Trump (like Trudeau) will make things worse; he (like Trudeau) is not up to the tasks at hand. <br /><br />If climate scientists are right and I think they are, then the climate chaos we witnessed for the past few years will put so many people under such stress that we will soon look back at the present refugee problem as a trickle. It is going to get ugly. Which world leader will be the first to order troops to shoot refugees? Will Trump build his wall and mount automatic machine guns as in Gwynne Dyer's scenario?Tobynoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-32931256.post-56738706660419278062017-01-16T19:28:59.972-08:002017-01-16T19:28:59.972-08:00As chess grandmaster Gary Kasparov noted, "Ev...As chess grandmaster Gary Kasparov noted, "Every [foreign policy] position Trump takes, starting from total ignorance around year ago, is on Putin's wish list. Brexit, Ukraine, NATO, EU, Merkel." <br /><br />I wonder what was on the mind of incoming White House national security adviser Gen. Michael Flynn when he called the Russian embassy 5 times on December 29? I'm sure it was a mere coincidence that that was the day Obama retaliated with additional sanctions on Putin. Surely the Russians couldn't have had a mole at the highest level of the Defence Intelligence Agency.<br /><br />CapAnonymousnoreply@blogger.com