The Last Resort - Eco-Extremism

Sooner or later it was bound to happen.

Guardian enviro-scribe, George Monbiot, writes that if those holding the reins of power choose to treat environmental activists as extremists then so be it.  I suppose we always knew it would come to a fight eventually. The only question was when.

First, the Guardian revealed that counter-terrorism police in south-east England have listed Extinction Rebellion (XR) and the youth climate strikes as forms of “ideological extremism”. Then teachers and officials around the country reported that they had been told, in briefings by the anti-radicalisation Prevent programme, to look out for people expressing support for XR and Greenpeace. 

Then the Guardian found a Counter Terrorism Policing guide to the signs and symbols used by various groups. Alongside terrorists and violent extremist organisations, the guide listed Greenpeace, XR, People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals, CND, the Socialist party, Stop the War and other peaceful green and left organisations. Then the newspaper discovered that City of London police had listed XR as a “key threat” in its counter-terrorism assessment. 

...The police have always protected established power against those who challenge it, regardless of the nature of that challenge. And they have long sought to criminalise peaceful dissent. Part of the reason is ideological: illiberal and undemocratic attitudes infest policing in this country. Part of it is empire-building: if police units can convince the government and the media of imminent threats that only they can contain, they can argue for more funding. 

...But there’s another reason, which is arguably even more dangerous: the nexus of state and corporate power. All over the world, corporate lobbyists seek to brand opponents of their industries as extremists and terrorists, and some governments and police forces are prepared to listen. A recent article in the Intercept seeks to discover why the US Justice Department and the FBI had put much more effort into chasing mythical “ecoterrorists” than pursuing real, far-right terrorism. A former official explained, “You don’t have a bunch of companies coming forward saying ‘I wish you’d do something about these rightwing extremists’.” By contrast, there is constant corporate pressure to “do something” about environmental campaigners and animal rights activists.

Think of the federal government's pipeline Stasi set up by Stephen Harper but now in service to the Trudeau government. It's a taxpayer funded secret police service that combines the RCMP, CSIS and private security interests to monitor, intimidate and even strongarm peaceful environmental activists. Even under the supposedly progressive Trudeau peaceful dissent is unacceptable.

It is hard to think of any successful campaign for democracy, justice or human rights that would not now be classed by police forces and the government as an extremist ideology. Without extremists such as Emmeline Pankhurst, who maintained that “the argument of the broken window pane is the most valuable argument in modern politics”, Patel would not be an MP. Only men with a certain amount of property would be permitted to vote. There would be no access to justice, no rights for workers, no defence against hunger and destitution, no weekends. 

In his Letter from Birmingham Jail, Martin Luther King Jr, subjected to smears very similar to those now directed against XR and other environmental groups, noted: “The question is not whether we will be extremists, but what kind of extremists we will be. Will we be extremists for hate or for love? Will we be extremists for the preservation of injustice or for the extension of justice?” 

Good citizens cannot meekly accept the death of the living planet. If seeking to defend life on Earth defines us as extremists, we have no choice but to own the label. We are extremists for the extension of justice and the perpetuation of life.

Eventually we all must decide which side we're on. With what we're seeing underway today, the petro-state is an abomination. It is, as some scholars contend, a crime against humanity. The choices are stark. You can acquiesce, you can support it or, on the other hand, you can oppose it.

The Wrecking Crew - We're All Part of It

While the world wrings its collective hands over how little we must do to thwart climate change, two other sinister threats lurk in the wings - overpopulation and our rapacious excessive consumption of very finite resources, renewable and non-renewable. Any one of those three, on its own, is more than enough to bring humanity crashing down. Let's talk about over-consumption, the existential threat standing in the corner that is usually overlooked entirely.

What better way to begin than to herald a new record. For the first time ever, humanity has consumed 100 Billion tonnes of materials in a single year. And the cherry on the sundae is that recycling rates are falling at the very same time.

The climate and wildlife emergencies are driven by the unsustainable extraction of fossil fuels, metals, building materials and trees. The report’s authors warn that treating the world’s resources as limitless is leading towards global disaster. 

The materials used by the global economy have quadrupled since 1970, far faster than the population, which has doubled. In the last two years, consumption has jumped by more than 8% but the reuse of resources has fallen from 9.1% to 8.6%.

You see, we're not only taking "our" share but we're now pillaging "their" share - the resources every other species needs to survive. That's why, whether it be marine or terrestrial, the overall numbers of our fellow creatures are in a lethal nosedive. In just 30 years we cut their total numbers by more than half, a number of species reduced to extinction. Yeah baby, that was us. We showed them a thing or two, eh?

What's our response to this? I know - veggie burgers. Hell, we'll eat insects if it comes to that. Anything to keep this bacchanal rolling.

Climate change, overpopulation, over-consumption - they're all tightly interwoven. So tightly, in fact, that you can't solve even one of them if you don't solve them all. And we can't even succeed at one - our current preoccupation, climate change.

Anyway, here's the report, released just in time for Davos. In typical form, it's jam packed with bollocks about how "we can still do this," ignoring all the squishiness inherent in our human nature, the "I've got mine buddy. You get yours the best way you know how." syndrome that has played such an instrumental role in the collapse of so many societies over the ages.

And, if you're thinking maybe we can clean this up by going back to "meatless Fridays," think again. Think the "Great Acceleration." Go ahead, open the link. Check it out. Watch the videos, look at the charts (about 49 of them). Then draw your own conclusions.

The Spirit of a Python

Director, author and Python, Terry Jones, has died, aged 77.

While he is and will remain best known for his work in comedy, especially Monty Python, I will remember him for his final film, "Boom, Bust, Boom," available on NetFlix.  Here's the trailer:

The New Oracles

We've got new oracles to advise the government how to get out of the current high-carbon death spiral with our asses more or less intact.

They're called the Canadian Institute for Climate Choices and the feds have funded them for five years to the tune of $20-million.

No one knows how quickly the world is going to cut carbon pollution, CEO Kathy Bardswick said in an interview, and Canada must make decisions that account for the uncertainty, rather than be paralyzed by it. 

In either a high-carbon or low-carbon future, “there’s a substantial impact on the country,” Bardswick said. “What we’re trying to say is, ‘Yes, we agree there’s uncertainty, and we agree that these scenarios can play out quite differently, and the implications can be quite dramatic. But that doesn’t mean that we wait and see — we’ve got to be able to plan within that context.’”

CICC opened with an 80-page report  that may or may not steer the petro-feds in the right direction. (Hint - let's see what Ottawa does with the proposed Teck mega-mine in the Athabasca Tar Sands. If they greenlight that this is probably a waste of $20-million on another silly gesture.)

Drawing on extensive economic and scientific research, the report sketches out two broad scenarios, with two possible outcomes in each one. 

In the first scenario, a massive economic metamorphosis has occurred. Nations around the world cut their pollution severely over the next 10 years, reaching the Paris Agreement goal. Global demand for fossil fuels has plummeted, and proven reserves are left in the ground. A majority of electricity comes from renewables like solar, wind and bioenergy, while nuclear capacity triples and heavy industry is largely decarbonized.

In the other scenario, carbon pollution continues to be pumped into the air unchecked, and the world fails to achieve the Paris Agreement’s goal, leading to runaway climate change: collapse of ecosystems, accelerating global heating, coastlines that sink underwater, relentless extreme weather and mass societal unrest. 

Canada must be prepared for that world, too, the report says, or it will become “caught in a continual cycle of impact and recovery.” People will be injured or killed, or suffer poor air quality and contaminated water, as insurance skyrockets and companies lay off workers. Food and water shortages drive war, conflict and humanitarian disasters, which reach Canada’s shores.

As the saying goes, you can lead the feds to water but you can't make 'em drink.

And So It Begins. Wuhan Virus Crosses the Pacific.

The first case of the Wuhan coronavirus has been reported in Seattle.

A person in Washington State is infected with the Wuhan coronavirus, the first confirmed case in the United States of a mysterious respiratory infection that has killed at least six people and sickened hundreds more in Asia. 

The man is a resident of Snohomish County, Wash., who experienced symptoms after returning from a trip to the region around Wuhan, China, where the outbreak began. He was hospitalized with pneumonia last week, and infection with the coronavirus was confirmed on Monday afternoon. 

Local officials declined to identify the patient, who was said to be quite ill. 

News of the first case in the United States comes amid growing evidence that the virus spreads from person to person, although it is not clear how easily.

I intended to do a post asking whether Canadian health authorities were doing anything enough to screen the steady stream of arrivals that enter Canada daily from China, especially through Vancouver. Surely we haven't forgotten the experience Toronto endured with the SARS virus, a similar contagion.

At the Risk of Being Branded an Anti-Semite...

Israel's prime thug, Bibi Netanyahu, has again shown his perfectly fascist face. He's calling for sanctions against the International Criminal Court, its prosecutors and its judges for having the temerity to consider investigating Israeli war crimes (which, by the way, are legion).

“I think that everybody should rise up against this,” the Israeli prime minister said in an interview with Trinity Broadcasting Network, the world’s largest Christian television network. 

“The US government under President Trump has spoken forcefully against the ICC for this travesty, and I urge all your viewers to do the same. To ask for concrete actions, sanctions, against the international court – its officials, its prosecutors, everyone.” 

Netanyahu’s calls come months after Washington used a similar tactic to block a separate potential ICC investigation into its troops’ conduct in Afghanistan. It announced in March that it would deny entry to ICC officials, and later revoked a visa held by the ICC chief prosecutor, Fatou Bensouda.

The Blowhard-in-Chief Releases Another Bag of Gas at Davos

Is it just me or is this guy truly demonic? If it's a way to undermine the environment, usually by scrapping protective measures, Donald J. Trump doesn't hesitate to unleash his presidential powers. He has that familiar "I won't be around when it happens" attitude.

The Cheeto Benito stayed true to form today in Davos, Switzerland for the annual gathering of the knobs.

US President Donald Trump has decried climate "prophets of doom" in a speech at the World Economic Forum in Davos, where sustainability is the main theme. 

He called for a rejection of "predictions of the apocalypse" and said America would defend its economy. 

In his keynote speech, Mr Trump said that it was a time for optimism, not pessimism, in a speech that touted his administration's economic achievements and America's energy boom. 

Speaking of climate activists, he said: "These alarmists always demand the same thing - absolute power to dominate, transform and control every aspect of our lives." 

They were, he said, "the heirs of yesterday's foolish fortune tellers".

The speech must have been written by Trump's personal Renfield, Stephen Miller.

Trump Tells NYC - Try Mops and Buckets

When it comes to sea level rise, New York city, and Donald Trump, it's a 'perfect storm.' As far as the Mango Mussolini is concerned, the burghers of Manhattan can just take mops and buckets in hand the next time they're flooded. They're on their own.

He announced his position, naturally, in a tweet:

"A massive 200 Billion Dollar Sea Wall, built around New York to protect it from rare storms, is a costly, foolish & environmentally unfriendly idea that, when needed, probably won’t work anyway. It will also look terrible. Sorry, you’ll just have to get your mops & buckets ready!"

But, when it comes to his golf course in Ireland, Trump is singing a very different tune.

As Politico detailed during the 2016 presidential campaign, Trump International Golf Links sought to build a seawall to protect a golf course he owns in Ireland from “global warming and its effects.” 

In a permit application for the wall, Trump International Golf Links cited scientific studies indicating that a rise in sea level could result in damaging erosion in a bay near the golf course. 

“If the predictions of an increase in sea level rise as a result of global warming prove correct ... it is likely that there will be a corresponding increase in coastal erosion rates not just in Doughmore Bay but around much of the coastline of Ireland,” the application says. “In our view, it could reasonably be expected that the rate of sea level rise might become twice of that presently occurring. ... As a result, we would expect the rate of dune recession to increase.”

NYT Endorses Two Candidates for President in 2020

For the first time, America's "Grey Lady" has endorsed two candidates for president in the 2020 elections. Not surprisingly, they're both Democrats. More surprisingly, they're both women.

This year the New York Times is co-endorsing Elizabeth Warren or Amy Klobuchar to become the next and first female president of the United States of America.

You Broke It, You Bought It - Climate Change and the Pottery Barn Rule

The United Nations has fired a rocket up the arse of the developed world by ruling that climate refugees cannot be sent back to their homelands.

Given that the developed world, the industrialized nations, are responsible for the vast majority of greenhouse gas emissions fueling global warming that is rendering the poorest and most vulnerable nations increasingly uninhabitable, leaving their beleaguered people the grim choice of migrating or staying put to die, it does seem only fair that we don't add mortal insult to lethal injury for these folks, especially their little kids. (I don't think I've ever written a sentence so complex)

Don't worry. It's only the UN. We'll find some excuse, plenty of them in fact, to reject this ruling. We'll bundle them up as "terrorists" or a threat to our beloved economies, you know, the bounty that God bestowed on us but not them, that sort of thing. And, yes, we'll look like utter swine but isn't that what the lipstick is for?

Pompeo - Screw You, We're Not Leaving

Trump secretary of state, Mike Pompeo, has served notice on the government of Iraq - 'we don't care what you say, we're staying.'

The State Department on Friday rebuffed the Iraqi government’s request to begin discussions on pulling out troops, saying that any American officials going to Baghdad during a state of heightened tensions would not discuss a “troop withdrawal,” as the Iraqi prime minister had requested. Instead, discussions would be about the “appropriate force posture in the Middle East.” 

The statement from Washington was a direct rebuttal to Prime Minister Adel Abdul Mahdi of Iraq, and was certain to add to the friction between the two nations. 

The prime minister said earlier on Friday that he had asked Secretary of State Mike Pompeo to send a delegation from the United States to discuss steps for the withdrawal of the approximately 5,200 American troops from his country, in the aftermath of a deadly American military strike ordered by President Trump that many Iraqis say violated their country’s sovereignty.

So much for the illusion of Iraqi sovereignty. That was all a pretence. Iraq remains an occupied land, its government's wishes subject to American veto.

Krugman on a "World Gone Mad."

Paul Krugman writes that the wildfires savaging Australia are terrifying but they can't compare to Australia's leadership.

In a rational world, the burning of Australia would be a historical turning point. After all, it’s exactly the kind of catastrophe climate scientists long warned us to expect if we didn’t take action to limit greenhouse gas emissions. In fact, a 2008 report commissioned by the Australian government predicted that global warming would cause the nation’s fire seasons to begin earlier, end later, and be more intense — starting around 2020.

So this should be the moment when governments finally began urgent efforts to stave off climate catastrophe. 

But the world isn’t rational. In fact, Australia’s anti-environmentalist government seems utterly unmoved as the nightmares of environmentalists become reality. And the anti-environmentalist media, the Murdoch empire in particular, has gone all-out on disinformation, trying to place the blame on arsonists and “greenies” who won’t let fire services get rid of enough trees.

These political reactions are more terrifying than the fires themselves.

...You might be tempted to dismiss Australia as a special case, but the same deepening partisan division has long been underway in the United States. As late as the 1990s, Democrats and Republicans were almost equally likely to say that the effects of global warming had already begun. Since then, however, partisan views have diverged, with Democrats increasingly likely to see climate change happening (as indeed it is), while Republicans increasingly see and hear no climate evil.

Does this divergence reflect changing party composition? After all, highly educated voters have been moving toward the Democrats, less-educated voters toward the Republicans. So is it a matter of how well informed each party’s base is? 

Probably not. There’s substantial evidence that conservatives who are highly educated and well informed about politics are more likely than other conservatives to say things that aren’t true, probably because they are more likely to know what the conservative political elite wants them to believe. In particular, conservatives with high scientific literacy and numeracy are especially likely to be climate deniers. 

But if climate denial and opposition to action are immovable even in the face of obvious catastrophe, what hope is there for avoiding the apocalypse? Let’s be honest with ourselves: Things are looking pretty grim. However, giving up is not an option. What’s the path forward? 

The answer, pretty clearly, is that scientific persuasion is running into sharply diminishing returns. Very few of the people still denying the reality of climate change or at least opposing doing anything about it will be moved by further accumulation of evidence, or even by a proliferation of new disasters. Any action that does take place will have to do so in the face of intractable right-wing opposition. 

This means, in turn, that climate action will have to offer immediate benefits to large numbers of voters, because policies that seem to require widespread sacrifice — such as policies that rely mainly on carbon taxes — would be viable only with the kind of political consensus we clearly aren’t going to get.

"A Betrayal Against Life Itself"

They're not the first to call for it but the Greta Thunberg  contingent at Davos is demanding that world leaders end the fossil fuel madness.

“Anything less would be a betrayal against life itself,” said Thunberg and colleagues in an article in the Guardian. “Today’s business as usual is turning into a crime against humanity. We demand that you play your part in putting an end to this madness.” 

The burning of fossil fuels is the biggest driver of the climate emergency. Scientists predict catastrophic impacts unless deep cuts in emissions are made rapidly, but global emissions are still rising.

Their demands echo the warning from renowned climate scientist, Hans Joachim Schellnhuber, at the 2015 Paris climate summit that our only chance of averting climate catastrophe depended on the "induced implosion" of the fossil fuel industry. It would be up to world governments to shut down the fossil fuel industry or else set the planet on fire. 

One by one the petro states have chosen the fire option. That includes Canada where a supremely hypocritical prime minister passed a declaration of climate emergency one day and, less than 24 hours later, greenlighted a massive, taxpayer funded, bitumen pipeline.  A betrayal against life itself, check. A crime against humanity, check. Putting an end to this madness? Hell no, we're cultivating madness.

From wildfires that burn hundreds of miles inside the Arctic Circle all the way to Australia in the southern hemisphere, we're running headlong into a wall - a wall of fire. And, despite their lofty pronouncements, that's not a matter of necessity. It's a choice they have chosen for us and everyone else on this planet.

John Ralston Saul Wrote of an "Interregnum." Could This Be What It Looks Like?

In his 2005 book, The Collapse of Globalism and the Reinvention of the World, John Ralston Saul proclaimed the end of neoliberalism as just another failed political-economic ideology. He wrote that we were in an "interregnum." An interval between regimes in which we sort of drifted along awaiting the next great thing.

Apparently JRS spoke too soon. Neoliberalism and the insane quest for perpetual exponential growth are still here. This malignant creed still holds sway in congresses and parliaments from Washington to London, Ottawa to Canberra.

Fifteen years is a pretty wide miss but, for all that, I'm not sure that Ralston Saul was necessarily wrong. Perhaps he just failed to understand that the nature of the next interregnum would be like none other before it.  It would look like this:

Australia, today

Fort McMurray

Paradise, California

This is Ralston Saul's interregnum. This is the end of neoliberalism because it's either neoliberalism or us. At some point either we choose to change on our own terms or we will be changed regardless. Time is definitely not on our side.

What's your idea for the next great thing? Or would you prefer to just keep electing the same political hacks who have quite knowingly delivered us into this global hell?

Here's a YouTube pundit who calls himself Ozzy Man to introduce you to their leader, Scott Morrison.  This is definitely NSFW. There's plenty of coarse language. It's not for delicate ears.

George's Pancake - Our Salvation?

Guardian enviro-scribe, George Monbiot, thinks a team of scientists from Finland have come up with a solution to feeding mankind without destroying the environment. It's 'hello microbes, goodbye farming.'

Christians believe that Jesus turned water into wine when a wedding celebration suddenly ran out.  Monbiot says we may be able to replace crops and livestock by a bit of alchemy involving nothing more than microbes and water.  Beat that, Jesus.

In a commercial lab on the outskirts of Helsinki, I watched scientists turn water into food. Through a porthole in a metal tank, I could see a yellow froth churning. It’s a primordial soup of bacteria, taken from the soil and multiplied in the laboratory, using hydrogen extracted from water as its energy source. When the froth was siphoned through a tangle of pipes and squirted on to heated rollers, it turned into a rich yellow flour.

This flour is not yet licensed for sale. But the scientists, working for a company called Solar Foods, were allowed to give me some while filming our documentary Apocalypse Cow. I asked them to make me a pancake: I would be the first person on Earth, beyond the lab staff, to eat such a thing. They set up a frying pan in the lab, mixed the flour with oat milk, and I took my small step for man. It tasted … just like a pancake. 

But pancakes are not the intended product. Such flours are likely soon to become the feedstock for almost everything. In their raw state, they can replace the fillers now used in thousands of food products. When the bacteria are modified they will create the specific proteins needed for lab-grown meat, milk and eggs. Other tweaks will produce lauric acid – goodbye palm oil – and long-chain omega-3 fatty acids – hello lab-grown fish. The carbohydrates that remain when proteins and fats have been extracted could replace everything from pasta flour to potato crisps. The first commercial factory built by Solar Foods should be running next year. 

The hydrogen pathway used by Solar Foods is about 10 times as efficient as photosynthesis. But because only part of a plant can be eaten, while the bacterial flour is mangetout, you can multiply that efficiency several times. And because it will be brewed in giant vats the land efficiency, the company estimates, is roughly 20,000 times greater. Everyone on Earth could be handsomely fed, and using a tiny fraction of its surface. If, as the company intends, the water used in the process (which is much less than required by farming) is electrolysed with solar power, the best places to build these plants will be deserts. 

We are on the cusp of the biggest economic transformation, of any kind, for 200 years. While arguments rage about plant- versus meat-based diets, new technologies will soon make them irrelevant. Before long, most of our food will come neither from animals nor plants, but from unicellular life. After 12,000 years of feeding humankind, all farming except fruit and veg production is likely to be replaced by ferming: brewing microbes through precision fermentation. This means multiplying particular micro-organisms, to produce particular products, in factories.I know some people will be horrified by this prospect. I can see some drawbacks. But I believe it comes in the nick of time.

Water Wars - Coming Soon, Maybe This Year

A new early-warning system to identify regions susceptible to war focuses on H2O, water. 

The Dutch government-funded Water, Peace and Security (WPS) global early warning tool, which was presented to the UN security council before it was launched formally last month, combines environmental variables such as rainfall and crop failures with political, economic and social factors to predict the risk of violent water-related conflicts up to a year in advance. 

It is the first tool of its kind to consider environmental data, such as precipitation and drought, alongside socio-economical variables, a combination lacking in previous tools designed to predict water conflicts. It is available online for the public to use, but is aimed more specifically at raising awareness among policymakers, and people and parties in water-stressed regions. 

The tool has already predicted conflicts that are likely to happen in 2020 in Iraq, Iran, Mali, Nigeria, India and Pakistan*. Developers claim an 86% success rate in identifying conflict zones where at least 10 fatalities could occur. The tool currently focuses on hotspots across Africa, the Middle East and southeast Asia.

* India and Pakistan have much in common. They're enemies. They're water insecure. Both have nuclear arsenals. Worse yet, there's another player that factors into their water woes - China. It too is water insecure. It too has plenty of nukes. And all three are mortally dependent on access to Himalayan headwaters, most of which are now under the control of China. What could possibly go wrong?

Growing global demand for water is already creating tensions – among communities, between farmers and city dwellers, between people and governments. Tensions are expected to increase as water scarcity becomes a reality for more people. According to the UN, as many as 5 billion people could experience water shortages by 2050.

Recent statistics from the Pacific Institute thinktank in California show that water-linked violence has surged significantly in the past decade: recorded incidents have more than doubled in the past 10 years, compared with previous decades. 

“The machine learning model is ‘trained’ to identify patterns using historical data on violent conflict and political, social, economic, demographic, and water risk,” said Charles Iceland, senior water expert at the World Resources Institute, part of the WPS partnership.

Where's Auntie Maude now that we need her?

No, Warren. An Accident Is No "Act of War." The US Navy Says So.

When I heard about the 737 crash in Tehran overnight, my first reaction was "bring on the conspiracy theorists." It's not that I'm fond of coincidences - Trump assassinates Iran's top general; Iran retaliates with missile strikes on two US air bases in Iraq; a Boeing 737 (no, not a 'Max' but - whatever); a Ukrainian airline (isn't everything dodgy in Ukraine?); a crash hot on the heels of Iran's missile strikes; that's a lot of coincidences - maybe.  But maybe it's also worth getting a few facts before racing to conclusions.

Our friend posts about a question supposedly by the New York Times' Nicholas Kristoff as to whether the Boeing jet might have been accidentally shot down by an Iranian anti-aircraft missile battery.

Then the hook:

If that turns out to be the case, Iran has committed an act of war against Canada. The League of Nations, among others, define an act of war as an attack by a state’s land, naval or air forces, with or without a declaration of war, on the territory, vessels or aircraft of another state. So this would appear to qualify, if true.

That's a pretty good reach, especially for a self-proclaimed "law professor." Sorry chum but you're getting a bit too unprofessorial. An attack is deliberate, pre-meditated. It's not accidental. If this was an accidental shoot down then it wasn't an act of war.

Let's contrast our friend's theory with Iran Air flight 655 as that passenger jet transited the Persian Gulf on 3 July, 1988. As the aircraft approached the US guided-missile cruiser yet still within Iranian airspace, USS Vincennes, the warship fired a Standard surface to air missile, killing all 290 passengers and crew. The navy later said it was all a mistake. They thought the jetliner was an attacking jet fighter. Oopsie!

Now was that an "act of war"? The US Navy admitted that they deliberately fired on and shot down the target but claimed it wasn't an act of war even if they had an itchy launch finger.

But, if this is going to be settled by conspiracy theories, here's another. Cui Bono? Who benefits from a commercial airliner being shot down moments after it lifts off from Teheran's airport? Who benefits from shutting down air travel into and out of Iran? Iran? Not so much. Let's remember, a modern 'manpad' or shoulder-mounted surface to air missile, could take down a jet. With the right people and competent networks it should be possible to bring a few in. Is that what happened? How would I know?

Even the National Review Thinks Trump is Nuts.

There are few more reliable Republican magazines than the National Review. Which is why it was refreshing to read NR columnist, Michael Doherty's take on the Mango Mussolini's antics in Iraq.

...since the news of this assassination broke, the president has sounded out of his mind. 

He has returned to his idea of vandalism, blasphemy, and outrage as strategy. Contradicting his own secretary of state, Trump promised that the United States would respond to further Iranian provocation by deliberately bombing cultural sites in Iran. “They’re allowed to kill our people. They’re allowed to torture and maim our people. They’re allowed to use roadside bombs and blow up our people. And we’re not allowed to touch their cultural sites,” he said. “It doesn’t work that way.” 

This disgusting threat is in many ways worse than his promises of “fire and fury” in North Korea. The punishment would fall not on the government, or on the military that tortures and maims, but on the whole Iranian people — and really all of humanity that has an interest in the preservation of great treasures of antiquity, of which there are many in Iran. These are jewels of ancient civilization that ought to outlast Iran’s current government, and that deserve a better custodian than the mullahs. That aside, the threat carries zero strategic value for us while offering infinite propaganda value for the Iranian regime.

Trump wasn’t done. “These Media Posts will serve as notification to the United States Congress that should Iran strike any U.S. person or target, the United States will quickly & fully strike back, & perhaps in a disproportionate manner,” the president tweeted. In this, he reveals he has heard about language of proportionality but doesn’t understand its place in just-war theory. Proportionality is not about returning an equal or ever-so-slightly more forceful slap to someone who slapped you. Proportionality is about using the appropriate amount of force to achieve the desired end.

This unhinged rhetoric is not just dangerous in itself, it’s unproductive. NATO members put out statements supporting America’s decision to strike at Soleimani, statements that read as if a stage director had scrawled the word “cringe” in the margins. They are tempered precisely because the publics of our various European allies find Trump’s rhetoric crazy, and unlike Americans, they are not inclined to lower their standards of sanity to accommodate his. They may also remember that the last two expansions of American hostilities in the Middle East created the refugee crisis and a wave of terrorism headed their way.

'Disgusting, unhinged rhetoric'. Sure. Trump sounding 'out of his mind.' Why not? That's the sort of thing you might expect from the mainstream media, or leftist outfits like MSNBC. Only this is the National Review. It's true of course, all of it. Trump has mentally deteriorated over the past two years. He's become a genuine nutjob. Captain Queeg of the Oval Office.  Even the National Review can't ignore the path their president is taking America down.

Has Trump Got His War? Tehran Retaliates.

Iran claims to have launched a missile strike on a US airbase in Iraq. Meanwhile, Reuters is reporting that six missiles hit the Ain Al-Asad air base. A Pentagon statement claims that two bases housing American military personnel were struck by a total of twelve missiles.

Recently the USAF has deployed six B-52 bombers with an aerial tanker contingent to Diego Garcia out of reach of Iran's ballistic missiles but within striking distance of Tehran. That's a 5,200 km. trip one way. The Royal Navy has sent a submarine armed with cruise missiles to Iran's backyard.

US-Led Coalition Announces "We're Outta Here."

Reuters reports of a letter delivered by the US-led coalition to the Iraqi army confirming they will be leaving Iraq.  No further details yet.

How to interpret this? Is this a decision of a unified coalition or are fractures emerging? Has Trump's impulsiveness and blundering scared off America's partners unwilling to leave the safety of their personnel at the whim of America's lunatic-in-chief?

The era of American-led coalitions may be over. What George H.W. Bush forged to throw Saddam's army out of Kuwait could be a thing of the past. If the dutiful followers lose trust in the putative leader things can fall apart pretty quickly.

On Sunday, Trump told reporters aboard Air Force One that Iraq will pay dearly if it throws out the coalition.

“We have a very extraordinarily expensive air base that’s there,” Mr. Trump said of Iraq. “It cost billions of dollars to build. Long before my time. We’re not leaving unless they pay us back for it.” 

Mr. Trump then escalated his language, saying: “If they do ask us to leave, if we don’t do it in a very friendly basis, we will charge them sanctions like they’ve never seen before ever. It’ll make Iranian sanctions look somewhat tame.” 

“If there’s any hostility, that they do anything we think is inappropriate, we are going to put sanctions on Iraq, very big sanctions on Iraq,” Mr. Trump added.

Update:  Pentagon officials say the letter, written by a Marine Corps brigadier general, gives a false impression about a troop withdrawal. The spokesman didn't go so far, however, as to say the various contingents of troops are staying either.