30 December 2020
COVID-19 Herd Immunity
Herd immunity cannot be achieved if the COVID vaccines do not prevent non-symptomatic vaccinated people from carrying the virus. Right now asymptomatic people are possible carriers; therefore creating more non-symptomatic people does not necessarily reduce the spread of the disease; it only protects the recipients of the vaccine. Thus full popular resistance to COVID-19 may only come when everyone is vaccinated.
29 December 2020
Trump Apologia
"I didn’t ask for this. My base elected me, now they’ve changed their minds. Or at least enough of the other side realized that they had too much to lose by letting my supporters win again.
But there will be another Trump; my base will go on forever. They are a good market for the media and consumer products industry because they only want to be spoon-fed information and opinions. For the next Trump that, too, is the business of politics—entertainment.
If we’re careful, we won’t allow the elites impose their supposed good order on society. They can always be bought off.
24 December 2020
Key to the Prisoner’s Dilemma
Since the key is lack of communication between the two rivals, espionage or hacking destroys the game unless both competitors are adept at deception. Unfortunately, when the judgment of the nation’s leader is questionable or corrupted by megalomania the citizens of the country are caught in a different game with their leader. This is an asymmetrical game in which a) if the people don’t trust their leader neither side wins, regardless of the leader’s belief b) if the leader is able to ignore the people because they trust him, he wins c) if both sides trust the other side they both win. The lesson here is that it is important for the people to choose a leader they can trust. Key to the Prisoner’s Dilemma Since the key is lack of communication between the two rivals, espionage or hacking destroys the game unless both competitors are adept at deception. Unfortunately, when the judgment of the nation’s leader is questionable or corrupted by megalomania the citizens of the country are caught in a different game with their leader. This is an asymmetrical game in which a) if the people don’t trust their leader neither side wins, regardless of the leader’s belief b) if the leader is able to ignore the people because they trust him, he wins c) if both sides trust the other side they both win. The lesson here is that it is important for the people to choose a leader they can trust.
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19 December 2020
Collusion is a Prisoner's Dilemma
Donald Trump has been charged with colluding with the Russians in relation to Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. He probably believes that he has skillfully played a classic game with Vladimir Putin, by not admitting to him that he doesn’t want to penalize Russia for occupying Crimea and invading other portions of that country so that Putin doesn’t have to admit any aggressive intentions towards the United States.
Trump believes he has been playing the part of a willing
collaborator with an equally diabolical enemy in a competition that allows each
of them to gain geopolitical advantages at no mortal cost to the other
player. This game has apparently saved
both countries in the past from mutual nuclear destruction. However, recent cyber-attacks on American
agencies and corporations may portend a breakdown of that tacit collusion
between the two countries.
The evidence of hacking of American digital networks shows
that the Russians have apparently decided that they may be able to take
advantage of inattention by their American rivals to how critically dependent the
U.S. is on computer networks for its power as an arbiter of international
geopolitics. The remedy to this threat
of electronic crippling will have to be a demonstration of commensurate Russian
vulnerability to interference in a crucial sector of its economy, if not communications
then oil and gas.
Ultimately, Russia and America are stuck in a prisoner’s
dilemma in which one potential sanction each of them has on the other is
deprivation of clean energy. Even more
important will be the complications brought to this game by the entry of China
into the mix. This challenge will necessarily
face Trump’s successor, as well, for the game will go on regardless of who
occupies the White House.
17 December 2020
Is It Trump’s Party?
Donald J. Trump seems to be deluded that he will continue to rule the Republican Party after he reluctantly leaves office in January 2021. The American news media have reinforced his belief that his party’s elected officials, federal, state and local, owe their political fortunes to his formation of a new coalition of voters who have adopted capitulated to his solipsism. Trump really believes that he was and should continue to be elected president because that is the order of things.
Trump really only came into prominence in the American mind as the result of the brilliant idea behind the creation of a popular reality TV show, The Apprentice. He didn’t create the audience for that show; he stepped into the role of an all-knowing business executive devised by the geniuses who recognized that there existed many television viewers who would be attracted to watching the contention of business aspirants with a potential unassailable boss.
The genius of Donald Trump was to realize that if there was a massive audience for his entertaining portrayal of a an unapologetically contemptuous CEO, a large bloc of the voters in our electoral democracy might also select that character as their leader. After all, most of those people think of politics as mere entertainment, and Donald Trump has the same personal values he depicted on The Apprentice.
What is surprising about this is how many Republican officials have expressed fealty to Trump’s delusion. It only shows how unprincipled many of them are. Their most important objective is to preserve their jobs, which means that they view themselves as desperately in need of money in order to finance their electoral victories. For many of them, those governmental jobs lead importantly to further lucrative positions in the private sector Raising those funds occupies much of their time during which they must confess their allegiance to the best interests of their donors. Many of those officials rely on private business interests for most of their funds. They have chosen to leave the collection of their needed funds to corporations and others who use the capital economy to earn revenue
Of course, there is another way to finance a political career—appealing directly to individual voters Some politicians are adept at doing that. It naturally sets up a conflict between individual interests and corporate business interests. Both have their merits. Republican Party members have traditionally represented the latter category. However, they have lately been confused by the success of Donald Trump into believing that he represents those interests. Some of them, including Leader Senator McConnell, are beginning to abandon identification of their personal fortunes with the continued reality showmanship of Donald Trump. At last, we’ve all had enough of his contempt.
