Musings From the River

We are heading down a path I thought unbelieveable after the 2020 elections. I thought (hoped) we had seen the last of Donald Trump, and it was apparent to me even before the election that Joe Biden no longer has the the mental capacity to serve as President of the United States. I was shocked when he was elected after spending the summer in his basement in Delaware, and it makes me wonder who is really pulling the levers of power at the top of the Executive Branch; I know it’s not Joe Biden, but that is another discussion.

Unfortunately, Donald Trump did not go away, egged on by a liberal press and a Democrat Party that wants to keep him as a frontrunner on the Republican side – because he is the only Republican that Joe Biden can beat. There was the harping about classified documents, then the gaudy early morning raid on Mar Lago. Now we have the political hit job that is the Bragg indictment in New York, which the Dems hope to parlay through the 2024 election season, attempting to ensure that Trump’s base (and some independent) rage against this gross injustice carries Trump to the nomination.

That is exactly what the Democrats want.

Trump is divisive and will not become any less so. While I generally agree with his policies and voted for him both times (though the second time was more a vote against Mr Magoo/Biden), he is a far cry from being the best this country can find as the Republican standard-bearer, mostly due to his personality and tendency to be boorishness and mean-spirited. He has had his chance, his moment in the sun, and it’s time to put him out to pasture and end the unceasing media focus on “The Donald”.

Trump likely lost the 2020 election because too many independent and suburban voters found his personality too toxic and voted for reason. It happened again in the mid-terms, when what was supposed to be a Red Tsunami turned into a slight high tide. Many voted split tickets, voting straight Republican down-ballot, but shunning the Trump-backed candidate at the top: think Dr Oz in Pennsylvania and Kari Lake in Arizona. It will happen again in 2024. Joe Biden will wait til as late as this Fall to announce he is running again, waltz to the nomination, and beat Trump again for the same reasons as in 2020. It is unfathomable to me that we would elect a vegetable like Joe Biden twice, but I fear we could be in danger of doing so.

This is my call to act, fellow Republicans and Independents. We know that no reasonable person in this country wants a Trump-Biden rematch, with Biden likely winning again, leading to four more years of an unknown and unnamed cabal running the country and pulling us ever farther left, to our great detriment. That is not who we are as a country.

What to do? Contact your local Republican campaign office, find out where they stand, argue against rubber-stamping Trump as the nominee again. Educate yourself now on other candidates, as the Republicans have a deep bench: Desantis, Youngkin, Haley, Pompeo, and others. I don’t believe the polls regarding Trump vs. Desantis will stand, I just don’t think enough people outside of Florida know Desantis well enough yet. Trump knows this, which is why he keeps attacking Desantis in his childish ways. Conservative news organizations need to challenge Trump to stop mocking Desantis and start having serious exchanges with him and other candidates now about the direction of the country. We do not need another Trump-Biden rematch, and neither should occupy the White House again in 2025. It is time for the next generation, with a pragmatic and centrist leader to restore civility and rule of law at home, and restore US standing in the world. Act now!

The current issue of my local Gannett newspaper is filled with ominous front page headlines like: “Perilous Course – The Climate Future is Now”, and “Going Forth Without a Climate Crisis Plan?” The “Perilous Course” story, especially, is purported to be ” a collaborative examination of how people up and down the East Coast are grappling with the climate crisis.” “Journalists” from 35 USA Today/Gannett newsrooms from New Hampshire to Florida are speaking with regular people about real-life impacts, “digging into the science”, and investigating government response, or lack of it.

In many cases, the writers detail the plights of people who have been displaced by flooding or natural disasters over the last 10-20 years, all attributed to climate change, with ominous warnings, like: “In the Chesapeake Bay region alone, 80,000 acres of forest have been turned into salt marsh in the last 150 years”. 80,000 acres sounds like a lot – it is 125 square miles. The Chesapeake Bay watershed encompasses 64,000 square miles. So, is 125 square miles, or 0.2 % of the watershed turning into salt marsh in 150 years really a crisis? Or, could it be simply part of a long-term ebb and flow of the environment? How about this: a professor of sociology at the Florida State University projects that 13.1 million people could relocate due to sea-level rise alone by 2100. Wow, again, 13.1 million sounds like a lot, and it is. But the man is saying that 13.1 million people, or 3.2 percent of the US population, MIGHT have to move if nothing is done about a sea-level rise PROJECTION in the next 78 years. Is that really a crisis? I have lived on a shallow bay 4 miles from the Atlantic Ocean for the last nine years, and I have seen no appreciable rise in the level of the bay in that time. Perhaps it IS rising, but if it is, it is so slow as to be indiscernible over that period.

No Plans – the writers lament that most states on the East Coast do not have a unified plan or budget for combatting climate change. However, many have set carbon emission reduction goals to combat the effects of the evil fossil fuels: Massachusetts will meet net zero by 2050. North Carolina also mandates a 70% reduction in carbon emissions from 2005 to 2030 and net zero by 2050. New Jersey and Pennsylvania. have set 80% reduction goals by 2050. I often wonder about such goals, because there seldom seems to be any concrete plan associated with reaching the goals, only reliance on emerging technologies. Is a thirty-year-out goal set to keep any politician or administration putting those “goals” from being held accountable way out there? Who will remember who did what?

How to Get There – How might we achieve these goals? Everyone is hanging their hat on wind and solar. Five wind turbines off Rhode Island’s Block Island are held up in the article as a bold move in the right direction. Completed after exhaustive engineering studies in 2016 at a cost of $300 MILLION dollars, the 5 turbines generate about 30 MW of power, probably enough to power about 17,000 homes. The problem is – the turbines have had many problems since initial operation and many tens of millions more have been spent to repair them. Tranmission cables were not buried deep enough (to save money), and stress cracks are already appearing in blades that were supposed to last many more years. All five turbines were shut down for a good part of 2021.

What about nuclear power? No mention of that anywhere in the articles I have read. It’s proven, safer than ever, and the greenest of green energies, the only emission being water vapor.

What about recognition that alternative technologies (wind, solar, battery technology for storage, transmission/grid issues)are not yet refined enough for helter-skelter abandonment of fossils fuels? We will be dependent on fossil fuels for many years to come, especially in developing nations, where it is by far the cheapest and most dependable of all alternatives. Do we simply turn our back on such nations and say sorry, we got ours?

Has any scientist or scientific group come forward with a tangible, practical explantion of the long term effects of the “climate crisis”, in terms the layman can understand? When we are told that the Earth will warm 1.5 degrees Celsius and the seas will rise perhaps a foot in that time, what does that mean in practical terms to people living in the Florida panhandle, or Kentucky, or Wyoming, or central New Mexico? Me, pretty sure I can handle an extra degree or a few more inches of water by the year 2100, especially since I won’t be around anymore, as is true of almost the entire existing population of Earth.

Perhaps that’s the root of the problem: first, the climate crisis is likely not as dire or existentially threatening as the AOC’s of the world would have us believe, because few of the dire projections take into account the likely advances in technology that will mitigate the negative effects, nor do they seem to give any credence to the fact that while, yes, manmade activities are contributing to the warming of the planet, natural, historic incremental climate changes taking place over milions of years are also at play. Some of us are losing our climate minds over an infinitesimally tiny blip in time, in the grand scheme of things. Second, most people look at the dire predictions and decide that either it won’t affect them all that badly, or that there is nothing they can do about it, and they have more important things to stress over, like how to put gas in their car and feed their families.

Says Dr. Ashley Ward, a climate health scientist at Duke University: “A lot of people don’t want big government in their lives, and don’t want to pay more taxes for programs or projects they don’t understand or think are necessary. I understand the push and pull here. But we need to adapt”.

Exactly, That’s the discussion I would like to (respectfully) see here. What is the best way to adapt? To me, wind and solar are not yet reliable sources of power, and can not always be harnessed and transported when and to where needed. We cannot now run away from fossil fuels, and will not be able to fully abandon them for decades. Nuclear power makes sense to me, as does adapting away from coastlines and flood-prone areas as we work to mitigate the effects of rising seas and temperatures. Why do we allow people in coastal areas whose homes and businesses are destroyed by flooding several times to go right back in and build in the same places? Could not $400 million dollars spent on a failed ocean wind farm have been put to better use in relocating have-not families in coastal and other areas? What about those affected by drought? So many questions – we have to do a better job than we are doing now.

         Is this the new foreign policy of the United States, NATO, the UN, and the EU?    While the madman Putin continues his murderous rampage across a sovereign nation, will the world continue to stand meekly by because we can’t risk a direct conflict with Russia/Putin?   Where will this policy stop?

Say Putin takes Ukraine, while continuing to bluster about dire consequences, even use of nukes, against whichever Western nations or alliances interfere.  Does he stop there, or does he then try for relatively easy pickings like Lithuania, Estonia, etc, while issuing the same threats.    No, you say:  then NATO will step in to protect its allies.   But in the meantime, we let Putin murder tens of thousands of innocents in Ukraine.

The point is, we are going to have to call Putin’s bluff sooner or later.   His army is not doing well in Ukraine.   Putin anticipated the Ukrainian people would roll over and hail a return to the Motherland’s embrace.   Not happening.   You see, the Ukrainians have tasted real freedom, and they like it.   They see the restrictions upon their neighbors and relatives in Crimea and the Donbas region, and will not allow themselves to be subjugated that way ever again.    Putin did not understand that, and feels now that he cannot turn back without hugely embarrassing Russia.

He might take control of the Ukrainian borders, but he will never control its people, who will subject the Russians to an endless war of attrition.   He will not be able to extend beyond Ukraine, as he will face tougher opposition and he has not the supply chain capability to keep his army indefinitely in hostile foreign lands.

Some world leader(s) (sadly, it won’t be slow Joe Biden) need to develop some gumption and stop the slaughter now.

1. establish a UN or NATO no-fly zone.   Russian pilots are not US and NATO pilots, and I predict they would fail to stand up to an onslaught of Allied fighters and electronic warfare aircraft.   Their anti-aircraft missile systems are very good, but they could also be neutralized.   NATO pilots shot down would be heroes.    Russian pilots would be shot on sight.
2. Visit some terror upon the Russians, demoralize them.  We would easily own the night.   Launch Predator drones with Hellfire missiles against the stalled Russian convoy outside Kyiv.    Supply Ukrainian fighters with the Switchblade mortar-launched drones with warheads, controlled from a handheld remote.

Would Putin resort to the use of tactical nuclear weapons, or worse?   I cannot say or predict, but to do that, even if he ordered the launch, would his generals comply with the direction of this unspeakable level of horror, or put an end to Putin’s rampage from within?    Again, Putin will continue to threaten this until he gets all the territory he wants, especially if we continue to stand idly by other than to supply Ukraine, which yes, is significant.    Somewhere along the line, we have to call his bluff.    Sooner would save countless numbers of Ukrainian lives, and everyone knows it.

Who will be first; who will be the leader?

Hi, I’m Phil. I’m in my late 60’s, a white Midwesterner now retired in North Carolina, son of a salesman (Dad) and elementary school teacher (Mom). I have four brothers. I hold a B.S. in Mechanical Engineering, am a 22 year retired Navy pilot, a retired commercial pilot, staunch conservative, own guns, and vote Republican. Between the Navy and my commercial flying, I have visited all 50 of these United States, and 45 other countries on 6 continents. I’m not real touchy-feely, and tend to see things more in black and white than any shade of grey. I’m starting this blog because I intensely love this country but am very worried about our future. I’m tired of the progressive minority and liberal media lying about what’s really going on, as they simultaneously rail against transgressions from the Right, while anything goes on the Left. I’m tired of trying to engage in civil conversations with some of the younger generations, and being told simply that my opinions (and that’s what they are – always feel free to disagree) are just wrong, because I watch Fox News.

I used to carry out these discussions on Facebook, but am quitting for two reasons: a)it isn’t the right venue; it never was intended to be a site for political discourse, and b) Zuckerberg has turned it into another political weapon for the Left – no sense supporting that. I want to use this blog to voice opinions on the issues of the day on my own site, and invite you to voice your support or oppostion in a respectful way – maybe we can all learn from one another, or agree to disagree.

See you “on the river.”