What worries me about UK energy policy

daryanenergyblog

Figure 1: Thanks to the roaring Forties South Australia is installing increasing amounts of wind energy [Source: energyaustralia.com.au, ND]

There was a serious black out incident in South Australia last month due to high winds. Inevitably the anti-wind farm brigade were quick to blame wind farms and inevitably the media (who don’t know any better) were soon parrotting these claims. Is any of this true?No, not in the least. South Australia has seen a significant rise in renewables, in particular wind power over the last few years. They are now supplying 27% of the state’s electricity. However the fact is that the wind farms stayed up and running through the high winds and that it was the collapse of several powerlines that actually caused the black outs.

Figure 2: Wind power has at times met a significant proportion of SA’s electricity demand []Source: The covnversation, 2015

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Brexit review – 5 months on

Its about 5 months since the referendum, so where are we in terms of brexit? Well, if leaks from Whitehall are to be believed, nowhere. Theresa May claims that she’s come up with a cunning plan, as cunning as a fox who won most cunning in show five times in a row. Only those leaks suggest that five months of work has actually produced…..nothing.

Like a school kid who constantly refuses to do her chores because she says she’s working on her homework, we’ve now seen inside Theresa May’s schoolbook and there’s nothing there but a few doodles. There is no grand master plan for brexit and their probably never will be. A country of 60 million does not get to dictate terms to a continent of 500 million, we’ll get what we’re offered and we’ll have to take it.

And we can’t even guess what sort of brexit we’re going to get, the government’s apparent position sways between the hardest of hard brexits, the laughably delusional statements of Boris to more recently Theresa May implying to the CBI she’ll go for the softest of soft brexits and may take more than the two years to happen as she’ll try to negotiate a transition deal. In short brexit means brexit seems to mean whatever the Tories reckon will placate whichever audience they are talking too.

About the only certainty we can have about the brexit process is that the Tories will inevitably use it to go after hard won environmental protections and labour laws designed to protect the very “JAM” families they now pretend to be the champions of.

And what are labour up too? Why aren’t they trying to stop the Tories? Well because with Corbyn in charge they are a rudderless ship. Both he and the “muesli” brexiters in labour also want brexit, as they hope they can rebuild their socialist workers paradise on the ashes of the mess the Tories leave behind. Of course they’ll never get the chance to do so given the impossibility of them winning the next election.

Which brings us to the supreme court ruling due next month. Theresa May’s strategy here seems to be that of the typical arrogant Tory, assume you’ll get your way (ya that worked well in the referendum didn’t it!) and then run around in a panic when you don’t and blame others for the mess you waded straight into. Her plan B is to put a three line piece of legislation to parliament. That would be little short of an insult to the democratic process. The most important bill in recent UK history cannot be three lines long. Not least because such a bill would be too opaque and at risk of further court challenges.

And keep in mind what parliament really wants here is to be consulted about the brexit process. They aren’t comfortable with the idea of turning Theresa May into an all seeing and all knowing dictator for some ill defined period and parliament reduced to that of a debating club. The government says they can’t involve parliament, because that would give away our (entirely non-existent) strategy. Well there’s a simple horse trade there, have a closed session of parliament and tell MP’s what Theresa May’s “bloody good idea” is. Then vote on article 50. Of course they won’t do that (because she doesn’t actually have a plan), and therefore there’s a chance of defeat in the commons. I’m doubtful the lords would endorse such a bill, as it would essentially be a case of the PM trying to cynically get around a court order. If the lords say no, then that puts a delay of at least 6 months to a year onto the process.

And the SNP and Northern Ireland assembly also want it determined if that have some say in the process. If the court says yes then that delays brexit yet further, or at worst kills it stone dead (or at least until after a border poll in Northern Ireland and an 2nd indyref in Scotland, this one called by Westminster).

And what is the state of the public finances? Well the guess is that we’re looking at a £122 billion hole in country’s finances, much of which will have to be borrowed. Its now likely the UK debt will exceed 90% of GDP by the next election (a level unseen since 1964) and likely exceed the symbolically important point of 100% within the next decade. And as former Chancellor Alastair Darling has pointed out this is arguably a hard problem to fix than he faced in the financial crisis . That was a temporary blip, this is an ongoing crisis that can only be stopped by massive public spending cuts or a significant hike in taxes.

And of course there’s the Trump factor. Some Tories were secretly hoping he’d win, as that would make things easy for the UK. But much as I warned, no, the only think we can be sure about trump is that he’s unpredictable. He’s now trying to instruct the Queen as to who she should pick as her Ambassador to the US. And his first instructions to Farage? go sort out those Scottish windfarms. Yes Trump things he’s entitled to dictate the energy policy of Scotland. And this is the great white hope of the brexiters!

You’re ambassador, lord Farage will see you now

Actually my guess is that Trump may not be in power by the time negotiating with the Americans comes up, he’ll likely have been impeached or had a little “accident” before then. I still say there’s an outside chance he won’t even be inaugurated, especially with allegations of voter fraud now swirling. Bottom line, you can’t rely on the Americans to bail you out, they’ve got bigger problems to deal with.

Given all of the above you would question the logic of pushing ahead with the aggressive timetable Theresa May has set. It would make far more sense to now delay the brexit process for at least a year in my view. Trigger it say in 2018 instead. This would give time for the legislative hurdles to be dealt with and for the government to actually come up with a strategy and consult parliament about that process. Also the fact is that 2017 is not a good time to be negotiating such a thing, there’s elections in Germany and France this year and possibly in Italy too. We’re not going to get anything sensible out of the EU because they have no idea who will be in charge of these countries in 6 months time. Waiting a year would give time to resolve this, talks when they do start, will be at a much swifter pace.

Of course the downside to delaying brexit, the whole reason why Theresa May is insisting on her current strategy is that this would mean the 2020 elections would straddle the brexit process. We’ll be voting on the next parliament about the same time brexit talks are winding up. My response is, good that’ sounds like an excellent idea. It gets around calls within her own party and the lib dems for a 2nd vote on the terms of brexit. If you like the deal she’s got, vote Tory, if you don’t vote labour, if you’d rather stay in the EU after all vote lib dem, if you want hard brexit and become airstrip one of the Trump empire vote UKIP.

So if’s that simple you may enquire why is Theresa May going out of her way to avoid this? After all the poll suggest she’ll likely win the next election anyway. Well the answer is very simple, I suspect if we got the PM drunk and asked her that question the response would be BECAUSE YOU MORONS VOTED FOR BREXIT.

Many voted brexit because they feel the government doesn’t listen to them, it was an act of political self harm, a cry for help. However as I warned prior to the referendum the likely outcome wouldn’t be a government that’s more caring and listening. Its one that would be more hostile, authoritarian and much more willing to lie and deceive the public. After all voters have just shown they can’t be trusted with important decisions.

So let us be clear, this is why the PM is so reluctant to trust either the public or even her own MP’s with a vote. Because both have shown themselves to be woefully unqualified to make important decisions anymore. Brexit means chaos and brexit means a UK that is significantly more authoritarian. So congratulations to any brexit voters who voted for this.

The Case for Space?

Figure 1: Could space travel and eventual colonisation help solve some of the world’s environmental problems?

I’ve been doing a bit of speculation recently on my energy blog about who space policy and sustainability might interconnect. In short, can space colonisation offer a possible solution to resource shortages or over-population? I’ve broken the answer down across three posts below:

Space a sustainability solution? A critical review

In the first article I look at the goals of space colonisation as well as the technical obstacles involved, notably in terms of propulsion technology and launch vehicle design. And to be clear, we are talking about space colonisation here, not space exploration, that’s two entirely different things.

Is it possible to significantly reduce the costs of launching payloads into space? The answer I suspect is, yes, which could make exploration cheaper and easier, but probably not by enough to make colonisation possible any time soon.

Space a sustainability solution – Part 2: Living on the high frontier

Not least because, as discussed in this second article, the problems associated with getting into space are small compared to the issues that come with living in space. Certainly, its possible for humans to live for extend periods on world’s like Mars or the Moon. But its far from proven if permanent habitation is possible.

And its also far from proven that we can sustain life support off earth for any colonists without regular resupply from earth, so any such colonies wouldn’t be a “backup” earth, as they’d be wholly dependant on earth for survival.

And one also has to question the motivations. With the exception of low level extraction of rare earth or precious metals, its difficult to build a credible and economically viable plan for space colonisation. I doubt we’ll be moving large number of people off the planet any time soon.

The case for space – Part 3: Martian delusions

Finally, I look at the recent announcements from groups such as Mars One, the Mars Society and Elon Musk’s proposals for Mars exploration and colonisation.

In short, one is left to ask if Mars one is an outright scam or merely a textbook example of the Dunning Kruger effect.

Bob Zubrin’s Mars Direct plan has some merit, although there are some holes in it, notably as it relies on a number of untested elements.

Unfortunately Elon Musk’s plans, which are based on Mars direct (just on a larger scale) also has a number of possible holes and potential show stoppers. Its possible they might be able to overcome these issues, but my guess is that it will take a lot longer that he proposes to get such a program off the ground and cost an awful lot more. And again, the jury is out as to whether Martian colonisation is even possible, or even a good idea.

Now everyone’s been Trumped

Analysis
So its Trump, how can 60 million people be that dumb! Many are trying to put the spin on it, that it was working class Americans in rust belt states fed up with how they are treated in Washington that swung the election. Well no, the polling data (both before and after the election) shows the vast majority of Trump voters are middle class or upper class whites who generally have a better than average income. The majority of low income whites still voted for Hillary. Certainly some more of them than did vote for Trump than would normally be expected in an election, but in theory this was cancelled out (to some degree) by an increased level of turn out and voting for Hillary by ethnic minority voters.

Indeed its worth remembering that she carried the popular vote, Trump carried the key swing states by only a tiny margin. The reality is that a Trump victory should have been mathematically impossible had it not been for large number of both wealthy or middle class Americans turning out to vote for him. So Trump is on their head, they are now responsible for whatever mess he makes.

A more crucial factor was that the “never Trump” block within the GOP clearly dithered at the final moment. I mean Republicans are such hypocrites. They launch all of that assault on Bill Clinton and Obama, go around thumping their bible complaining about how America now has no morals anymore….then vote for “grab them by the pu%&X” Trump, who is worse than Bill and far more corrupt than any president or candidate has ever been (Trump university for example, shady deals, Mafia connections) and will be spending some portion of his presidency in court. He may actually end up being indicted on bribery charges before he takes up office. And we can’t just point the finger at white men, the polling data shows a majority of white women also voted for him in certain older age groups. And least we forget Trump is likely to run up a massive deficit, far larger than Obama, so all that BS from the GOP about the debt ceiling over the last few years was clearly just political street theatre.

One fact is clear, is that facts no longer matter anymore. We are truly in the post truth world. And don’t even take my word for it. The analysis of a neuroscientist of Trump supporters is that there’s something wrong with their brains. They have an enlarged and overactive Amygdala, which means they are much more likely to overreact to perceived threats (whether real or imagined). They also have demonstrated an inability to be capable of separating fact from opinion, a trend we saw over in the UK prior to the brexit vote. In short, they believe crazy things because they don’t want to look bad in the eyes of their peers and because they gain some sort of sadistic pleasure out of the fact that it winds up liberals when they do this. Many of these are also increasingly getting their news from Facebook, or Alt-right websites who have both been accused of polarising subscribers by only showing them web pages that won’t challenge their views in an effort to get up site hits.

And there is also the Dunning-Kruger Effect, by which many overestimate their own ability. I see this all the time as a lecturer. The people who will most overestimate their performance tend to the low achievers, who then can’t understand how it is that they failed (I’m not joking they’ll be on like 18% and want it remarked convinced that somehow we got it wrong). By contrast some of the high achievers tend to underestimate their performance (and come to me straight after the exam with the “well I know I’ve failed, what now?” line….when in fact they finished top of the class!). Or put another way, many Republicans don’t realise how dumb they actually are.

And finally there is the racism. As in the brexit vote, some will try to argue that Trump winning had nothing to do with racism. Actually no, it very much had everything to do with it. Again the polls show that. The two leading reasons given for voting Trump were terrorism and immigration (i.e. no more darkies). On economic issues, even with low wage blue collar workers, Hillary won out easily. The simple fact is that many Americans who voted for Trump were quite willing to sacrifice some of their economic well being to see the wall build and America become a more racist place. There’s no way to sugar coat it. What Trump shows is that America is a very racist and misogynistic place.

If Trump and his supporters aren’t fascist, why do they keep getting caught making fascist salutes

Which is hardly surprising given how the GOP have been pushing those over stimulated Amygdala buttons for many decades now. They’ve effectively brainwashed a large chuck of the US population to the point where they cannot separate fact from fiction and believe in new age myths over real data and statistics. Where some fantasy pedalling creationist, climate denying whack-job is given the same credibility as a Nobel prize winning scientist. In doing so they’ve done great damage to American democracy. I mean I was talking to someone from China the other day and enquired what he thought of democracy and he just laughed. I mean seriously, if you were Chinese, horrible thought the Communist party is, would you rather have a system that elects Putin, Trump or votes for brexit?

Trump’s other supporters
And then there’s the other group of Trump supporters, Jill Stein and Gary “Aleppo” Johnson voters. Let’s be clear, you effectively voted for Trump. Go through the data, you’ll see that in the 5 key swing states (any 3 of which would have handed the election to Hillary) and if only half of those who voted for Stein and Johnson voted for Hillary she’d have won (or if all those in 3 of those states who voted for Stein voted Hillary, she would have won).

When Jill met Putin…..

One can’t argue with the maths, Hillary is not the president thanks to these voters. In effect by voting for either of these candidates in a swing state was the moral equivalent of taking part in a firing squad, but convincing yourself that you fired the blank round every time. Trump is on your head as well. I hope you like him, because its now your fault as much as it is the Republicans.

Hillary robbed at email point

Hillary tries on her inaugural gown

And given how narrow the victory was one has to look back at the e-mail scandal and the FBI’s last minute intervention. This clearly had an impact, its difficult to believe it didn’t. Now while its clear the polling data was off, it still had Hillary in about an 8% lead prior to Comey’s letter. The final polls put Hillary about 4% up. So one assumes that it caused a 4% swing against Hillary, while the polls were actually off by about 4% as well. I’m reminded of this scence from the Simpsons where Mr Burns runs for office.

Hillary had a massive lead prior to the Comey’s intervention

While Hillary has to take some of the blame, she may not have been the best choice of candidate (recall I never said I liked her much myself, its just I could see the difference between her and Mr Disaster). And she lost this election more than Trump won it (she got several million less votes than Obama got, while Trump got less votes that Romney got!). But clearly she’s right in pointing the finger at the FBI’s intervention, noting that if true, then Comey broke a long standing electoral law and should, along with Rudolph Giuliani and Senator Chaffetz be subject to a criminal investigation. Of course with Mr stop and frisk now likely to be the attorney general, that seems unlikely to actually happen.

Bernie
Inevitably some of the Bernie brigade are chirping about how Bernie would have won it. And yes I’ve seen polls showing that. However we have to put this in context. He hadn’t just fought an election campaign and have baseless racist/sexist smears thrown at him by the GOP, with the direct assistance of the FBI. Yes, he might just have pulled it off (this election favoured the outsider), but equally its possible is that he’d have still lost, perhaps by a larger margin.

Most Americans are trained from birth to consider anyone calling themselves a socialist to be coming for their wallet, their gun and their bible,in that order. Now I know that’s BS, but that’s still what many think. And there are large number of Americans, including quite a lot in the electoral block that typically vote democrat, who will not vote for an atheist as president. Bernie may have tied down a bit more of the white working class vote, but he’d have seen lower turn out among ethic minority groups from strongly religious backgrounds. And Blomberg would have followed through with his threat to run as a 3rd party candidate.

Again, look at the demographics of those who voted for Trump (who actually voted, ignore this myth about angry blue collar voters) its difficult to see Bernie making a bigger dent. Yes he might have won, but it would have been close. Then again, technically Hillary won, it was only this dumbass electoral college system that stopped her.

Trump v’s reality
So what can we expect from Trump? Well he’s biggest opponent is likely to be this little thing called “reality” and he can’t build a wall around that. Take for example his plan to put a 45% tariff on China and 35% on Mexico. Ya, that’s the thing, stick it to the Chinese, that’ll show’em….hay why’s my I-phone now 45% more expensive? And gas prices just went up, and when I went to buy new tires for my buick they were 35%….oh wait, now I see!

The only thing protectionism will achieve is it will make everything more expensive. Now while that’s not a big deal for those who can afford to pay 45-35% more for everything, its not so great news for anyone on a tight budget. Yes some companies might move their factories into the US, but only those who exclusively sell to Americans. As other nations will retaliate with tariffs of their own, they’d be shutting themselves out of the international market by moving into the US. It would in short, make more economic sense for Apple to relocate out of the US and abandon the American market than lose the rest of its world sales. America simply lacks the economic clout to fight a trade war with China or the EU. Trump and his supporters might think its 1928, but its not.

Then he wants to build the wall and deport all of the immigrants. Now ignoring the engineering and practical problems with all of that, the enormous costs and the fact that the Wall has been obsolete since the Wright brothers invented this thing called “planes”. And who is going to do their jobs? Do you think unemployed people in the rust belt are going to trek halfway across the country to take up manual labour jobs picking crops and cleaning toilets in California or Texas for 6 months a year, then go home again? The end result of his policy will be labour shortages and crops left to rot in the fields. As a result of Trump’s policy we could well see queue’s forming outside shops, much like in Venezuela recently, as certain items become scarce.

Economists fear the US deficit exceeding 100%….

Then there’s the deficit, his plan is to run up a massive deficit, up to $5.3 trillion to $10 trillion. Certainly, he’d push America pass the long feared threshold of 100%, at which point its likely investors will start to panic, US debt will be downgraded and interest rates will soar.

…..because it raises the risk of national bankrupcty

Now Trump says, oh I’ll renegotiate the debt or print more money. Ya, and you do realise that will devalue the US dollar? Meaning beyond a certain point, he’s no longer a billionaire (because a billion bucks suddenly ain’t worth that much). And this would also have to push up salaries, including those of state employees. government contractors will start charging the state more for their services. Lenders will charge a higher rate of return, so again interest rates go up. In short economic meltdown.

Another member of the Billionaire’s club! Trump’s plans would make everyone a billionaire just like him!

Certainly the “print money” option is a good idea, in a crisis, as a temporary means of restoring order. But as a long term debt management strategy its the equivalent of buying Trump wine and mixing it with water and then trying to sell it, only nobody wants to buy it at the original price, instead they’ll only buy it at a discount price. Trump is basically trying to argue that he can still make money selling this diluted wine at a lower price than he buys it. And recall the largest holder of US debt is pension funds based in the US not China.

Trump v’s congress
The second problem for Trump is that a number of his policies will not last long in congress.

For example one of the first groups he’ll be upsetting with any trade tariffs will be the US automotive lobby. This is a cabal of car makers, fossil fuel companies, construction firms (who build and maintain roads) and auto dealerships. A lot of US auto parts are shipped in from abroad (most notably Mexico), as is lots of its fossil fuel supply. They will be more than a little upset at the thought that their cars should be more expensive and their profits should take a hit. And these are not the sort of people you want to mess with. Keep in mind the global warming denial machine is just one tiny part of this lobby group. At a local politics level, these guys wield a lot of power (as this Adam ruin’s everything mentions), typically 20% of local sales tax comes from automobile sales. Who do you think local politicians will listen too, Trump or the guys who fund their campaign and the main source of local tax revenue?

In short, Trump messes with these guys, and they’ll see to it that the GOP will get crucified in the mid-terms. And the GOP know that, so they ain’t going to endorse a lot of the things he’s proposed. Likely they’ll pick and chose. For example his tax cut plans, they’ll go for the idea of cutting taxes to the wealthy or getting rid of estate taxes, but likely leave out the bit about closing off loopholes. Which given how ruthlessly Trump has relied on those loopholes himself (he’s probably not paid any tax for 18 years), its likely he’ll go along with. This will, as noted, push up the deficit, leave many poor Americans worse off, while the wealthiest one % are much better off. As fo

The GOP will also go after various ideological issues that play well with their electorate, e.g. repeal Obamacare, ban abortion and gay marriage, deport migrants (although oddly enough not his wife!), make gun ownership compulsory (except for Muslims and minorities of course!), etc. The environment, well they’re pretty much going to ban that, with consequences much like in this Simpson’s sketch  (its scary how old Simpson’s episodes are starting to play out in reality).However, they will likely face Filibustering tactics from the democrats, who will effectively now try to shut down congress and count down the clock on Trump’s presidency. And the GOP can hardly complain as this was essentially their tactics under Obama. In short, its likely the log jam in US politics will get worse under Trump not better.

There are some positive policies that might emerge, the GOP and Trump being the hypocrites that they are, they can be prone to a strong element of “not invented here” syndrome. e.g. Obamacare. Mitt Romney was dead set against this, and I mean who the hell came up with this job killing idea?…Mitt Romney did, Obamacare was modelled along the lines of similar policies in various American states…including one brought in by Mitt Romney! This explains Trump’s dithering on repealing Obamacare. He’d be replacing it with something very similar, just a bit more expensive and not as effective.

Similarly he might get certain things passed, who knows maybe even some modest gun control measures, some job creation through another stimulus package (much of which will inevitably find its way into his and his supporters pockets of course), simply because he proposed these things rather than Obama or Hillary. But beyond that, I’d brace yourself for disappointment.

Trump v’s the world
Trump will also face opposition worldwide. Pulling back from the Paris climate deal is not that straightforward, its now entered into international law, he’s going to find it very difficult to pivot away without suffering blow back. And the deal explicitly states that a country must give 4 years notice before leaving, so that’s not even possible within his presidency.

He also wants to make friends with Putin and break with the NATO alliance. Ya, run that by your generals first! They would be appalled and point out the dangers in such a policy towards US interests. Most of America’s forward deployed forces are in Europe. They rely on European airspace to supply forces in the middle east, conduct intelligence in Russia and watch for possible missile launches. Losing that is simply not acceptable as far as his generals will be concerned.

And I take it he doesn’t want to get re-elected? You do know that one of Putin’s allies happens to be a little place called IRAN who took delivery incidentally of S-300 anti-aircraft missiles a few weeks back. These missiles effectively make it very unlikely that Israel could now carry out any attacks against Iran without losing a lot of aircraft. As one US general put it “Iran is now Israel proof”. Even the US forces would now have to accept causalities from any bombing missions against Iran. Which means Trump would upset the Israeli lobby by cosying up to Putin.

And it takes some doing to have the Israeli’s and the Arab world against you. Those Muslim’s he wants to stop from coming into the US happen to control over 50% of the world’s oil production and hold many strategic bases. They now might just go away and form an alliance with the Chinese.

More worryingly its very easy to see how Trump and Putin could get into conflict with each other. For example, egged on by pro-Putin rhetoric from Washington Putin goes into the Baltic states, much like how Saddam mis-read signals from Washington and went into Kuwait. NATO forces, including American forces respond. And note that US commanders in the field don’t necessarily have to call the president before opening fire. If US forces or civilians come under attack, (or NATO allies ask the US commander for assistance) they can respond without waiting for a presidential order. So Trump would have to explicitly order his forces to stand down, even if it meant abandoning American civilians and military forces to be shelled and bombed. He’d be committing the very crime that the GOP tried to claim Hillary committed with regard to Benghazi, except on a much larger scale. He would be vilified, even by his own supporters as a new Benedict Arnold and likely Congress will have him out of office so fast his wig will spin.

Wall street’s man
And the bad news for anyone who did vote for him because your angry about the elites in Wall street in congress, well your a moron, stay away from ballot boxes in future. One little feature of election night I noted, firstly the Asian stock market crashed, dropping 1000 points in a few hours (as you’d expect if you’d followed the campaign). So heavy were these losses that the Dow didn’t open the next day, as it had lost 5% as a consequence of these losses in Asia. Then when it opened rather than the expected falls continuing, instead it barely moved.

Then the Asian markets regained their earlier losses within 24 hrs. To me this indicates that Wall street insiders knew something the Asian stockbrokers didn’t know (but quickly worked out), the fix is in. This behaviour means one of two things A) Wall street knows that something’s planned, Trump will not be president, he’ll have himself a little “accident” in a few days time, the electoral college will vote for Mike Pence or Hillary instead, etc. Or B) He’s been fixed, they’ve got some dirt on him or bought him, he’s their man.

I’m tending towards the second option, given that he’s now talking of repealing the Dodd-Frank act, a key bill brought in by Obama to prevent another financial crisis. In short all that BS during the rallies about going after wall street and draining the swamp, no it was all lies. He’s going to do nothing of the sort. If anything he’s going to make it easier for Wall street to screw the little guy, not the other way around.

Either that or the first option is correct and he’s not going to be president for some reason.

Trump and the UK
There are some in the UK who cheered Trump’s election. Theresa May won’t have been one of those. Firstly, after going to all this trouble to get brexit to kill off UKIP it does not suit the Tory agenda to now have UKIP going around portraying themselves as the UK Trump party. Also there has never been any doubt the UK could get a trade deal from the US, the question was always how beneficial it will be. Its a bit like trying to buy a car. If you’re in a hurry you’ll get it if you pay more than its worth. You want a fair price it takes a lot longer. You may have to walk away from a few deals first.

And again, remember Trump will have to get the details of such a deal past Congress. Recall the US auto lobby. Recall May has essentially committed to getting tariff free trade for the UK car industry. Its not possible to square those two circles. If Trump concedes on this point, he’ll face massive opposition from a very powerful lobby group (who been trying to stop European made cars, essentially those owned by their bitter rivals in Japan, from gaining a foothold in the US market), with their fingers in many swing states (and the pockets of many politicians) and some of the very voters who put him in power work in this industry. If Theresa May concedes, she can be looking at hundreds of thousands of job losses in the lead up to an election. There’s a solution, but its not that easy, it will take time and careful negotiation.

And if the UK ends up part of some sort of transatlantic trading bloc, they could face sanctions and punitive tariffs from the EU and China. Given that the UK does more of its trade with the EU than America, if it has to pick a side, the logical thing to do would be to pick the EU (of course there I go with my “logic” and “facts” again). This is the whole reason why so many voted remain. The UK is too small to be a world power by itself anymore. Its option are to either pool its resources with the rest of Europe, or become a vassal state of an existing empire, literally the 51st state in all but name.

And another reason for voting remain, is that the fear of the UK becoming essentially airstrip one (of 1984 fame) if it leaves the EU. You may enquire what’s to stop the US moving its forces in Europe and stationing them in Britain. Well, firstly geography (the Middle East is too far away! And you’d still need overflight rights from the Europeans). Secondly, this would be political suicide for the Tories. All of that controversy back in the 80’s over US missiles in the UK would spark off again. This is exactly the sort of controversy that could blow the Scottish independence referendum wide open or give Corbyn a fighting chance in 2020.

Trump’s Impeachment
The GOP wanted to impeach Hillary “in her ball gown”. This does seem unlikely, most of the controversies she has been accused of were simply made up or over-egged. More importantly the GOP have now set the bar for what constitutes grounds for presidential impeachment so low, its basically a given that any president whom they don’t like, if they can get the necessary votes, he can be removed from office.

And Trump has been involved in numerous scandals already, as noted he will be spending quite a bit of time in and out of court as it is. Also there are already warning signs of where a possible future scandal will erupt. Making white supremacist Steve Bannon as possible white house chief of staff for example, or that odorous brown envelope distributing toad Myron Ebell as head of the EPA, appointing his own relatives to senior posts, yet they also are trustees on the trust fund that will manage his finances during the presidency. You could start a sweepstake on how long before the balloon goes up.

And the democrats show every sign that they are going to come out of the gate swinging on the 21st of January. They feel that they have been cheated out of the presidency and are likely out for blood. They don’t have a majority enough to start impeachment, but they can start making waves. The GOP will likely try to hang onto Trump, so long as he’s useful. If he proves himself to be the disaster many expect him to be, the democrats won’t have to try very hard to convince enough of the Republicans to back impeachment. Personally I reckon a Trump impeachment attempt (successful or not) is essentially a matter of when not if.

Rise of Fascism

Of course we are making a very dangerous assumption here. That all the checks and balances of the US government will work. But what if they don’t? G. W. Bush should have been at the least investigated over the Iraq war and those “black flights” but he wasn’t (even Trump agrees with this). Its quite clear that Trump and a number of his inner circle have fascist tendencies. The way he’s now flip flopping like John Kerry at a summer footwear convention does suggest that they regard their own supporters as sheep. Mindless drones in a cult of personality who are too be manipulated, control and where necessary betrayed.

Keep in mind that Hitler was helped into power by the very sort of people who helped Trump into power, because they saw him as a useful idiot, who could be used to keep the plebs in line, while they the establishment still secretly ran things. Of course they didn’t count on Hitler ending democracy and relying on his cult of personality to rule by degree. The checks and balances of the US state are about to be subject to destructive testing that will test them to their limits.

If they fail the consequences are pretty grim. As Obama pointed out, one has to worry about a vain insecure man like him, who can’t be trusted with a Twitter account, having access to the nuclear codes. We are very close to midnight I fear.

And if the checks and balances fail, let us remember who got us here. Republicans, (so called) conservatives, plus Jill Stein and Libertarian voters, this one is on all of you. Historians of the future may judge your actions very harshly. My own guess its we that Trump in power probably signals that the US has receded from its high water mark. The US has essentially voted to go backwards, to retreat from the world, to be a less progressive place, to be the new “sick man” of world politics (by putting a sick man in charge). And that is the real problem with this election result.

You’ve been Trumped too

All in all, I think Trump was summed up rather well by Michael Forbes, the farmer who opposes Trump up in Aberdeenshire. In the recent film you’ve been Trumped Too, he reminisced that when Trump came to Scotland half the country loved him (including Alex Salmond) and half hated him. Now everyone hates him as they realised he’s a complete con artist, who tells tall tales, never delivers, he just fills his own pockets and massages his own ego.

My guess is that this is the reality, Trump is out for one person – himself. He doesn’t care if the country falls apart so long as he comes out on top. And that’s who America voted for!

What to watch on election night….

Might I recommend an appropriate film for US election night “By dawns early light”. Its a 1990’s film which provides a chillingly accurate description of how a nuclear war might progress. The final scene has a Donald Trump like character on board the E4 trying to enact a nuclear strike that will essentially end the world, only for the USAF airborne command centre plane (the looking glass EC-135) to ram his plane in order to stop him transmitting his orders, with assistance of the E4 crew who deliberately bank their plane to save the world…hopefully it won’t become a documentary by tomorrow morning.

Bigoted Britain

One of the more unsavoury aspects of the brexit vote is how the bigot brigade now feel they can throw their weight about. There’s been a worrying rise in racist and xenophobic incidents, up 14% nationally, but as high as 70% higher in some hot spots. A number of foreigner visitors (some only here as tourists) have reported all manner of stories of random abuse being shouted at them, eggs thrown at them, shop windows smashed or being attacked in a public park. Even Lily Allen has reported how she had abuse shouted at her by a cab driver who refused to accept her fare (she’d said something earlier in the week about how the UK should take in more refugees). And this is on the mild side. We have of course the recent murder of a Polish man (now being investigated as a hate crime) and of course just prior to the referendum, there was the murder of MP Jo Cox by a pro-leave bigot.

Unsurprisingly given that Britain has become a more racist and unwelcoming place, some have had enough and there’s stories of how some Polish people are now moving out of the UK, now no longer feeling welcome. I’ve even heard talk from one or two people I know who are thinking about leaving. We’ve even got the rather embarrassing story of how the descendants of Jewish families who came to Britain to flee the nazi’s, are now fleeing back across the channel and seeking to regain their German citizenship.

The word “Britain” is increasingly being seen in international circles as synonymous with the word “bigot”. And anyone who voted brexit, let us be clear this one is on your head. Make whatever excuses you want, but by voting leave you made common cause with the sorts of racists and bigots a previous generation of Briton’s died to stop from taking over this country. By voting leave you betrayed every principle the UK was founded on. For shame! History will likely judge your actions very harshly.

Far right out of the closet
Stateside some Americans might be tempted to take the moral high ground and say how awfully racist the British now are…yet they still can’t explain why so many want to vote for Trump. Maybe I can offer an explanation.

In part it has to do with “the bloc”, that being the GOP voters, who for various reasons (ideology, religion, down right ignorance and stupidity), will always vote GOP no matter what. The GOP could nominate Kim Jung un, he could campaign on a platform of selling them all into slavery and randomly shot into the crowds at his rallies and I guarantee you the GOP would still carry most of the “red states”. Even if the reincarnation of George Washington was the democrat candidate.

Secondly, Americans, much like the British, need to accept that they are a much more racist country than they have ever realised. Case in point, the Bundy brigade who held up a wild life preserve at gun point, then after a stand off, car chase and shoot out (which left one of their number dead) recently beat the rap and walked out of court without any punishment. By contrast, protesters against an oil pipeline in Dakota have been harassed, suppressed and imprisoned. A reporter, who was filming the protests, now faces 45 years in prison. Edward Snowden would get a “mere” 30 years if he arrived back in the US.

Spot the terrorist (PS, according to the Trump bigot brigade, its not the guy with a gun)

And in other news missed within the election coverage, a Saudi student was killed in what is believed to have been a racially motivated attack. Plus, as James Comey’s blatantly politically motivated actions have illustrated, parts of the FBI are filled with racist rightwing partisans.

An African American church burning…in the name of Trump!

One is reminded of the bad old days in the deep south where the Klan would go out and lynch someone, get caught and walk out of court scot free. Meanwhile any black or northern college activists who tried to do something about segregation would be followed around by the cops, get beaten to a pulp while the cops looked on and then get themselves arrested and the book thrown at them for the most minor offences…..then also get lynched and murdered themselves.

The unfortunate reality which this election campaign has exposed, is that racism in the US did not end with the Jim Crow laws. It just went underground, it went dark. The reality many Americans need to accept is that probably about 1/3 of the country, or at least 3/4’s  of “the block”, are racists and bigots. They do not believe that a black person is equal to a white person (some even argue that blacks were better off as slaves!). Nor is a catholic, a Jew or a Muslim equal to a WASP like them. That Hillary is automatically disqualified from being president, not because of her emails or her politics, but because she’s a women and a women can’t be in charge of a man.

And its obvious the US far right plan to try and intimidate ethnic minority voters during the voting on Tuesday. Already some of them are showing up at polling stations with guns. The irony is their excuse is they fear the election being rigged…..so they plan on basically rigging it themselves! One can only assume that if they win, much like how the brexit brigade were emboldened in the UK, they’ll go on the rampage. We’ll be hearing stories of burning crosses on people’s lawns and ethinc minorities being driven out of white neighbourhoods.

Again spot the terrorist…hint he’s the guy who isn’t white

Making the West history
And what are the likely consequences of all of this? I mean if foreigners leave it will mean more jobs for British people? Actually no! If one or two of the people I know leave, well yes I suppose a British person could take their job…..if they’ve got a PhD in a particular narrow field of chemistry or engineering and about ten years experience! Oh, and if they leave they take their research grant with them and the half a dozen British technicians who work for them get the sack.

As for lower paid workers, it is often argued they are doing the jobs the British won’t do. That’s not quite true. Often the problem is that these jobs are temporary posts in locations far away from unemployment blackspots. A Polish person will have no problems relocating to Inverness for 6 months to do a minimum wage job over the summer. But a Britain person in Skegness with a house and kids in school often isn’t willing to do so. Remove the option to hire the Polish person just means one of three outcomes, the job will be unfilled, raising the risk of the company shutting up shop or move overseas. The company may increase its wages to tempt a British person to take it (but that pushes up the cost of the services it offers, making it more expensive to UK customers and potentially rendering the company uncompetitive internationally). Or,  the company may seek to eliminate the job by automating it altogether. All in all, the likely outcome of this rise in racism is likely to be less people in employment not more.

As I’ve pointed out before, the UK is not Australia (i.e. a combination mining colony and holiday destination). Running a knowledge based economy in an ageing country without the ability to bring in young minds (and tax payers) and fresh ideas is likely to be a recipe for economic disaster in the long run. The next generation of inventors and innovators will skip Britain (and the US) and head for less racially charged nations. Neil Ferguson pointed out in his series a few years ago, The west, and in particular Britain’s, success in past centuries boiled down to a number of “killer apps”. Competition, Science, rule of law, etc. Now you (like me) may dispute some of this theory here, even perhaps devise your own set of “apps”, but one cannot help but point out that many of these “apps” only work on the implicit assumption that the West remains open to foreigners to coming in and open to new ideas (i.e. none of this anti-science malarkey also on the rise since brexit).

And keep in mind that the UK is at a disadvantage to other Western states because it lacks the natural resources of the US, Canada or Australia. It doesn’t have the high value exports and warm climate of Spain, Italy or France and its got nothing like the high tech industrial base of Germany. Indeed per capita, even Ireland ranks above the UK for industry as a proportion of its GDP (20% in Ireland v’s 10% in the UK).

So brexit now threatens to undermine the UK’s ability to bring in new talent (such as scientists, doctors, etc.). Indeed the country may now lose the people it has as they seek their fortunes in other parts of the world (as the falling pound means a massive drop in relative salaries). Already quite a few recent engineering graduates are heading for the exits.

Also the other “killer app” of the UK (relative to the rest of the West) has been its relatively free markets and easy access to finance. Given that the banks are on the verge of jumping ship (for better or for worse) that crosses off that one. An orderly evacuation of New York is possible if Trump wins. And the post-brexit UK is now an economy based heavily on government intervention and political patronage, as the Nissan and Hinkley deals make clear. Those who bend’eth the knee before the brexit high sept, will have gifts lavished on them. Those who are seen to be out of favour (e.g. wind farms which have helped cut UK carbon emissions by rather a lot recently and stabilise energy prices in he wake of rising gas prices thanks to brexit) are punished for their success. Keep in mind that its likely the Nissan deal could work out as extremely costly to the UK, and Hinkley C is likely to cost the taxpayer tens of billions (on top of the hundreds of billions bill payers will have to stump up over its 50 year life). And its recently been revealed that the government will have to pick up the tab for the plant’s eventual decommissioning (which generally has worked out more expensive than building the plant in the first place).

And one cannot help but point out the irony of a brexit won on the back of a lie that we’d get money back of johnny foreigner in Brussels to spend on the NHS….instead the UK is likely to have to pay out billions to foreign multinationals and billionaires, while the NHS is screaming for funding, with dire warnings of possibly collapse in the provision of certain services if something isn’t done quickly. Hardly progress is it! And as a whole the UK government is already facing a £14 billion shortfall due to falling tax revenue.

And this post brexit bigotry also raises a more serious risk, the breakup of the UK. I would argue that hidden in the small print of the contract that is the UK is the long standing principle that the English, who make up the majority of the UK’s population, will not use their majority position to force English nationalist domination onto the other parts of the country. Brexit and the bigotry it has spawned obviously suggests that this particular contract has been torn up. And if that’s the case, then the UK itself is on borrowed time. I’m not sure if the Indyref2 will go the SNP’s way, we’ll have to see. I will certainly be voting yes, if only to get away from all of this awful xenophobia. But even if its another no vote, I’d still argue a future break up of the UK becomes a matter of “when” and “how” and no longer “if”, unless something is done to kill of this rising tide of bigotry. The lessons of history are not on the UK’s side here.

Recall how the Soviet Union tried to hold things together as the Commonwealth of Independent states after the fall of communism, which very quickly broke down, once the other nations saw a rising tide of Russian nationalism. Similarly Yugoslavia broke up, when the other nations feared domination by the Serb majority. Czechoslovakia split down the middle as well. And the Austro-Hungarian Empire imploded after World War I once it became clear the scale of the mess the Hapsburg’s had dragged the various ethnic groups in the country into. And least we forget Ireland left the UK also thanks to World War I because the view was taken that we could no longer tolerate English interference in Irish affairs, or being dragged into European wars that we wanted nothing to do with.

One of course hopes the future breakup of the UK will be peaceful, but speeches along the lines of how “we came into the EU as one nation and will leave as one”from the brexit brigade sound eerily similar to what was coming out of Slobodan Milosevic’s mouth in the lead up to the Yugoslav civil war. Trying to stonewall the Scots in the event of indyref2 (which seems to be Theresa May’s plan) is a potentially very dangerous tactic.

Equally headlines branding Judges “enemies of the people” is the sort of thing I’d expect to read in Der Sturmer in the 1930’s, not the UK in the 21st century. And of course one cannot help but put point out the irony of how one of the arguments for brexit is that British judges should make decisions like this….now the British judges have spoken they’ve been vilified. There’s a very real risk that if there is a vote on brexit in parliament, of it being turned into a rerun of the 1933 Enabling law vote in Germany.

So if brexit means bigotry, then I would argue its a price that is too high. The price is likely to be the future economic prosperity of the UK, if not an end to the UK itself. Thus brexit must be stopped, or failing that it must be set up to screw over the bigot brigade. A soft brexit, with open borders, a relaxed policy on refugees (here’s a thought, the regions which voted the most for brexit should be required to take in a higher proportion of them!) should be a priority.

And there needs to be a change in the law to drive the bigots back into whatever gutter they crawled out of. Fines, prison sentences, a block on claiming benefits or working in a public sector related job, all should be increased to make them think twice before opening their dirty racist pie holes. I’d argue this taxi driver who refused to pick up Lily Allen should be stripped of his cab license for life. Anyone who is convicted of racial hatred, I say treat them like the UKBA treats migrants to the UK. They’d have to go through several years of paying taxes but going without benefits payments or tax credits or voting rights. Then, assuming they behave (else we reset the clock and they have to start all over again), they earn the right to reapply for citizenship to get all of these things back (paying through the nose for it, going through citizenship classes & tests, etc.). That might teach them a bit of respect!

Some points on the article 50 court ruling……

Given today’s court ruling on article 50 I think its important to establish a few points.

Firstly, it goes along with what I said immediately after the referendum, that there is a massive legal question mark hanging over the whole brexit process. Let us review the facts, 52% of the electorate on a turn out of about 70% voted leave, which means only 37% of the electorate actually backed brexit in a non legally binding referendum. This is well short of what would be considered the minimum democratic standards. In most democracies to do something as radical as leave the EU would require a clear majority of the electorate to back it (i.e. 50% +1 vote). And of course we have to ignore the numerous blatant lies told by the leave camp prior to the vote, many of which they reneged on within hours of the polls closing.

Yet on the basis of this Theresa May was not only going to try and drag the country out of the EU, but she wasn’t going to consult parliament, neither to confirm the decision to invoke article 50 nor even to set the terms of the UK’s exit. She was going to appoint herself as the all seeing all knowing dictator, the dear leader, whom we must trust implicitly. And she appeared to be aiming for a hard brexit, despite there being nothing on the ballot paper about that, plus the impression was given during the referendum campaign that they’d be aiming for a soft brexit. Indeed Boris Johnson initial pitch was that he won’t even trigger article 50 but just negotiate a better deal.

And since we’re talking about, when did Theresa May win an election? Where’s all this stuff about hard brexit in the Tory election manifesto? When did they get elected on the promise of giving away billions to foreign multinationals? (such as Nissan and EDF).

Now brexiters will make various excuses at this point, whinge about remoaners, but while doing so they will ignore a very important point – you are setting a very dangerous electoral precedence. If Theresa May, an unelected standin PM with no democratic mandate, can leave the EU with no vote in Parliament, on the back of a non legally binding referendum, which only 37% of the electorate supported, what’s to stop Nicola Sturgeon (who actually did win an election and a 2nd referendum in the event of brexit was in the SNP manifesto) taking Scotland out of the UK on a similar mandate? And I discussed before “the Spanish option” for preventing Scottish independence, will not work. It would most likely result in an overwhelming Yes vote, possibly even a majority of the electorate backing it. And then what are they going to do if she wins and decides to implement Scottish independence unilaterally, invade Scotland? Keep the place under martial law forever? I seem to remember that being tried out in Ireland, remind me how did that work out?

And speaking of Ireland, keep in mind the same potentially applies in Northern Ireland. If there’s one thing that would drive enough people in the province to back a united Ireland its a hard brexit. And the precedence Theresa May is setting is that if somehow Sinn Fein can get a vote, even if its non legally binding (i.e. not approved by Westminster) and even if less than 50% of the NI population back the measure, they can have their way. Unionists assurances that they can prevent a vote by controlling enough of Stormont seats may not hold if the economy tanks and electorates decide to punish them for supporting brexit in the first place (or at least the one unionist party who foolishly backed brexit) .

All in all, I’d argue the Tory case here is slim to non-existent. Parliament and the house of lords should vote and they should be allowed to vote their conscience. And given that a vast majority of both houses are anti-brexit, then they should be allowed to vote that way. If that pisses off the brexit brigade, too bad, go away and hold another referendum and do it properly this time. i.e. no lies, you have to get 50% of the electorate to back brexit and you have to lay out exactly what brexit means, firmly nail your colours to the mast as to what sort of brexit you are looking for…..and a signed letter from the EU confirming you can get what you claim you’ll get.

Of course the danger is that MP’s will be pressured into backing brexit against their better judgement. Well I would advice them to think again. Keep in mind if you are a labour MP, polls have shown that labour supporters overwhelmingly backed remain, by as much as 90% in some cases. If your constituency voted brexit, you have to consider that this motion was backed by a minority of labour supporters (who should really stop reading the Daily Express) along with the Tory and UKIP voters. The Tory and UKIP members in your constituency aren’t going to suddenly vote for you just because you voted for article 50…..but the overwhelming majority of labour supporters might stop voting for you if you do! Hence why I would urge everyone to go to your MP and make it clear that if they vote for article 50 they can count on you never voting for them or their party ever again.

And the Tories here are also in a tight spot. Quite a number of the marginal seats in Oxfordshire and in and around London (basically where elections in the UK tend to be fought and won) voted remain. And I mean by a very wide margin, 70% in some cases. The likes of Amber Rudd, Theresa May, Boris Johnson and Jeremy Corbyn all contest seats like this. It is hypocritical to say the least to argue that a labour MP who is pro-remain should be pressured into voting for article 50, just because his district did so, but then say that pro-leave MP’s can defy the overwhelming support for remain in their constituencies. And ultimately these MP’s need to consider the consequences for themselves of now voting for article 50. To be blunt its possible all of those I’ve just mentioned could be out on their ear at the end of the next election, if the electorate decides to punish them at the polls.

And since we are talking about it, recall the house of lords is not bound by the electorate. They are well within their rights to vote the way they see as being in the best interest of the country. And given all of what I’ve said above it would be perfectly reasonable for them to vote against article 50. This would eventually trigger the use of the Parliament act, but in the process it would allow some sort of compromise to be sought.

And the obvious compromise is two fold. Firstly put all the cards on the table. On the one hand aim for a soft brexit, with as close ties to Europe as possible. Secondly look at further devolution of powers to Scotland and Northern Ireland, perhaps making the UK an entirely federal state. This could allow both regions to join the EU in their own right. Now the powers that be say no, but there is a legal precedence here. Greenland left the EU but Denmark (which Greenland is still part of) remained. So I suspect it could be argued the same could apply to Northern Ireland and Scotland in reverse, so long as they were suitably independent from Westminster.

Unfortunately, I doubt this will happen. This is the problem with the whole brexit process. It is in the hands of a bunch of authoritarian, narrow minded, hard right ideologues, who see it as a god given mandate to roll back every bit of progressive legislation passed in the UK since the end of the war. The very fact the forced the courts to intervene like this should show you that they will steer the ship into the iceberg rather than give up control or change course.

A GOP stitch-up of the election

The “October surprise” of a new batch of Hillary’s e-mails has threatened to upset the election. The democrats have cried foul and perhaps for good reason. There is a long standing tradition in all democratic governments than in the weeks leading up to an election government agencies are supposed to be in a state of Purdah, which means no statements should be released that might sway the vote either way. While the system isn’t quite as official and regulated in the US as it is in the UK, it is still a widely respected policy. Its been suggested that FBI chief James Comey actions, who is also a registered Republican, might actually be illegal and thus he could end up in prison rather than Hillary.

Indeed the FBI’s actions here don’t add up. Normal practice would be to keep this sort of thing confidential (even if there wasn’t an election going on) until you have something more tangible (such as some actual “evidence”, the FBI haven’t even read these e-mails yet, they could be a collection of Hillary’s pot roast recipes for all we know). This applies whether you are investigating a political candidate or Benny from the Bronx or Johnny tightlips.

Why? Well for starters we have this principle of innocent until proven guilty. If you don’t even have evidence of guilt (never mind proof), its a little early to be throwing around accusations. It makes getting an unbiased jury harder and makes it more likely the defendant will get off on a technicality (as it kind of implies you launched a fishing expedition against him, which technically the cops aren’t supposed to do). Also obviously enough if a prep knows they are being investigated they will do something about it, skip town, intimidate witnesses, “retire” a key informant, etc. Given that the democrats now see this as a GOP plot, they are closing ranks, the chances of the FBI completing their investigation in a timely manner are somewhere between slim and none. So one is forced to the conclusion that either James Comey is grossly incompetent or criminally abusing his office for political ends.

But how serious is this e-mail scandal? Well firstly we do need to remember that back when Hillary did set up this account it was against the backdrop of wikileaks when there were fears that US government e-mail systems weren’t that secure. This was largely the fault of Obama’s predecessor G. W. Bush. His big idea, the department of Homeland security, was a bureaucratic nightmare. So in order to make it work, they adopted very lax controls over e-mail security, which was exploited by Wikileak whistle-blowers.

Also at the time the legislation governing the handling of confidential materials was a bit ambiguous, it wasn’t clear if it applied to e-mails. Keep in mind that Hillary’s predecessor, Condelezza Rice went around with a blackberry during her time in office (the whole reason Hillary went with this private e-mail server was because the NSA won’t supply her with a secure blackberry). On the other hand, its been argued Hillary might have been using a private e-mail server to avoid future FOI requests. Keep in mind that the GOP have been bombarding her with these for the last 25 years. So her paranoia is understandable, but its possible she was genuinely trying to hid something (e.g. emails to wall street bankers, the Clinton foundation, etc.). But the point is A) we don’t know, this is all speculation. And B) Republicans have done the same thing or far worse in the past.

If the bar for prosecution and denying someone access to high office is this low, then G. W. Bush (two illegal wars, black sites, illegal use of torture, the biggest recession in 80 years), G. H. Bush (Panama invasion, the Church committee while head of CIA), Reagan (Iran Contra) should all have been impeached and removed from office. And Mitt Romney and Trump himself should also be disqualified as both have done far worse than anything committed by Hilary. To call the Republicans behaviour here double standards doesn’t even come close.

Of course, one factor in all of this everyone seems to forget is that there’s a long standing tradition in US politics that upon the election of a new president, the heads off all of the US government departments will file a letter of resignation with the new president. Now generally the incoming president will refuse to accept their resignation and re-appoint them. But every once in a while they don’t (Nixon was notorious for using this to get rid of officials he didn’t like). Given the frayed relationship between Hillary and Comey, he probably feared she won’t e-mail him back once he tenders his resignation (her likely claiming that she didn’t want to force the FBI to start another e-mail investigation!) and he’d be out on his ear.

So there’s an element of cynical short-sightedness here. Comey, trying to save his career, regardless of the cost to the country. Of course whether you’d want to be FBI chief with Trump in charge is another matter. He’ll use the FBI to go after his perceived enemies, so he’ll spend the next 4 years reading the e-mails of Hillary and late night comedians, while drug dealers, the mafia (who may have Trump on the payroll), terrorists and corrupt business executives get ignored. In short the FBI will be sent back to the bad old days of J. Edgar Hoover’s time in charge…if they aren’t already there!.

And of course, what’s the likely outcome? Well if Hillary wins (which is still the most likely outcome), not only is Comey gone but pretty much every Republican senior office holder too. She would be well within her rights to argue that if the GOP are going to use the offices of state to settle political scores and play silly games, screw you, I’ll sack the lot of ye’s and appoint democrats or independents to those jobs instead. Of course this will lead to yet more partisan politics and a lack of political progress.

And speaking of short-sightedness, what is Assange up too? Okay, he doesn’t like Hillary, she doesn’t like him. But what does he hope to achieve? Does he want Trump to be elected? What will happen then? Assange’s claim for seeking asylum is that he fears going back to Sweden in case they extradite him to the US where he may fact charges carrying the death penalty. This doesn’t add up. Sweden has laws in place that would forbid extradition under such circumstances. But with Trump in charge, do you think Trump is going to respect Ecuadorian sovereignty? No way, he’ll have some assassin blow Assange’s brains out from across the street or send some Green Beret’s in to drag him out. So for the sake of scoring a few childish points, he’s jeopardising his own life and the entire political system. No wonder he has the Ecuadorian’s nervous. My guess is Trump or Hillary he’ll likely be put out on the street not long after the election, as he has now made himself a liability.

The short-sightedness of some people, they’re willingness to cut off their own nose to spite their face, is just sometimes baffling. Hopefully American voters will have the good sense to see through the facade to what’s really going on here and ignore it.