The Scorched Earth Strategy

Bush and the republican sheep who followed him have put the party into such a hole that nationalized health care may be unstoppable this time. Bush and Greenspan also managed to severely damage the reputation of capitalism. From the beginning, even before he was elected, I wondered who was behind Bush, who the real power and brains could possibly be--I could never conceive of Bush being anything other than a puppet. But, I still wonder, who are the puppetmasters? Cui bono? It's too depressing to believe the straight story, that the entire Bush era was a succession of stupidities and accidents.

The Pakistani Way

http://economist.com/books/displaystory.cfm?story_id=10424283

 

The book reviewed revisits the Pakistan-nuclear proliferation nexus managed by Mr. Khan. This is one of America's great foreign policy failures in recent times. If the book's interpretation is accurate, it begets some wonder concerning what other activities our political and intelligence leaders may have decided to let pass as they let Khan's network pass for all those years. Presumably we remain vigilant at least with respect to our rivals--but have we allowed other supposed allies to proceed with WMD programs under cover of our willful ignorance? And doesn't such a policy stance severely diminish our moral standing on counter-proliferation issues? Is this a certain reward now on offer for any nation that allies itself with us--however temporarily? It is difficult to conceive of a more foolishly short-term approach. Also, why did we let Khan run unfettered through the 90's? Pakistan was then less important strategically.

But, of course, the book may be wrong; maybe we just didn't know about Khan--wouldn't that be a relief? Then, our only problem would be somehow to correct our monumentally wasteful and incompetent intelligence services.  

Dr. Watson and the Goodthinkers

Watson, the Nobelist DNA co-discoverer, has been run out of conformist society for mentioning the great gap in IQ scores between black Africans and the people of the developed world. The scientific literature counts a 25-30 point differential. Watson's point, in context, was that this is likely a major obstacle to African development, since IQ tests are designed to measure an individual's capacity to function in a modern economy and society. These scores indicate that only 2-5% of black Africans have IQs of 100 or above, 100 being the average IQ of white Americans and Europeans and Japanese and most developed populations. Who in Africa can lead? Who can run government, create businesses, manage businesses, provide technical and engineering services, enforce the law, provide medical care, engage in banking services, manage money for governments, businesses, individuals? In the developed world, we rely on people with IQs over 100 to do these things, or at least to provide the leadership in these sectors. This is not to speak of the surplus IQ needed for actual innovation.

For mentioning this crucial issue in the development, not just of the economy, but of civilization itself--Watson is ostracized and most hypocritically lambasted. If his cowardly critics actually cared about these African unfortunates, they might seek for solutions to this massive IQ deficit instead of persisting in their quasi-religious posing as holier-than-thou saints of political correctness. For example, there is clear evidence that African IQs are substantially depressed by poor pre-natal, post-natal, and infant nutrition. Also, excessive infectious disease rates among mothers and children reduce cognitive potential. Action, thus, might be taken. But the PC scoundrels prefer to engage in a ritualistic excommunication "action."

The following post is a fairly thorough examination of this shameful episode of the intellectual "establishment" working hard to scramble and suppress the truth and invert decent values:

http://www.gnxp.com/blog/2007/10/james-watson-tells-inconvenient-truth_296.php