When I awoke on Tuesday morning (I’m penning this a bit later in that am) one of the first things I did was check my phone and was greeted by an email saying that several major websites including the New York Times and CNN had been hacked. This is part of a major issue confronting America recently and I want to pontificate on it for a bit today.
Tag Archives: MAD
Making Putin Smile
Russian President Vladimir Putin wants to make Russia a world power again. Aside from its nuclear arsenal it is way too small by most other measures to attain such a status anywhere in his lifetime by overtaking other countries unless those other countries are significantly weakened. Nuclear war means mutually assured destruction (MAD) or something so close to it as to be unacceptable to any rational nation state. While Putin may be evil, he is rational. Putin never seems to smile. (Laughing at people is not smiling.) Let’s juxtapose those facts. Continue reading Making Putin Smile
A MAD Week Starts 2018?
I remember the duck and cover under a desk drills in school in preparation for a nuclear attack by the Soviet Union. That would have done about as much good as a Betsy DeVos led Department of Education. Out of that era came an international relations theory known by the acronym of MAD which stood for Mutually Assured Destruction. Decades later came a television series named Mad Men. That “mad” stood for Manhattan’s Madison Avenue which was the epicenter of the powerful advertising business in the 1960’s. Last week we may have seen a 2018 version of mad men (as in insane) and they may be engaged in mutually assured destruction only unlike various American Presidents and Soviet Premiers they may not be smart enough to avoid the mutual destruction. Let’s explore. Continue reading A MAD Week Starts 2018?
The Manchild Who Cried ‘Wolf’
This is another Sunday article where it is impossible to determine the big story of the week. I began penning this early Friday afternoon, just hours after the Neil Gorsuch was confirmed as the 113th Supreme Court Justice in American history. That act is arguably the greatest theft in American history and one that we will suffer from for decades. The news is dominated by last night’s attack on Syria; but that only serves as part of a backdrop for today’s article. Let’s explore something that is deeply concerning me about the state of the presidency. Continue reading The Manchild Who Cried ‘Wolf’