Caffeinated Thoughts

Nuclear Proliferation And Why We Should Support It
Obama’s Support for Same Sex Marriage Should Come as No Surprise
Universal Suffrage: Not Always A Good Idea

Nuclear Proliferation And Why We Should Support It

Posted: 09 May 2012 10:58 PM PDT

Could nuclear proliferation, ie the spread of nuclear weapons, actually be a good idea? In this post I will explain why I think it is (under certain circumstances), and why it may be the best way to preserve peace in the world.

Here is how it works: Essentially, the two most powerful countries in the world after the US, in other words Russia and China, both have nuclear weapons. They’re both potential superpowers (although I’ve always argued that Russia is a greater threat than China), and they’ve both shown a certain tendency to be aggressive towards their smaller neighbours (Tibet and Taiwan in China’s case, Georgia in Russia’s case).

The problem for the US is that the US not in a million years would wage a war against either country, and so it’s hard to act when China bullies Taiwan or when Russia decides to take their military on a field trip to Georgia. Sure you can protest, but since when do these countries care? It’s not like they weren’t counting on you protesting when they made their decisions.

Russia and China has some democratic neighbours that we in the west ought to support, but kind words are not going to help them. Pledging to support them if they are attacked is a good first step, but it’s far from enough (in particular as no-one really trusts the US after all the betrayals committed under Obama).

These countries have to be armed enough to withstand a Russian or Chinese attack. But even if you were to give away guns, ammo and tanks to every individual in the entire Taiwanese population, they would still be outnumbered by the Chinese army.

What is then left, if we want to ensure that these countries never ever occupy one of their neighbours again? The answer lies in nuclear proliferation. By simply providing Taiwan, Georgia, Latvia, Lithuania and all the other democratic countries bordering these evil nations with nuclear weapons, the problem is solved.

Do you know why the cold war never became a real war? Because of the mutually assured destruction that would have occured and that neither side wanted. The US knew that if they attacked Russia, Russia would strike back with nuclear weapons, and then the US would launch its nuclear weapons and then the fight would go on until everyone froze to death in the following nuclear winter. No-one wanted that outcome, and so neither party decided to go to war against the other party.

That’s exactly the kind of stand-off we want to create between Russia, China and their democratic neighbours. By providing them with nuclear weapons, and obviously the know-how on how to use them, we can chain Russia and China to their current geographic areas and create eternal stability in these parts of the world.

I can see three objections coming up: First, what if the nukes get stolen? What if terrorists take them? Sure, the US nukes are safely guarded (or so we’d like to think), but there is no guarantee this would be the case in other countries.

The problem with that argument is that those who make it don’t really understand how nuclear weapons work. You can’t just run away with them and then light the fuse and make them go off wherever you want. Portable nuclear weapons – nuclear weapons that could be carried in a briefcase or so – is truly a scary scenario, but they don’t exist yet and so terrorists getting nukes, or stealing “stationary” nukes is not something we have to be worried about.

Then the next problem is: What if it doesn’t work? What if, say, Russia were to attack Georgia using some kind of Bliztkrieg strategy and occupy them before they have time to launch their nukes? Then the US nukes would fall into enemy hands! First of all, I believe Russia would be most unlikely to try anything if Georgia were in possession of nukes; the risks are just too high. And even if they did, and they did get the nukes, it wouldn’t really make a difference. Russia (and China) has thousands of nukes, even if they get an extra 10 or so from Georgia that won’t change anything at all.

Finally, would these countries really want nukes? I mean, there is a reason why they haven’t developed them themselves so far? Yes there is. But the reason is not necessarily that they don’t want nukes, but rather that 1) They don’t have the money/know-how to build them and 2) it takes time to build a nuclear arsenal, and during that time they would be vulnerable for an attack from a Russia or China who realizes that it’s “now or never”. If the US simply decides to give Georgia a dozen of nukes as a christmas present or whatever, that’s a whole different thing and I doubt many countries would turn the offer down.

But why should the US do it? Nukes are expensive, is it not a waste, even if it would work? We need to remember that the US, as it stands of today, is a superpower in decline. This is not in any way irreversible, but over the next 1-2 decades, the US will have to focus on solving its fiscal crisis and won’t have enough money for military expeditions like the ones in Iraq and Afghanistan (even though I think they were both justified). In order to make sure that China and Russia doesn’t occupy the world while the US is busy getting its fiscal house in order, I believe nuclear proliferation to selected allies is necessary.

Thanks for reading. Please leave a comment and let me know what you think.

Obama’s Support for Same Sex Marriage Should Come as No Surprise

Posted: 09 May 2012 07:30 PM PDT

The White House today touted President Barack Obama's revelation in an interview with ABC News. President Obama announced, "I think same sex couples should be able to get married." He went on to say…

I have to tell you that over the course of several years as I have talked to friends and family and neighbors, when I think about members of my own staff who are in incredibly committed monogamous relationships, same-sex relationships, who are raising kids together; when I think about those soldiers or airmen or marines or sailors who are out there fighting on my behalf and yet feel constrained, even now that ‘don’t ask, don’t tell’ is gone, because they are not able to commit themselves in a marriage, at a certain point I’ve just concluded that for me personally it is important for me to go ahead and affirm that I think same sex couples should be able to get married.

It's interesting to make this announcement the day after North Carolina became the 31st state to pass a marriage amendment. He won North Carolina in 2008, but speaking in favor of a policy that North Carolinians soundly rejected won't help him him in what many are seeing as a battle ground state. The Democratic National Convention will be held in Charlotte, NC this summer as well. While Mitt Romney has not been outspoken on this issue; he has taken the opposite position. Romney said to ABC News, "My view is that marriage is a relationship between a man and a woman. That’s the position I’ve had for some time, and I don’t intend to make any adjustments at this point. … Or ever, by the way." Even though he has stated opposition to same-sex marriage in the past it was pointed out today that he has promoted the gay-rights agenda and was headed down this road.

"The announcement today by President Obama should come as no surprise to the American public," former GOP Presidential Candidate Rick Santorum said in a statement made earlier today. "President Obama has consistently fought against protecting the institution of marriage from radical social engineering at both the state and federal level. The President recently opposed the North Carolina constitutional amendment and, of course, he refused to defend President Clinton’s Defense of Marriage Act before the U.S. Supreme court. The charade is now over, no doubt an attempt to galvanize his core hard left supporters in advance of the November election."

This position is sure to become an issue in Iowa which is also expected to be a battleground state in the general election. A.J. Spiker, the chairman of the Republican Party of Iowa said today, "Marriage is an institution that can only be between one man and one woman. While President Obama continues to play politics, the Republican Party of Iowa will continue to support maintaining the traditional view of marriage as between one man and one woman."

It would seem that President Obama has thrown open the door to social issues to play a role in the upcoming election. Establishment Republicans are afraid this will be a distraction, but it could very well come back to bite him in November considering recent voter turnout when the issue has been on the ballot.

Universal Suffrage: Not Always A Good Idea

Posted: 09 May 2012 06:54 AM PDT

Universal suffrage is something we take for granted in western countries. That every man and women above a certain age (in the US 18) can vote is seen as maybe the most important rights of all, and most Americans believe the US should work to spread this right to countries where people don’t currently have it.

I agree – to a certain extent.

I believe we that there are two things we need to recognize:

1) Of the fundamental rights – the right to vote, the freedom of speech, religion and press etc – the right to vote is the least important. Free speech occured long before universal suffrage, as did freedom of press and religion. You can have them without having the right to vote. Everyone – exactly everyone – in the US has freedom of speech, even a five year old. But the right to vote is limited to those above 18, because only those above 18 can be trusted to have developed a good enough understanding of the world to vote (that is of course just one reason, but it pretty much sums it up). Which brings us to my second point:

2) In other countries, the right to vote may have to be limited not by age, but by other requirements such as literacy.

It is the second point that I’m going to discuss in greater detail.

In some countries, illiteracy rates are as high as 90 %. This includes most african and some asian countries. I believe that universal suffrage in those countries is undesirable, as people who cannot read doesn’t make for good voters. How can you be an informed voter when you can’t read a party manifesto? How do you factcheck candidates’ claims when you can’t read? The answer is you don’t. And that is why universal suffrage so often ends in disaster when tried in developing countries.

Look at Zimbabwe. Robert Mugabe, the massmurderer dictator, was once democratically elected. How did that ever happen? He was just really good at fooling clueless naive Zimbabweans who had no way of factchecking his claims (and who had never heard of the disastrous results communism had brought in the Soviet Union). Ridiculous pie in the sky promises that voters here would have recognized as such were believed by the gullible Zimbabwean people.

I’m not against suffrage in African countries – but looking back, maybe it would have been a good idea to limit the suffrage to the 10 % of Zimbabweans who actually know how to read and write?

This isn’t the only time this has happened. Whenever suffrage is given to people who don’t know how to read and write, disastrous consequences follow. Often, illiterate people don’t even know who or what they’re voting for. Someone told them to write down some funny signs on a piece of paper, and that if they did so, manna would fall from heaven. That’s essentially how illiterate people vote.

I’ve already discussed the problems of the “dumb vote” as I call it in a previous post. Now imagine if the “dumb vote” consisted of 90 % of the population. Not a good platform for democracy, right? In particular as politicians in Africa effectively have an incentive to keep their people uneducated; if they were educated they’d vote for someone else. Of course you can’t tell voters that you’re going to keep their kids away from school, but once elected, you can invent excuses as for why those investments in education that you promised hasn’t happened (most likely this will mean blaming everything on the white man)

The risk is also very great when illiteracy is high that a leader will be elected who will make sure that no more elections are held – he will make himself a dictator. Of course this could happen anyway, but the risk is certainly higher in countries where illiteracy is the norm. A democracy where people who can’t read or write are allowed to vote is bound to be shortlived.

Iraq and Iran are both countries with low illiteracy rates, and so universal suffrage could – notice, COULD – work in those countries. But certainly not in the majority of African countries.

So what is the solution then? Should we just sit down and do nothing? Of course not.

We should insist on freedom of speech for every human on this planet. We should promote freedom of religion and press as well, and the right to assembly. We should work to educate people in developing countries, through (private) foreign aid investments.

But we should not insist on universal suffrage in countries that aren’t ready for it.

Some may say that universal suffrage is the only way the oppressed and impoverished africans can get a say. I understand that point of view, but the facts are truly stubborn: Without literacy, universal suffrage cannot work. Does anyone seriously believe that the leaders elected by said impoverished africans have made anything better for them?

If we want democracy all over the world, and I for one do, we need to understand that it has to happen step by step. As conservatives, we do not believe in revolution; we believe in reform and realism.

It is time we apply realism to the issue of global universal suffrage as well. Thanks for reading.

Horoscop

joi, 10 mai 2012

Caffeinated Thoughts

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