On the perils of childbirth...

When it comes to women's birth, practically everyone has an opinion on it, even most men seem to suddenly become "experts" in telling women what they should or should not do. Women who profess to have prior experience are likely to be even more annoyingly opinionated, amongst the vocal groups. Likewise for those who think that by "researching" into the subject matter, they can become experts too, in which category the writer of the recent Mother Jones article about childbirth looks to fall into.

In balance, most people (including those medical practitioners in OB/GYN) should and could say, though, is that statistically speaking, scenario x has y percentage chances of happening, which goes with z list of risks. As anyone who has reared multiple children can tell you, every child can be different. Same is true with childbirth. It is thus that only the woman - the expectant mother - can truly be the expert in her own case, who should really arm herself with knowledge and research, rather than relying solely on the "expert opinion" of her OB/GYN doctor or nurses. In this day and age when there are tons of books, online materials, forums and support groups, this is not hard to do at all.  Perhaps the harder part is, how to discern the details that are relevant and pertinent to oneself specifically, amidst huge volume of data out there.

Knowledge, in other words, is power. And we have to be responsible (quite often, largely) for the decisions that we made for ourselves. 

I thus find it annoying when I read that Mother Jones article, citing one anecdote of a woman with a long family history of cesarean sections due to small hip, that she experiences a difficult vaginal childbirth that led to risks which her OB/GYN doctor allegedly did not tell her or brushed aside.

Let's be upfront about it, the old saying about women with childbearing hip are made for carrying babies is not without merits. Put it another way, if a woman has small hips (which one could not help), it's more likely than not that she would have a more difficult natural childbirth, all other factors being equal.

I can say a word or two about that, since I have small hips myself. My first childbirth was a painful and difficult one, with some 16 hours of hard labor, even though my baby was only 7 lbs. My baby was breech for a number of hours before thankfully it fell into position. It's tremendously painful, never mind the risks to both the baby and the mother. A childbirth can quite literally resets a woman's body. My hip during pregnancy and after childbirth has expanded four inches. (Some of my friends have seen their hips "exploded" literally a few pant sizes after childbirth.) It should come as no surprises that bodily changes happen. Take incontinence, for example; afterall, there was much tear and stretching and scarring of the vaginal tissues, it's almost to be expected. That's why women who have vaginal childbirth are always advised to do Kegel exercises to (hopefully) train those muscles back in shape. As with any woman who has had a vaginal childbirth will tell you, it'll never be the same again.  (It's quite apparent that the writer of that Mother Jones article is one of those who have never had such "luxury" of experience, from the way she writes.)

All these, among other things, were known to me because I researched on it. Even if my OB/GYN had explained to me, it could not possibly begin to describe any of these, not in terms that a new mother (as I was back then) would ever possibly imagine it.

But the risks are always real. My mother was with me in the hospital at the time. It was only later that she told me how much she was worried, since she knew the high fatality rate to women during childbirth. That was why we had decided to have the childbirth in a hospital, just in case there is any complications or emergencies, where C-section might be needed.

That is not to say that C-section is not without risks. Quite far from it, there are far more health risks to the mothers that would require far longer time to recuperate. Two of my sisters have had their babies delivered by C-section. It's a fine line to walk, and a decision that the woman (and the husband) has to make. No doctors should or could make that call. 

In the bygone era when more was always better, everyone went for C-section since it was vogue. These days, the pendulum has decidedly swung the other direction, that everyone (particularly the educated middle-to-upper class women in the West) wants a vaginal (more natural) childbirth. Tons of resources listing pros and cons of vaginal vs C-section are available for anyone who cares to look. There really is no excuse for anyone to say, "my doctor did not tell me [of the risks]", whichever option one might choose. 

(Ok, there might be a case to make, for those illiterate women who either don't have the ways and means to research on the topic, that they could be far more susceptible to risk factors, one way or the other. But I don't get that feeling reading the anecdote in the Mother Jones article.)

Having a child, giving birth to one, and bringing the baby up to healthy adulthood, to be fully productive member of society, is a lifelong process that is really a gift of God. To be honest, it's not really for everyone. (Some people love it, some people don't want to have anything to do with it. But that personal choice, to me, is totally fine.) This also takes a huge dose of responsibility on oneself. If one is not willing to read or check the fineprint, "don't sign on the dotted line." There's really no point having buyer's remorse, looking for bad guys to blame.

On social (in)justice, Black Lives Matter, et al...

Of all the events that sprang up in the last couple of years, was the Black Lives Matter movement. Not that I have any immediate insight to it, nor was I ever directly impacted by it, but just some random thoughts that might worth jotting down in my journal.

There was much injustice against the African-Americans as a race historically, that much is beyond dispute. From the perspective of the modern times, who could ever argue for slavery afterall? It is also without doubt that United States, as a nation, had benefited enormously from the slave trade in the centuries past. One could say the nation and economy could not have flourished without the benefits of slave labor. The horrific of treating another human being as commodity, a cargo that could be bought and sold, is simply too wrong to comprehend.

Much injustice (genocide, land seizure, enslavement, permanent displacement, and more) had also been done to other groups, like the indigenous people of Native Indians.

In fact, United States had many a company in this department. Just ask Australia, and how the whites in the bygone eras had treated the native aborigines. Or, any of the western European countries in their expeditions and colonization of Africa and South America. The list goes on.

The questions for us now are, what do we do about it, now? How do we treat the history? How to make amends? How far do we go when enough is enough? How to make sure history doesn't repeat itself? And, who should be paying the price for past wrongdoing?

I'm not a historian, I'm not even black, nor white. I'm just one of many latecomers to this New Land. For all the public discourse, outcry, events, and more about social (in)justice, racial issues, and discrimination, I do have some thoughts from my vantage point.

African-Americans (I'll use the term, with blacks, interchangeably here since it's a few less characters to type) are pioneers in the struggle for social justice and the civil rights movement. Anyone who came after them has to thank them for it as they benefit inherently from the civil rights and progress gained. There is at least no more redlining, segregation, at least the legal protection against those practices.

Along the way, every generations seem some form of injustice, from the internment of Japanese-Americans during the WWII, to the Chinese Exclusion Act that lasted more than sixty years, to the overt hostility of Muslims in the early years of the 21st century, epitomized by Donald Trump during the 2016 presidential election season when he openly suggested banning Muslims into US.

As each wave of migrants overcame the hostility, hardship, and assimilation, they move up the economic ladder and economic ladder, given social mobility. That much was true with the Irish, Italians, Eastern Europeans, and the Asians. Many African-Americans rode that wave too, although given the size of the black population, many more seem to have been left behind in ghetto-like conditions, with dimming education and employment prospect.

It did not help that over the decades, many wrongs were done to the blacks as a group, from the erstwhile Tuskegee experiment, the crack cocaine epidemic in the 1980s, to the unfair justice system, and now police brutality incidents that spawn the Black Lives Matter Movement. There is little wonder that the blacks mistrust the police. I totally get that. Whenever there is crime where the perps (police or otherwise) are white and victims are blacks (or minority), social media lit up. There is an almost conceived notion that the whites must be wrong, and the blacks are wronged, yet again. One has to say, it's decidedly not fashionable to be white these days.

These days, when I read stories or news, it's easy to hear how the narratives are shaped, depending on the reporter's leaning. There are times when I hear stories like the alleged gang rape by Nate Parker, or the serial sexual assaults by Bill Crosby over a number of decades, I feel the need to yell "Who cares if the perp is black, or not?" To me, as long as the crimes are established, they should be punished for it. They should not get a pass, just because their skin is black. Riding on the backs of their black ancestors is simply shameless. And for those to compare one crime to another interchangeably, it's just wrong.

It is almost fashionable too, to revisit slavery and to rewrite history by erasing it, like the cases where college students wanting to rename building names, or take down statutes, citing reasons of intimidation, or that by preserving certain part of history or traditions, it's tacit endorsement of past practices. But, can such actions really do anything? I'd bet you all the money too, that 99.99999% of the students going through those buildings (that named after some slave masters a few centuries ago) don't think of it at all. So, why wasting all the efforts, blowing all these hot air, to drag everything through the mud again?

How far back can and should we go in order to atone to historic sins? Should all the whites go back to their ancestral homeland (of England, or Germany, or some such), and give the land back to the native Indians? And in a land of immigrants like United States, where many of them have had no ancestors whatsoever that did those past wrongs, should they be punished too, just because they are now firmly Americans?

Ultimately, I'm getting so tired of the mention of it, every time someone plays up the race card, or gender card, whatever, in order to justify their point. It's like, someone was killed, but no, the perp was not to blame because, hey, he's black, he can't be blamed. He came from broken homes, he's poor, he suffers from discrimination, etc etc. (You can easily replace the word "black" with anything, like "hispanic", or simply "minority".)

We should all be compassionate for others and their suffering. Yet, there is literally no way to tease out how much of it was due to historic wrongs, society's faults, or one's own willful wrongdoing. There is no way you can play what-if, or hold control studies, on whether someone might turn out differently if, say, his skin is white but not black, or if his parents earn six-figure salary versus toll some manual jobs.

One interesting case in point, is the model minority of Asian-Americans (in particular, Chinese-Americans) when it comes to how one might rise above one's station, overcome discrimination, bootstrap for better education, better employment, and more. While this group takes up just 5% of total US population, a group that was discriminated upon for so many decades, they now on average beat every other group, including, yes, the whites, in terms of education level, employment rate, wealth accumulation, home ownership rate, and more. And they did it, all without much help (or welfare) from the government. How did they do it?

(One should give credit where it's due, and Asian-Americans, as with all other minority groups that came after the black slaves, have reaped benefits from the Civil Rights movement too. One must not forget that. But, so does every other minority group, including, yes, the blacks themselves too.)

I'm a regular reader of New York Times. I like its in-depth reporting in general. But I have to say, there are many a times when reading NYT columns or reporting can get me all roiled up. The easiest argument, the default argument, is always that government has to do more, to help, to make amend, to right the wrongs. No doubt there are many cases where that is true. But c'mon, when do we start to talk about personal responsibility?

On AI, automation, universal basic income, and the prospect of human labor...

I have meant to drop a note in my journal here about the progression of technology and its impact on human labor, but keep forgetting.  Maybe on this quiet Saturday afternoon when it's snowing out, it's high time for a cup of hot chocolate while jotting down my thoughts.

There have been a lot of noises, and fights, since Uber (and the likes of Lyft) burst on scene. As with most startups from Silicon Valley, they were successful in grabbing headlines and market share by evading regulations, effectively eating the lunch of taxi industry. This is in contrast to more evolutionary approach of Zipcar which looks to only offer an alternative to car ownership, Uber wants to replace taxis. It's only natural that taxi industries from around the world (except notably in China and India) rally against it. Governments of some countries (like France) decide to side with the taxi industry that came out in full force of mass demonstration, while others (like Australia) essentially throw up their hands, providing some one-time reimbursements to taxi owners while embracing Uber with open arms.

Some people love it, others hate it. It began to dawn on those Uber drivers who initially love the idea of working only when they feel like it, that they were paid pittance for driving Uber customers around, paying for literally everything, including insurance, gas, and more. Some try to sue Uber for formal employee status, others want Uber reimbursement on insurance and more. At the same time, incidences like sexual assaults (from India to Australia) began to emerge.

Increasingly, these human drivers are becoming more like nuisance than help. They complain, they are hard to be motivated, and they generate really bad publicity. Something has to be done.

At the same time, technology is fast maturing with self-driving cars. Google has quietly accumulated more than two million miles of test driving driverless cars. Startups that focus on self-driving trucks are getting road-tested. Tesla is shipping cars with auto-pilot system that one would expect from airplanes. It's looking more likely by the day that driverless transport will become reality sooner than anyone would think.

And this is just the ground transport alone. Others like Amazon has already tested drones delivery of shipment (albeit in rural England initially) and created concept stores with no service employees. Even factories in China are beginning to introduce automation due to rapidly rising labor costs (since the first wave of excess labor migrating from rural to urban areas in the 1980s are beginning to wind down). 

Machines don't complain, they can work 24x7 (with just the occasional greasing and maintenance/repairs), they don't ask for wage rise or benefits, they don't unionize, they don't take bathroom breaks, they don't eat, they don't sleep, they don't get sick, they have no issues with work-life balance, and they certainly don't shit and pollute the environment. They would do exactly as you tell/program them to, no questions asked. They don't worship false gods, or become terrorists. (Along that allegory, they must be excellent soldiers.)

Ultimately it is the customers, end-users, who would deal a death blow to workers. They prefer self-checkout at supermarkets and airports to avoid long lines and grumpy employees, they like ezpass with automated toll collection and no human toll collectors or fumbling with coins, they want low shipping costs and fast, accurate delivery. And they want low cost everything.

(Were those same customers who might once be workers thinking that the automated system that they so love would one day replace them? I doubt that they were that far-sighted when they were reaping short-term benefits as customers, only to find out that it's too late to stop the tide when they lose out to machines as workers.)

In a way, the decision by corporations to automate is almost a no-brainer, from a pure economics perspective. 

There is however huge human tolls as a result of automation. Huge swath of no/low-skill, uneducated workers are displaced. Even the Obama administration has issues report that sounds like siren call. These workers are shifted almost exclusively to supporting Donald Trump in the 2016 presidential election, as a repudiation to all establishments (both GOP and Democrats). There are even union workers breaking ranks from union leaders to side with Trump instead of Hillary Clinton (the de facto Dem champion for workers). NAFTA/TPP, my ass, indeed.

Indeed, the human costs of losing one's livelihood are immeasurable. So many of these workers, and younger generations too, were told to get an education, and to re-train for another field(s) that are more labor intensive (eg. health care, nursing, education, retail or service sectors). So many of the displaced heed the call, borrow to the tilt, just to get themselves a piece of paper called a degree, in some discipline like liberal arts that has hardly had any job prospects. Four years and tons of student debts later, they find themselves just as trapped, perhaps in even worse shape. 

Europe takes a different tact in handling these surplus human labor in the form of universal basic income, but the prospect is equally dim. The idea is that, government would give every individual non-means tested income, whether you work or not. Finland is testing this on limited scale. 

It's an interesting idea, reminiscent of a "social security income" to everyone. You don't have to earn it, you just need to be there. Nice idea, but I have serious doubts.

First off, the money has to come from somewhere. These European countries thought they were ingenuous to discover this, but they are not. Just ask Saudi Arabia or Brunei, both of which have been giving out freebies and cash to their citizens for the longest time. 

Before one asks the question of "how did they do/afford it?" a better question to ask is "where does the money come from?"

They share a couple of common traits. Both Saudi Arabia and Brunei derive so much of their free money from oil. Their people don't have to work for it, they just need to have the good fortune for being born there and with the right lineage. The government can afford it without taking on debt (to finance the cash handouts) because all they need to do, is to pump more oil.

Right there, you'll see the problems: (a) Not every country has that kind of good fortune of "natural resources" to fund your lifestyle, (b) The size of your total population cannot be too large, (c) What would happen when the oil runs dry some day? Population is only going to grow, and oil reserve will continue to go down, thanks to all the pumping. These two trends are going to diverge and deteriorate. 

Is it any wonder that even rich country like Switzerland rejected this idea of universal basic income? 

The one thing that perhaps no one can and will dispute, is that, technology will continue to advance, whether you like it or not. There will come a day when automation is here to stay and become reality. What will we do with all the surplus human labor, all those no/low-skilled, non-educated workers? This is assuming that there will still be jobs for the highly skilled, and highly educated workers, who are presumably citizens of the world who can still command decent-to-high salary. And then there is the ruling elite class, the investors, the moneyed class, the CEO types, who control not only the purse string, but corporation decisions. 

In short, what would our world be like when all resources are controlled by an increasingly small group of individuals, while the rest of the world population festers? How could these poor individuals continue to be "customers" when they cannot "produce"? As offensive as it might sound, what purpose would they serve on this planet earth, except to consume? Increasingly too, the world as depicted in the Hollywood movie Elysium (2013) doesn't look that farfetched. The AI story from Google is great in terms of technological advancement, but it'll only serve to highlight the impotence and the very many shortcomings of humans. What are we to do about it? What can we do? Would the coming of age of AI be like the success of the Manhattan Project, introducing a weapon of mass destruction that the scientists ultimately would lose control of, much as Oppenheimer introduced, then opposed nuclear weapons, to no avail?

Can there ever be a happier middle where humans can reap the benefits of technology and automation, without sacrificing our soul? I really don't know.

But I do know this: As much as I hate to say it, there are way too many humans on this planet earth. For those who are born into misery and suffering, would it have been a better fate if they were not born at all? I don't want to answer for others, but I know it would be a yes, if it were for me. That would make birth control an altogether positive thing to promote. I hate to say this too, but looking at China today, versus 35 years ago when it started opening its door to the outside world, its mandatory one-child policy has, by all likelihood, reduced at least 1 billion additional mouths to feed. Some thirty odd years later now, the younger generations and its government are able to focus on moving up the food chain than to toll for laborious work (although it must be said that China still has a large portion of population that falls in this "surplus" category, but at least the country is in far better position to help them). It's the best possible outcome for a country to have. And for those who complain about the draconian government policy, and the reversal of it without so much as an apology, I don't think they are (or can) look at the better picture of who much good the one-child policy had been for the world population as a whole. Such is human toll on individual levels, as opposed to the larger collective common good.

Compared that to, say, Africa or Middle East or South America, the situations of the latter look almost hopeless, sadly to say.

Ok, I digress. Back to the prospect of human labor. If the size is to shrink to a more manageable size, there would perhaps be a better position to consider universal basic income for the remaining humans, while delegating all work (and wealth creation too?) to machines. When that day comes, the idea of productivity gain will no longer be relevant. As always, there will no doubt be winners, and losers. 

But wait, what would become of the differences in countries, what with all their strengths and weaknesses, since machines are machines, and it makes no difference between a machine in the US, versus those in China, or India, or Africa, would it now.

Even if the world over can afford it, to have a universal basic income for all that survive, for them to continue consumption while machines will serve humans, I'm not sure if that's the nirvana that we are sold. There is virtue in work, and the art of creating things by hand, the craftsmanship that goes with it. The work that makes humans feel productive, fulfilled, belonged. A monthly check can never replace that. 

And what would the world be like, when machines and AI take over? Would The Terminator (1984) and The Matrix (1999) be our cautionary tale? Why would machines even need humans at all? What is our value of existence, except to take over this planet until we eat or consume all other species to extinction, and wreck so much havoc that climate change will become permanent?

Boy, now my head really starts to hurt...

2016: Taking stock, and looking ahead...

This past year is rather emotionally exhausting. So much so that there were days I didn't even want to read news. Worse still, countries (not only US, but other countries like UK, China, Middle East) have taken an almost predictable, if undesirable, path. Income inequality and wealth gap continue to deteriorate. Nativism, and in some corners, fascism, are on the rise. Ruling classes do not take care of the people, and the people are redirected to blame something/someone else, be it immigrants, or border control. I've even heard some religious friends exclaiming that this would be how end of the world would look like.

I'm not feeling too good about it all. There's no comfort in rehashing 2016, perhaps it's better to just forget about 2016, and look ahead to 2017 instead.

Let's just move on.  New job starting, new venture taking shape, it's certainly time to move on...

On the Donald Trump presidency, Hillary Clinton's losing, et al...

I'm still too emotionally exhausted to talk about the 2016 presidential election.

I had expected Hillary Clinton to win, although I never really believe in the wide margin that so much of the main media had believed she would win. I thought she would win, but only by small margin, so that she would not and could not claim a clear mandate to rule in the next four years. And I had expected the House and Senate would go to GOP.  That would have been the "usual" path, for the electorate's desire to split the White House and the Congress. I can feel it, even though I live in a solidly blue state in New England.

But, that was not meant to be.

HRC lost, and by such wide margin in electoral vote that her campaign didn't even bother to ask for a recount (even though that joke of a task went to Jill Stein, the Green Party candidate whose campaign did not even warrant a footnote to this election, except with its claim of wanting to launch recount lawsuit in multiple states, raising millions of dollars from people in the pursuit. Now that the court has shut down all her request, and all electoral voters had voted accordingly, I wonder what's going to happen to those millions of dollars that Stein raised but was never used?

In the parlance of electoral system, it matters not that HRC has won the popular votes. In the land of United States, popular votes never really count for much, even though HRC has won by the widest margin in popular vote historically.

One can only say, this was an election that Hillary Clinton lost, it's not an election that Donald Trump won. The HRC camp has since blamed her loss on the FBI debacle and its director, James Comey, in the back-and-forthing about the email server scandals that HRC has no one to blame but herself in the sloppy handling of sensitive government emails. She and Obama have also blamed in on the Russian meddling via cyberhacks that have likely led to the leaking of John Podesta's emails, among other things, to WikiLeaks and the press.

But no, those are just white noise. To the extent that these incidences have done, they only serve to reinforce what voters' belief, one way or the other. Even without all these leaks, Trump and GOP supporters have chanted Crooked Hillary, complete with bumper-stickers long before the Comey debacle and Russian meddling.

Hillary Clinton lost because she ran a lackluster campaign. What does We Are Stronger Together, the HRC slogan, really mean anyways? When people, particularly the struggling working class, have no food on the table or money in the bank, they want to talk about the economy, and they want to talk about jobs. Instead, HRC and Democrats want to talk about gay marriage and LGBTQ rights, they want to ensure protection to illegal migrants, they want to advance further the liberal agenda, but nary a mention of the bread-and-butter issue of the economy and jobs. Obama kept reminding voters how much US economy has come back, from the abyss in the depth of 2008. If the stock market is any indication, Obama could well be true. But it's universal knowledge (and acknowledgement) that the income inequality and wealth gap can render an "economic recovery" a totally different view for someone who is moving ahead, and those who lost their jobs, livelihood and were left behind. Belatedly, HRC came to acknowledge the devastating effects of NAFTA, the trade deal that her husband had championed and which she supported...until she's not. She and Obama are tone deaf enough to tell those struggling coal miners that she's going to close all the coal mines, and chanted "those [manufacturing] jobs are not coming back!" While that is likely to be reality, you won't win any votes by feeding voters tough medicine like that. Meantime, Obama and preceding governments kept reciting the same lines to younger generations that they need to get a college education in order to compete. So many young adults have heeded the call, borrowed heavily to go back to college (even if it's some literal arts bullshit degree with no job prospect in some for-profit no-name schools), just to realize that there's no job waiting for them upon graduation, all while they are saddled with huge student debts that will follow them for life.

Meanwhile, Trump's message was simple. He says he would bring the jobs back. How, he didn't say. Whether he can do it, most people have doubts. No matter, it's a message that insecure voters want to hear. Meantime, he says he'll build a wall along Mexico border to keep illegals out, and make Mexico pay for it. He says he'll ban Muslims coming to this country too. Whether he will do it, it's highly unlikely. No matter, it's something nervous voters feel good hearing it, even though they know very well that it's unrealistic. He says he'll drain the swamp, so to speak. How would he do it, he wouldn't say either. The list goes on and on and on.

But as one of The Atlantic reporters had it exactly right:  Main media takes Trump literally, but not seriously. Voters [his supporters] take him seriously, but not literally.

Main media had their field day almost everyday chronicling Trump's supposed gaffe, which to other mere mortals, would have sunk a campaign long ago. But Trump trumps even the ultimate teflon kid (Bill Clinton), and nothing seems to stick. In fact, people have come to expect this kind of gaffe from Trump, to the point of entertainment. He bumps up TV ratings when he's on a show, he lit up Twitter, he generates tons of clicks.

Since the November defeat, Bill Clinton has come out publicly to lament that HRC campaign staffers ignored his plea that they needed to focus on economy issue, and that they should not write off the white working-class voters. Afterall this was one voting bloc that had voted for him not once, but twice. Joe Biden had lamented that Dems seem to have given up on the solid white working-class voters as has-beens, and chooses to chase the unicorn voting coalition of young voters, hispanics, blacks, educated classes, and a combination of voter blocs that Obama had garnered in 2008. Too bad that the young voters prefer Bernie Sanders, the blacks feel let down by the first black president, and the hispanics...well, they are just not that big a voting bloc afterall. Feminists from the 1960s looove HRC, women voters these days don't feel that kind of affinity to a candidate just because of her gender.

Looking back, perhaps the biggest mistake of Dems was that, in the rush to try to make history (from putting the first black president in office, to wanting to put the first female president in office too), they had simply believed that "it's time," "it's her turn." Although I have no doubt she would be a solid leader, she had failed in pushing for a compelling vision of where she wants to lead the country to. I'm sorry, but maintaining the status quo and legacy from Obama is not a "vision." Voters do not need just a caretaker in the White House, they need a true leader. It matters not that Trump is hardly one to claim that title, but he certainly promotes himself well, like a peacock.

As much as I hate to say it, I do believe that, had Joe Biden been on top of the ticket, he would have won. Biden has always been able to connect to working class voters in a way that HRC had never been able to do.

I don't know what's going to happen in the next four years. Judged from the way Trump has handled the transition of government, prognosis is not good. This is a guy who would dole out cabinet positions to his rich buddies like candies, openly criticizes an outgoing president of his policy, fragrantly ignores technocrats and diplomatic protocols in maintaining government policies and positions, and refuses to acknowledge the very many potential conflicts of interests. That list goes on and on and on as well.

Long story short, Trump is the manchurian candidate that everyone has so worried about. Given the full GOP control of the Congress, what would become of this country...

On the implosion of Donald Trump...

I haven't written on my journal for a while. Spring/summer travel, the works. There have been so much going on that I wish I have more time to jog down my thoughts on each of them. There were the refugee crisis in Europe, the on-going destruction in Middle East (flavor-of-the-month being Syria, of course), bomb and terrorist attacks in various European countries, Brexit, and to cap it all, the presidential election. Boy, that's quite a mouthful just to enumerate them.

Let's take the presidential election in US.

Surely it hasn't been this "entertaining" for the longest time, with plots thickened by the day, that it's becoming like the reality version of House Of Cards. But of course, there's nothing funny or amusing about it since the stake is so high. Whoever gets to the White House is going to almost dictate the direction of where the country (and by proxy, the rest of the world) goes for the next four years, and with the appointment of Supreme Court appointments at stake, the larger impact of the presidency would be felt in at least the next three to four decades to come.

I generally don't vote for anyone just because a candidate share the same gender as I do, although one can hardly deny the very powerful symbolic notion of the first female president, holding court in the most powerful office in the world. It's about damn time, one could say. But no, Hillary Clinton (HRC) has not had my votes by default. I have to admit, she has earned it, fair and square, through decades of dedication that work toward the largely same goals through public service, sans the time she's private practice, I suppose. Although I don't agree totally with the liberal agenda, the general directions that she has laid out are ok (or at least better than what Donald Trump has propositioned). Yet, I would not have wanted to see the near amnesty of illegals in the country, nor take-your-pick-in-gender fights where one can essentially choose whatever gender one wants, or the push of trade deals that imperils the working class in US (case in point being NAFTA).

When one looks at the other alternatives to HRC, she instantly looks more electable. I won't take Jill Stein (Green Party) or Gary Johnson (Libertarian) seriously. I was particularly unimpressed by one interview I heard Stein on the radio where she was asked whether she would admit she's wrong in supporting the anti-vaccination movement back then, even after the myth was totally debunked without any scientific proof. Without much of an admission of guilt, all she could muster in response was, trust me, I'm a doctor. I'm, like, really? So what if she's a medical doctor when she couldn't even look at scientific data in the eyes and face the facts.

As to Gary Johnson, there's nothing more to be said. The guy self-implodes the moment he half-admitted that he didn't even know what Aleppo is when it's all over the news about Syria. That says so much about his narrow worldview as a libertarian, no doubt.

And then, there is Donald Trump. Watching the love-hate relationship between Trump and GOP establishment during the primary season was priceless. We know now, that the ostrich approach didn't work out so well. Without so much of any effective rebuttal from GOP establishment and leaders, Trump goud each candidates, devours them one after another. All the while, GOP grassroots and core supporters egg him on. And why not? Trump is the ultimately protest choice of the GOP grassroot supporters, the largely white working class, particularly men, who have been left behind in economy. They were the ones who were fed the red meat rhetoric about liberal conspiracy whenever things don't go right, so that they would not have time to look closely at what their own party has done for them. After more than two decades of wool over eyes, they look to have finally wise up and opt for someone like Trump who is totally outside of the system, totally unconventional, and who also totally turns off the GOP establishment. So much the better. It doesn't matter if he's crass, or bigotry, or petty, or ignorant. In Trump, these voters see themselves in him, only with more money.

I won't even bother with all those stupid back-and-forthing about email server issue of HRC (extremely careless but no crime) or even Bill Clinton's infidelity issue (as if a husband's philandering is the fault of the wife, ah!), or how HRC might have acted dismissive toward those other women. I'm pretty sure no one in GOP, or in Trump's campaign, cares to ask opinion of any woman of how they might feel if they were in the shoes of HRC during the Monica Lewinsky scandal. If they have asked me, I would have told them I would probably have reacted the same way as HRC. Before the proof, no wife would want to believe in the betrayal. Afterall, Lewinsky did do her best in seducing a very married man. Him philandering, no question about it. But it takes two to tango, and Lewinsky was just as sinful as Bill Clinton did. Was that something that can be blame on the wife (HRC)? No.

But, we all knew of those incidents years ago now. The public, and GOP, has had more than thirty years of continuous vetting of the Clintons. GOP and Trump are just wasting their breath, and every voter's time, in diverting the attention from the real issues that this election really should have focused on.

Trump, on the other hand, is an entirely different matter. He's an unknown entity. Bit by bit, things came out. Trump cast himself as the successful billionaire who can use his business experience to run the country. And then, news came out that he really isn't as successful as he claims to be, with reports that he didn't pay his bills or his workers, and even evaded taxes for years using huge losses accumulated on papers. No matter, he's shameless enough to grab the megaphone to claim him to be smarter than thou, that if he can game the system (or you) and you don't, it's your fault, not his. Just one month from election day, the revelation came, in the form of lewd conversations of Trump talking casually about groping women, all recorded on tape for the world to see. More women came forth with accusations against Trump, even though most were from years ago. Trump campaign tried desperately to duck, deflate and counter-attack HRC, dismissing the talks (as "locker room banter"), dismissing the women and their credibility, even threatening libel lawsuit. Perhaps this is the final straw for those like Paul Ryan who reluctantly walked with Trump, but finally had ammo to proudly claim he's breaking from him for good.

It sure is highly entertaining. All that HRC has to do, is to tread lightly, and watch Trump implodes. That said, I highly doubt that HRC would win with as big a margin as one would have claimed to be a mandate for her ultimate presidency. It's highly likely that she would end up follow Obama's footsteps, having to prove his worth with a two-term presidency, a re-election, turning around the economy, tackling intractable issues like pushing for climate change, and even introducing a flawed health bill that we now know it as ObamaCare. Still, a good half of the nation's voters would not go with Obama. I'd bet, it'll be the same pattern for HRC, even if she wins.

No matter, we can never please everyone, so we might as well push ahead whatever way we see fit. I hope HRC takes that path.

I won't even contemplate Trump winning.  :)

On my support for Brexit and its win in referendum...

I haven't been writing in my journal for a few months now. Too busy with other things, I guess, or maybe there's just too much same-old-same-old. There were however a few things worthy to note, one of which is the rout within the GOP after Donald Trump won the de facto nomination (which is worthy to note in another post), but the more recent one was the Brexit vote on June 23, in which Britain has voted 52% to 48% in favor of leaving the EU.

It was said that the Brexit vote shows generation divide among young voters (who more strongly favor staying in the EU in general) and old voters (who mostly want UK to stand on its own feet again). There's talk of despair among young voters after they lost the referendum, of fear from uncertainty, of resentment toward the elders who "sold them out," as they call it.

There was also talk of racial bigotry against immigration as it shaped up to be one key issues (inability to control immigration within EU and burdensome regulations from EU), hence the disparage of less affluent, less educated, lower-class voters by those citizens-of-the-world class championed in the City of London where its financial hub thrives, thrashing those who wanted out as anyone who can't handle change or uncertainty or competition.

The intense campaigning and drumbeat of the Brexit referendum from the Remain campaign and the Leave campaign, what with all the misinformation matches those from the Trump campaign. Both sides are to blame in the playing up of the element fear, of uncertainty.

In the Remain campaign, David Cameron, the PM who resigned the next day after losing the Brexit vote, and all business elites worked incredibly hard as trumpeting the call of mass exodus of jobs and business headquarters and financial services out of UK and London to the continent. For a while, I almost thought that worked for them; afterall, Cameron used the very same tactics during Scotland referendum for independence in 2014. History would not repeat itself with the mainland, and it goes to show the Englishmen prefer pride and independence more so than the Highlanders.

On the other side of the fence, the Leave campaign played up the element of fear from a different vantage point. There is the uncontrolled immigration primarily from eastern European countries who are free to come to UK to work, enjoy its healthcare and welfare system, pushing down wages with intense competition for low-end jobs, all of which UK cannot say no because they are part of one big happy (not) family within the EU. Even the debunked euro-myth of EU regulations governing the shape of bananas sold is still much cited by by the Leave campaigners, including the ex-London Mayor, Boris Johnson. While the banana regulation might not be true, there are plenty other regulations in all shapes and forms across all industries to pick on. While they might not be worthy for news headline, anyone who finds Brussels overbearing will not have a hard time finding something to chew on.

There is much parallels between the steady-hand campaign message from Hillary Clinton, and the upstart, rock the boat messages (for better or worse) from Donald Trump and Bernie Sanders in this very season of primaries season on this side of the Atlantic. Clinton mirrors (and supports) the Remain campaign, Trump bleats about the Brexit vote that Leave won. The underlying current, voter angst and distrust of anything that establishment told them, is very real. It didn't help that the chiming in by other foreign dignitaries, including Obama and Merkel and Juncker (as if UK voters care about what Juncker had to say), essentially telling UK voters to not do the stupid thing (ie. to vote to leave EU), akin to very stern talking down to them like little school children by their principal. Even my kids would tell me, long before the vote, that the approach will not work. It didn't.

So now, after the Brexit vote, Cameron is out with more carnage to come. The one person who should be running scare right now, should be Hillary Clinton.  But...I'm digressing.

Why do young voters, those under 35 in general, were so scare? It's indeed conceivable for much of their apprehension. Afterall they had born into this world, knowing nothing about Britain being its own country, when all they know in their life is UK being part of EU. Indeed it would be hard for them to fathom a time when their country had been standing all alone when the Nazis came marching across the continent, and all those countries in the continent were dropping like flies. The Brits were tough, and they were blessed with visionary leaders like Winston Churchill who had the wisdom and toughness to stand against the wind.

In modern times, the marching does not come with guns and weaponry, but with trade and dollar bills. While I don't want to thrash the younger generations to be as weak as the Vichy government back in WWII days whose job in collaborating with the occupied force of Nazis, there is much parallel in that. All it takes, is to wave "a good life" in front of time, and their knees would turn to mush. In modern times, these younger folks would cloak that in another euphemism called inclusion, or progressiveness, or pan-internationalism, or liberalism, whatever.  No matter, the result is the same, which is that they are all too ready to give up sovereignty and self-control for a better life, an easier life.

So, why do I support Brexit?

I've supported Thatcher back then with keeping GBP alive, even if UK opted to join EC (the precursor of EU).  Ease of bilateral trade can indeed be beneficial to everyone. I worked in the financial sector at the time when Euro was rolled out in 2000, and I never understood. (Well, of course I could certainly hear all the "benefits" from the Euro camp, but I was never convinced or sold on how ECB can manage a single currency for so many countries, even with the disparity back then between the economic fortunes for the smaller eurozone was substantial less than what it is today.) At least with GBP still alive, Bank of England can effect some change to its economic fate in terms of fiscal and monetary policy. Without GBP? Well, you need to look no further than Greece, and the deep shit it's in. Enough said.

I have always considered free movement of all EU citizens to all EU countries to be possible only if these countries are largely on the same boat, with similar economic fortunes. That was indeed the case in the earlier days of EC, and then EU. With the fall of the Berlin Wall, and the break-up of the Soviet Union, all its former communist satellites were let loose. Over the years, western Europe has rushed to embrace these poor cousins, starting with East Germany.

One has to realize, having a meal with someone is not the same as going to bed. What started as a trade bloc and strategic alliance (in the form of NATO) now requires much than just trade agreement or sharing with military secrets, all of which individual countries can choose to do with, or without, because they still retain that modicum of control. When you give up your currency, you give up your ability to control both fiscal and monetary policy. For small countries rushing to join the big boy's league, there might be argument for that; but a country that is more than capable of doing that, why would you give that up? And when free movement suddenly means open border and free for all (including welfare and health care), all while your own citizens are struggling, it all makes so much less sense.

Some would call me ranting and fear-mongering, but is it really? There is even name-calling from younger voters, of how older voters ruining their future. Is that the only future they can envision? (If yes, it'll be the saddest thing of all.) For those young people who says they want to be part of Europe too. What's stopping them? They still can move anywhere of their choosing. Is showing a passport that big of a deal, as compared to giving up their country's fiscal and monetary policy and border control? I would argue that it's not.

Thirty years on, and one global recession (circa 2008) later, we now know the wisdom from Thatcher (even if it's just on GBP alone). Some would call it isolationism, or rolling back the clock in the face of global trade deals like NAFTA. As the young people and working class (both of whom are struggling) in US would attest to it, global trade deals invariably benefit multinational corporations who won't have nary a care about local livelihood or ruined economies because the trade deals allow them to simply move from one country to another after devouring everything from that land. When will the young voters in UK wake up to that? While we're on that, when will Scotland and Northern Ireland (both of whom now want to breakaway from UK to join EU) start to learn something from the unfolding debacles in Greece who is still paying the price to stay in the eurozone, with no end in sight.

By the way, I never see immigration as the main issue for Brexit. I see sovereign control on issues pertinent within its own borders to be of paramount importance. Immigration, if regulated and managed properly, can be a good thing. This should be something that US should learn something about as well, rather than the Democrats (and Obama's) assertion to provide pseudo amnesty to all illegal migrants, just because they manage to cross the borders. If anything, I find that offensive. To me, it has nothing to do with nativism, or racial bigotry.

I do hope Brexit would serve a case study for other countries, not only for those who rush to join trade deals, but also for those who believe being a hanger-on to someone else's coattails is the only way to live and compete with competitors like China.

As to the aftermath of Brexit, EU now wants UK to leave as soon as possible as if contagion will not happen. It only goes to show how out of touch with reality those in Brussels are. Anti-establishment sentiment has been rising substantially in all countries (and not just on the continent due to the refugee/migrant crisis from the Middle East). Even if the exit UK is to complete tomorrow, those parties like Podemos in Spain, or Marine Le Pen in France, and even the Five Star Movement in Italy will accelerate in their rise.  While Trump is crass, crude, and at times, even comical, one would be foolish to dismiss him as an also-ran.

I do look forward to a day when Britain would show the world that there is a third way to survive and thrive in this increasingly competitive globalized world. If there is anything that we should learn from Britain (and Churchill), standing all alone in the face of great adversity, with much courage and vision, we should realize that British voters might have once again shown us that that courage and vision. The question now is, do the Brits have another visionary leaders like Churchill to march with them?

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I should say though, that one area that Britain would definitely lose out, is the seat at the big boys' table. The Brits have been profoundly apt in playing politics on the world stage. Leaving EU would mean it's vacating its seat on the EU table. I would suspect though, that over time, UK will find its way in again, when Germany needs a more capable ally than France on all EU matters.