To my liberal friends

 History, Politics  No Responses »
Nov 092024
 

In the days following Tuesday’s historic US elections, I’ve seen many reactions by liberals: friends, acquaintences, public figures like journalists.

With few exceptions, almost all of them appear to have jumped to the wrong conclusions. “Putin won this election,” they said. “Harris should have focused on immigration,” they told us. “We underestimated the stupidity,” they complained. “They’re all Nazis,” I’m told.

Nope. Trump voters are not stupid. It was not Russian propaganda that decided the outcome. You won’t shame them into voting Democrat by comparing them to the Nazis. Nor did the result have anything to do with any specific tactical decisions by the Democratic campaign.

This election—which may have tragic, historic consequences concerning the stability and viability of the Western world order that dominated the planet and ushered in an unprecedented period of relative peace and prosperity in the wake of 1945—was decided by factors that were known to Aristotle more than 2500 years ago.

Portrait of Aristoteles. Copy of the Imperial era (1st or 2nd century) of a lost bronze sculpture made by Lysippos

“Now in all states there are three elements: one class is very rich, another very poor, and a third in a mean,” he writes in Politics*. “It is admitted that moderation and the mean are best,” he continues, warning us that when the very rich and the very poor dominate over the mean, “thus arises a city, not of freemen, but of masters and slaves, the one despising, the other envying“.  This leads him to his key conclusion: “But a city ought to be composed, as far as possible, of equals and similars; and these are generally the middle classes. Wherefore the city which is composed of middle-class citizens is necessarily best governed; they are, as we say, the natural elements of a state. And this is the class of citizens which is most secure in a state, for they do not, like the poor, covet their neighbours’ goods; nor do others covet theirs, as the poor covet the goods of the rich.”

And look at our world in 2024. Throughout the Western hemisphere, the middle class is in retreat. Despite the rise in GDP, incomes remain stagnant, barely keeping up with inflation, if that. Housing prices are skyrocketing, making home ownership an unattainable dream for much of the younger generation; even renting a decent home is beyond the reach of many. The wage and income gaps are both on the rise, even as the streets fill up with the homeless, public infrastructure is often crumbling, healthcare systems are under stress and often near the breaking point, even public transportation fails to deliver far too often.

Now you might think that these issues should be top priority for political forces that occupy the left of the political palette. After all, traditionally it’s those on the left who championed these causes, worked in favor of a strong middle class. Not anymore. Even when the left’s agenda is not saturated by woke virtue signaling about pronouns, DEI education, divisive identity politics and other forms of self-serving activism, they failed to address the very concerns that drove far too many voters to vote for Trump. They also missed the elephant in the room: The issues are not specific to the United States. The rise of authoritarians like Orban of Hungary, the success of Brexit, the election of right-wing leaders elsewhere in Europe, the rise of the far-right in Germany are all pointing in the same direction.

Calling Trump voters stupid, racist, fascists is not helpful. Perhaps there were stupid, racist fascists voting for Trump, but the vast majority who voted for him were none of the above. They were concerned citizens, deeply disappointed with the lack of solutions coming from the left. Perhaps they underestimated the dangers represented by a Trump who openly indicated his willingness to weaken democratic institutions, who openly declared the institutions of the American Republic the enemy. Time will tell.

However, the left had a clear path ahead: forget identity politics, virtue signaling, cancel culture, and other forms of radical activism, intolerance in the name of tolerance, illiberal means to enforce the made-up standards of woke liberalism. Focus instead on the issues that matter, promoting real solutions to the problems plaguing the middle class. Because if you don’t, someone else will… or at least they will pretend to do so. And that’s exactly what right-wing populists do.

Perhaps folks on the left should spend a tad more time reading Aristotle.

In case Aristotle is not enough, here’s my collection of posts on Trump 2.0. I collect them here so that I can easily direct folks to this post rather than explain all over again what I think. Anyhow, I still recommend Aristotle over my own pearls of wisdom.

And now that we’re done with this political nonsense, let me go back and do useful things.

*Translation by H. W. C. Davis, Oxford, At the Clarendon Press, 1908
 Posted by at 5:14 pm

Bark vs. bite

 History, Politics  2 Responses »
Nov 062024
 

Earlier tonight, I heard a Republican strategist on CBC News telling us not to worry if Trump wins: his bark is worse than his bite.

Damn, I hope he is right. But historical precedents suggest otherwise. I am, of course, especially reminded of how Adolf Hitler came to power in 1933; many who supported him were also convinced that his bark was worse than his bite.

Well, it wasn’t. The rest, as they say, is history.

As a matter of fact, perhaps I am an alarmist, but I tend to think of something else after the spectacle tonight. It is what became perhaps the most iconic moment from the entire Star Wars franchise: the recognition by Padmé Amidala of what just happened when the Galactic Senate granted extraordinary powers to chancellor Palpatine.

Coming back from the land of science-fiction cautionary tales to that of real history: In early August 1914, Sir Edward Grey, Britain’s foreign secretary remarked that the lights were going out all over Europe. Today… well, America was called by the late Ronald Reagan the shining city on the hill of liberal democracy. The lights of this great shining city might have been extinguished tonight. There are other lights of liberal democracy still shining brightly, including the lights here in Canada, but they are much less powerful and rapidly diminishing in number. Liberal democracy, which has always been an outlier in the course of human history, is now fully in retreat.

And, well, I daresay many who call themselves “liberals” bear at least some responsibility. Over the past few decades, life for many in the Western world stagnated or became worse. Incomes barely kept up with inflation, homes became unaffordable. The income and wealth gap between rich and poor rose. Families could no longer promise their children a life that, never mind better, would be at least as good as the lives of their parents. Public infrastructure was often neglected, health care systems remained underfunded. Many Western cities saw a palpable rise in homelessness and visible poverty: Just look at the number of homeless right here on the main streets of downtown Ottawa, minutes from Parliament Hill.

Leaders and activists on the left had ample chance to step in, offer and, if in power, implement real, forward-looking solutions. Instead, they chose to focus on, ahem, the “important” problems of the day: proper pronouns for everyone, DEI programs at workplaces, stamping out white supremacism in math education (I kid you not! Wish it was a joke) and other pressing issues. In light of that, why is anyone surprised that populism won the day?

Sadly I am not. Much as I rooted for Harris, I predicted a Trump victory, and it appears that I was not wrong.

Now we get a chance to find out if that CBC analyst was right after all. Is the bark worse than the bite? I’m not holding my breath…

 Posted by at 3:20 am

Tomorrow belongs to me…

 Film, History, Music, Politics  No Responses »
Oct 302024
 

Here’s a pro-Trump view of the recent Trump rally, shared by CNN’s Fareed Zakaria in his October 30 “Global Briefing” newsletter:

Americans are tired of living in survival mode. Raging wars, a crippled economy, an immigration crisis, a growing chasm of political division, and rapid inflation have made Americans realize that they want joy again, they want unity again, and they want to dream again. Standing in such a significant arena, surrounded by a sea of red hats and adoring, cheering Trump fans, I couldn’t help but get emotional about how historic this moment in time is for our country. I was 14 years old when Trump was elected president and have, like many of his other supporters, been forced to deal with the vitriol, insults, and hatred of the left over the past eight years. It has often been tiresome to stand up for my own beliefs in the face of such fierce adversity. But watching Trump on that glorious stage at Madison Square Garden reminded me—reminded all Americans—of what lies ahead with a Trump presidency: hope. And that is always worth fighting for.

To say that these words — honest, heartfelt no doubt — give me the creeps is the understatement of the year. What these words actually remind me of is this immortal scene from the film Cabaret:

Yes, they were earnest. Their feelings were true. And that’s what makes this scene one of the most disturbing scenes ever in movie history.

 Posted by at 6:28 pm

Yes, it’s the economy, stupid

 Politics  No Responses »
Oct 282024
 

Recently, a friend of mine remarked on the fact that Americans are disillusioned with Democrats, despite the fact that the US economy is doing splendidly well.

It is true. The productivity of the US economy is nothing short spectacular.

Trouble is… it’s not helping families. This Wikipedia chart tells the story (though there are many other, similar charts, comparing family wealth, incomes, and other measures of inequality).

What this chart tells us is that the living standards of typical American families have been stagnant for a quarter century or more. No matter what they do, they are stuck. Their lives are not getting any better, even as America produces one billionaire after another, with some of them, like Musk, predicted to become trillionaires within the next decade or two.

Yes, American voters are concerned about the economy. But the economy they’re concerned about is not the economy that is reflected by macroeconomic statistics like GDP growth. They are concerned about the economies of their own families. What they can afford. Can they buy a house. Can they replace an aging vehicle.

And increasingly, they cannot. Median family wealth is stagnant while housing prices rise. Tuition fees rise, along with student debt. Things are not getting any better, and in particular, parents cannot promise their children a life better than their own.

This is a hotbed for populism, of course. They sound the battle cry: Kick out those immigrants! Erect trade barriers! Lower those taxes! Well, guess who benefits when that happens:

After all, when the bottom half of Americans are not doing well, the perfect solution is to lower the taxes for tycoons and captains of industry, right? Because of… I don’t know, trickle down? Or just blame yourself for your own misfortune?

So well, yes, it’s the economy, stupid. But make sure you read the right economic statistics. The numbers that actually reflect the realities of life of most Americans.

 Posted by at 12:39 am

How I learned to stop worrying and love Trump…

 History, Politics  1 Response »
Oct 242024
 

No, I did not suddenly have a change of heart concerning Trump’s likely victory and the resulting, unprecedented subversion of American democracy that I expect to see.

I just turned full-blown cynic.

I am, after all, 61 years old with no children to worry about. Even if I remain healthy for a long time to come, the bulk of my life is very obviously behind me, not ahead of me. And I lived that life during an unprecedented era of peace and prosperity, unique in the history of humanity. (No, not perfect. But unprecedented and unique in extent and duration.) I never knew hunger, never had existential fears, never was deprived of my most basic rights. So who am I to complain?

But now, things are about to get exciting. No, not in a good way, but exciting nonetheless. And as I said multiple times in the past, Trump is but a symptom. Even if he loses this election, the underlying causes remain. Rising inequality. A stagnant middle class. Worsening living standards, the inability to offer the new generation a better life, or at least a life comparable to that of their parents. Social tensions reignited, often by opportunistic activists who’d rather see the wounds fester (so they can profit from them) than heal. None of these go away even if Trump drops dead tomorrow. And it transcends the United States. The issues exist here in Canada, throughout Europe and elsewhere. Regimes opposed to the very concept of liberal democracy are taking notice, and playing this to their advantage.

What will be the ultimate outcome? A major war is a near certainty, in my opinion. Collapse of many democracies is likely, with the exception of those few that have within them the will to reform, and also have the ability to protect their borders. The collapse of the global, interconnected economy will bring insane suffering and only play into the hands of future autocrats.

Illustration by DALL-E

I have no idea when the proverbial poo will collide with the ventilator. But collide it will, and it will happen sooner, rather than later. I don’t think the world has been this close to the brink at any moment in my lifetime, anytime since 1945 as a matter of fact. But now I no longer fear that future. Rather, I have become mighty curious. It is, after all, not every day that one gets a chance to witness such a monumental moment in history, something on the scale of the collapse of the Roman Republic, at the very least.

 Posted by at 12:17 am

History books to come

 History, Politics  4 Responses »
Oct 172024
 

First, let me express my unbridled optimism: Yes, there will be history books in the future. I hope.

What will they say about our present time? Nothing encouraging, I fear.

They’ll note the date October 17, 2024, as the date when Ukraine basically presented a nuclear ultimatum: If the country is not welcome into NATO, at some point in the future it may very well rearm itself with nuclear weapons. Which, arguably, it has every right to do, since 30 years ago Ukraine gave up what was then the world’s third largest nuclear arsenal in exchange for supposedly robust security guarantees by, among other states, the Russian Federation.

In unrelated news, several days ago there was a minor earthquake registered in the Dnipro region of Ukraine. Which, incidentally, supposedly coincides with some old Soviet weapons testing grounds. Or not. Ukrainians say the epicenter was several kilometers below the surface and the world is not alarmed. Still…

One of Midjourney’s suggestions for the cover of a future history book

Meanwhile, Donald Trump is gaining. If I had to bet my money, I’d bet on him winning in November. The consequences will likely be catastrophic, both for democracy within the American Republic and for NATO and the broader Western democratic alliance.

In my country of birth, Hungary, Orban continues to reign supreme. And he’s no longer the outlier in Europe: increasingly, nationalists and authoritarians are gaining elsewhere on the continent.

Elsewhere, China continues its saber-rattling at Taiwan, North Korea now sends soldiers to help Russia, the Middle Eastern conflict widens, there’s even a spat between Canada and India over an Indian assassionation of a Sikh nationalist on Canadian soil not long ago.

In short, let me not mince words about this: The world is fucked up badly, and it’s becoming more and more fucked up each and every passing day.

Meh. I am 61, and I have no children to worry about. So maybe I’ll just lean back and watch the show? It’s about to get really exciting.

But yes, I still hope that there will be future history books.

 Posted by at 11:28 pm

More crazy times

 History, Politics  No Responses »
Oct 112024
 

Recently I invented two nightmare scenarios concerning American politics. Well, how about a third one.

Imagine for a moment that January 20 comes about; preceded by a period of two months loaded with crazy lawsuits, state electoral offices consumed with conspiracy theories, disputed outcomes. Ultimately, a fatally divided Supreme Court with, say, five conservative justices on one side, one conservative with second thoughts (arguably more interested in protecting the US Constitution than granting free reign to Trumpists) and three liberals on the other.

So when the fateful day comes, inauguration, the world witnesses the most alarming spectacle. Even as the five conservatives swear in Trump, across town, the remaining four justices do the same with Harris.

Midjourney does not let me depict Trump or Harris directly, but it was willing to produce this image of competing Roman emperors.

Looking at history as a guide, the outcome will likely not be pretty. There were competing emperors in the history of the Roman Empire, and competing popes in the history of the Catholic Church. The result was often (always?) violence, bloodshed, suffering. We’ve not seen something like this in functioning modern democracies (even the US Civil War as a more, well, orderly business) but I expect the worst.

Unlikely? Thankfully so. Impossible? Not anymore, I think, and that speaks volumes about the times in which we live.

 Posted by at 6:43 pm

To my American friends

 Politics  1 Response »
Oct 062024
 

These days, I tend to avoid politics as much as possible. Sure, I keep myself informed about the facts, but that’s it. I’m not interested in opinions, talking heads, polls, predictions, ideology or propaganda.

But that does not mean that I am not concerned. On the contrary: I am more concerned than I’ve ever been in my 60+ years on this planet. That’s 60+ years of living in fundamentally peaceful, prosperous, safe societies where my basic rights were respected, where I never faced existential concerns like famine or war, where my personal freedoms were never seriously in danger. (Indeed, not even in Kadar’s goulash communism in Hungary, where I grew up.) In other words, the rules-based world of Pax Americana, 79 years and counting.

I am concerned because a second Trump presidency may end it all. Here you have a person—a bitter, deeply flawed, corrupt egotist—who is far more comfortable in the company of dictators (and far more willing to praise them) than among democratic leaders. A person who already telegraphed his intent to abuse the system, to take personal revenge on those who slighted him, to cling to power even by extraconstitutional or unconstitutional means.

In other words, a challenge like no other in the 248-year history of the great United States of America.

How is it even possible? Perhaps because the problems are real. Problems I noted before. The stagnating middle class. Rising inequality. Rising poverty. Homelessness. The bleak future that younger generations face compared to the lives of their parents and grandparents.

There is a political class that feeds off these grievances. Their goal is not to address the problems but to perpetuate them and use them for political gain. This political class exists across the board. It includes rabidly “woke” left-wing activists and it also includes Trump and his loyal entourage promoting his cult of personality. However, there is a crucial difference. The “woke” lot may represent the “radical left” but, radical as they are, they still largely work within the system. Trump and his followers already made it crystal clear that they will not let the law or the US constitution stand in their way. And their tactic is as ancient, as transparent as it is effective.

Note how they talk about election fraud. Note how they talk about “weaponizing government”. Or “weaponizing the justice system”. You might think of these as mere accusations, empty election rhetoric. But it’s a lot more than that. What this propaganda accomplishes is that it normalizes that which they accuse the other side of doing. Never mind that the other side is not actually engaged in election fraud or criminal abuse of governmental powers. It’s enough that Trump’s followers believe (and yes, they truly believe) that it happens. What it accomplishes is simple. Once their side wins, they’ll only do what is right and just, and “return the favor” by, well, engaging in election fraud and weaponizing government. The justification? They’re not doing anything that the other side has not been doing already. It’s only fair. And necessary, even, as they accept the excuses from Trump’s apologists.

This “projection” thus has a clear goal. The current Administration is accused of doing precisely the things that a Trump administration plans to do. And the accusations are really justifications: if the current administration can do it, why can’t we? Keep this in mind as you think about the goals of Trump’s propaganda machine. It’s not about winning over Harris supporters. It’s about convincing their own supporters of the legitimacy of their planned undemocratic, “illiberal” tactics.

And this is why a Trump victory is about far, far more than the ordinary politics of the day, like taxes or abortion rights. It is an existential threat to American democracy.

This is why I feel the need to do something I’ve never done before: I urge my American friends to do the only sensible thing. Hold your noses if you must, but even if you disagree with her on every single issue, vote for Harris. Especially if you live in a “purple” state. Harris may do things you don’t like, but you’ll be able to cast another vote four years from now, and give her the boot. The same is not necessarily true if Trump wins.

And no, do not assume that “it cannot happen here”. It can. This is in fact precisely how great democracies die. This is how the Roman Republic died, this is how the short-lived democratic experiment in Germany known as the Weimar Republic came to an end. This is the recipe that was followed by Putin in Russia, this is the “illiberal democracy” that Orban is promoting in my native Hungary. This is how Erdogan solidified his position in Turkey, and this is what far-right politicians in Europe might try to do, should they gain power. It CAN happen here, and it may very well happen if Trump wins. Put country ahead of party, ahead of partisan politics, ahead of short-term interests. It’s the very idea of the great American Republic that is at stake.

 Posted by at 3:43 pm

Crazy times

 Politics  2 Responses »
Oct 062024
 

The other day, I came up with not one but two rather outlandish political scenarios. Outlandish but, frighteningly, perhaps not altogether implausible. And that alone I think is a sign of the troubled times in which we live.

First scenario: An unholy alliance

Suppose for a moment that Trump wins the election next month, and takes office in January. He of course promised us that he will bring peace to Ukraine. We think we know what it entails: cutting off aid to Ukraine, actively promoting a Putin “peace plan”, forcing Ukraine to surrender, at the very least, a large chunk of its territory if not its independent statehood altogether. Much like Chamberlain’s “peace for our times” that he helped bring about in Munich, in late September 1938, Trump’s peace plan will likely just embolden Russia’s dictator, leading to greater conflict.

But what if reality turns out to be… a tad different?

What if… lo and behold… in the weeks following Trump’s return to the White House, while he is busy carrying out his revenge plan, targeting his opponents, reshaping the Department of Justice, denouncing judges and the media, the fighting in Ukraine quietly subsides. It becomes less intense. Trump then holds an unassuming telephone conversation with Putin. Putin agrees to halt offensive operations, even withdraws some of his forces. Ukrainian opinion is divided but they are war-weary, and territorial concessions, though painful, increasingly seem like a price worth paying in exchange for peace. And perhaps they even receive some powerful guarantees, like an American base near the newly redrawn Ukraine-Russia border. So sometime in 2025, the war ends, in a manner even Ukrainians find at least marginally palatable.

The world celebrates as it watches Trump making a historic visit to Moscow… where, as the details emerge shortly thereafter, he establishes a new coalition with Putin to counter China. And suddenly, we have a whole new Cold War on our hands: a West, united with Russia (the country that, after all, has the most reasons to fear a militarized China — just look at the map to see why) in confrontation with the global South led from Beijing. Putin’s future in the history books as Russia’s Great Dictator is assured, and Russia gets the best security guarantee ever to counter the one real threat alongside its borders, a China with a very large, but aging population, a faltering economy, and insatiable hunger for Siberia’s wealth in natural resources. Trump has been played and, blinded by his oversize ego, he does not even know it.

Where this confrontation leads, I have no idea, but it may very well result in open war on the Asian continent, war on an unprecedented scale.

Second scenario: Et tu, Brute?

We have all seen the performance of JD Vance, Trump’s vice-presidential candidate, during the televised VP debate. He was good. He was better than good. He was intelligent, polite, professional, collegial, knowledgeable. In short, he was everything Trump is not, and his calculated, smooth niceness visibly rattled his opponent, Walz.

Caesar by Orson Welles, Mercury Theatre 1937

What JD Vance demonstrated that night was how clever, how smart, how capable, how shrewd and disciplined a politician he really is. And that made me wonder…

Suppose Trump and Vance win in November and occupy the White House in due course in January. For a while, things proceed as expected. Trump begins, as anticipated, by abusing his powers, firing government officials he dislikes, gradually turning law enforcement, the Justice Department into his personal revenge machine against those who may have slighted him. And Trump being Trump, he continues to say the wildest things whenever he gets a chance, in interviews, even on social media.

And Vance waits. He waits for the weaponization of government to become a fait accompli. Most importantly, he waits for Trump to say or do something even crazier than usual, something we all know we can count on Trump doing. And when that happens… That’s when Vance pounces, like a political ambush predator. He “pulls a 25th”. That is to say, in cahoots with his friends in government and Congress, he uses the US Constitution’s 25th amendment to remove Trump from office due to his incompetence.

And there you have it: the 48th President of the United States, JD Vance, inheriting an already badly corrupted machinery of the state thanks to his former boss and predecessor. A machinery that he fully intends to use as he continues the reshaping of America, keeping it as a Republic in name only, not unlike how the Roman Empire maintained the pretense of a republic for centuries after the first “first citizen”, Gaius Octavius, better known as Augustus Caesar, took the stage.

Can it happen? I think so. In fact, I worry that soon enough, we’ll be confronted with a reality far weirder than these scenarios I concocted up. Indeed when you think about it… the very fact that we are discussing not the first but the possible second term of a crooked egotist, a corrupt real estate con artist as the President of the United States would have been considered beyond-the-pale outlandish nonsense as recently as 15, 20 years ago.

 Posted by at 2:39 pm

Imagination

 Canada, History, Hungary, Politics  2 Responses »
Sep 272024
 

Allow me to let my imagination go wild.

Imagine a country in which access to health care — basic health care, no fancy machines, but competent, well-trained professionals — is easy. Want to see a cardiologist? Go to the local clinic, cardiology is on the third floor to the left, present your ID card and within 30 minutes, an assistant will call you by name and you’re talking to a cardiologist. Or any other specialist, for that matter. Oh, and if your child is sick, the pediatrician will make house calls. Free of charge, as all of this is covered by the public health insurance system.

 Imagine emergency services that work. An ambulance system that, barring large-scale natural disasters, does not know the meaning of “level zero”. Emergency rooms that always have the capacity, at least in normal times, to quickly process patients and accommodate them.

 Imagine hospitals that are well staffed and have surplus capacity. In particular, imagine mental hospitals that host many mental patients, including patients who, though not raving lunatics, are nonetheless incapable, for one reason or another, of leading proper lives independently, and would end up homeless, crippled with addictions or worse, if they were not institutionalized.

 Imagine a country with no real homelessness. Sure, if you are in dire straits, you may not be able to find luxury accommodations, but you’ll not be left outside: If nothing else, a shared room will be available in a workers’ hostel or dormitory, with a bed and a wardrobe that you can call your own, but eventually, you might be able to get at least a tiny apartment, not much, just a bedroom, a toilet, a shower and a cooking stove, but still. Your place. One that will not be taken away so long as you pay the subsidized rent and don’t exhibit outrageous behavior.

Female dormitory at a downtown Budapest hostel for construction workers.
Fortepan / Peter Horvath, 1982

 Imagine a merit-based system of tertiary education that does not cost a penny. Institutions that teach valuable skills in the sciences, engineering and the arts, not made-up diplomas that exist only to serve some ideological or political agenda. Institutions that kick you out if you do not meet minimum criteria, fail your exams, fail to complete your assignments.

 Imagine a cheap public transit system that… just works. Reliably. The subway runs 20 hours a day, with all maintenance done, properly completed, during the overnight hours. Buses and trams arriving on time, a system only interrupted on rare occasions by major weather events or large accidents.

 A pipe dream, you say? Maybe… except that what I am describing is the reality in which I grew up, in the goulash communism of behind-the-Iron-Curtain Hungary.

To be sure, things didn’t always work as advertised. There was no homelessness epidemic, but young people often ended up paying through the nose to live in sublet properties, often just a bedroom in someone else’s apartment. The health care system was nominally free, but people felt obligated to pay real money, a “gratitude”, under the table to compensate severely underpaid doctors and other health care professionals.

No, I do not want to pretend that life under communism was great. After all, I “voted with my feet”, leaving behind my country of birth, opting to begin a new life starting with nothing other than the contents of my travel bag and a few hundred dollars in my wallet in 1986. Nonetheless, my description of Kadar-era everyday life in Hungary reflects the truth. That really is the way the health care system, public housing, public transportation or tertiary education simply worked. Worked so well, in fact, we took them for granted.

The fact that these things today, in the capital city of a G7 country, namely Ottawa, Canada, are much more like pipe dreams, much farther away in reality than in Kadar’s communist dictatorship 50 years ago…

Homeless couple in recessed side entrance of Ottawa’s Rideau Centre.
Google Street View, July 2023

The mind boggles. Seriously, what the bleep is wrong with us?

 Posted by at 2:28 am

A house divided against itself…

 Politics  No Responses »
Sep 232024
 

Here is a sentence similar to some of the stuff I wrote right here, in my blog: “The threats the United States faces are the most serious and most challenging the nation has encountered since 1945 and include the potential for near-term major war.”

Except that this sentence is not from my blog. Rather, it is the opening sentence of the summary of the report by the bipartisan Commission on the National Defense Strategy of the United States Congress.


When you consider the source, the sentence I quoted must make the blood in your veins freeze for a moment. Just to be sure, the authors of this report spare no words scolding their fellow Representatives for playing politics at America’s expense: “We would be far stronger if we returned to the maxim that politics ends at the water’s edge,” they tell us after lamenting about the political gamesmanship that paralyzes Washington.

I do not live in the United States, but I recognize that the security of the Free World is determined in no small part by Washington. I just hope that the American political class come to their senses before it’s too late. As Sun Tsu told us, the best way to win a war is “to subdue an enemy without fighting”. I fear that United States might miss its chance to do so while American citizens view their next door neighbor a threat to their future that’s worse than the threat due to their nation’s real enemies abroad.

 Posted by at 11:25 pm

Someone…

 Politics  3 Responses »
Aug 282024
 

I saw this on Twitter but it needs sharing. About men who think they are supportive of women, but only see women as appendages or extensions of themselves. No. They are someones, not someone’s someones. Why this is even an issue in 2024, I do not comprehend.

 Posted by at 11:05 pm

79 years

 History, Politics  No Responses »
Aug 102024
 

Yesterday, August 9, 2024 marked the 79th anniversary of the last time nuclear weapons were used in anger. Or to put it another way, today began the 80th year without a nuclear war.

Can we make it through the end of this year, too, without major confrontation?

Russia vs. Ukraine. Iran vs. Israel. China vs. Taiwan. These are just the major flashpoints, but probably because they are on everyone’s front pages, they’re also the least likely ones. Fecal matter tends to encounter propellers in the most unexpected places. After all, who would have thought on June 28, 1914 that a student stepping out of a coffee house just as a car carrying a VIP made a wrong turn in the distant city of Sarajevo will change world history? Who would have thought on July 7, 1937 that a Japanese soldier with a belly ache in faraway Beijing would trigger an incident on a bridge informally named after a European explorer who visited centuries prior, leading to the first shots fired in a global calamity that eventually concluded with the aforementioned last use of a nuclear weapon in anger?

War. War never changes, goes the motto of the Fallout family of computer games. And I am increasingly worried that the Fallout games, just like a text game from the dawn of personal computing, A Mind Forever Voyaging, foreseeing a society with rising inequality, political polarization, authoritarian rule, will be treated not as cautionary tales but as instruction manuals…

 Posted by at 10:31 pm

Orthogonal

 Canada, History, Hungary, Politics  2 Responses »
Aug 072024
 

Having read comments from some Brits who wish to get rid of the monarchy in order to turn their country into a “democracy”, I despair. It is one thing that, in 2024, most folks are illiterate when it comes to science and technology but apparently, history and the social sciences are also badly neglected subjects.

My point, of course, is that these commenters confuse the form of government with the sources of power and the nature of the state.

A form of government may be a republic (res publica, i.e., governance in the name of the public) or a monarchy (monarkhia, rule of one), among other things.

However, both these forms of government can be autocratic (relying on the might of the state) vs. democratic (relying on the will of the people) insofar as the source of power is concerned.

And neither the form of government nor that source of power determine if the state will be liberal (that is, respecting basic rights and freedoms, such as freedom of conscience, freedom of enterprise, or the rule of law) or illiberal/authoritarian.

Midjourney’s response to the mostly Claude-written prompt, “Three regal anthropomorphic cats sitting on thrones, representing the orthogonal concepts of government. One cat wears a crown (monarchy vs republic), another holds a scepter and a ballot box (autocracy vs democracy), and the third balances scales of justice (liberal vs illiberal). The cats are arranged in a triangle formation against a backdrop of a stylized world map.”

To illustrate, let me offer a few examples. I live in Canada: a liberal, democratic constitutional monarchy. South of us is the United States: Also liberal and democratic, but a republic.

In contrast, the DPRK (North Korea) may serve as an example of a state that is an illiberal, undemocratic republic. Saudi Arabia is an illiberal, undemocratic monarchy.

Examples for other combinations are perhaps harder, but not impossible, to find. Orban’s Hungary, for instance, is rapidly converging on a state that is best described as illiberal, but democratic (the primary source of power is the people, not the might of the state) republic. I think some of the states in the Middle East (maybe Kuwait?) might qualify as relatively liberal, yet undemocratic monarchies.

These categories are not perfect of course, and do not cover all outliers, including theocracies, transitional governments or failed states. Still, I think it’s important to stress that the form of government, the source of power and the nature of the state are three fundamentally orthogonal concepts, and that all combinations are possible and do exist or have existed historically.

Understanding these distinctions is important. For instance, there are plenty of historical examples (e.g., the French Revolution devolving into the Reign of Terror, or the Russian revolution leading to the totalitarianism of the USSR) when the transition from monarchy to republic led to a significantly more autocratic regime. “Republic” is not a synonym for “democracy”.

 Posted by at 9:44 pm

Grumbling Monday

 Canada, Cybernetics, Physics, Politics  2 Responses »
Aug 052024
 

It’s a civic holiday Monday that feels like a Saturday, reminding me of an old Soviet-era science-fiction novel, Monday begins on Saturday, by the Strugatsky brothers. It’s also a rather gloomy Monday morning, so it’s time for me to grumble about a few things.

For instance, how politics infuses everything these days. I signed up to follow a Facebook group dedicated to brutalist architecture, which for some inexplicable reason, I like. The comments section in one of the first posts I saw rapidly deteriorated into political bickering, as to whether or not it was appropriate to repurpose one of the Nazi-era indestructible flak towers in Hamburg as a luxury hotel. Because you know, politics is everything.

Speaking of which, I saw another post elsewhere about employees of a large US company who, after being told how successful the company was last year, were informed in the same breath that the company will cut their pension plan contributions. Needless to say, there followed comments about the evils of capitalism. Having experienced both capitalism and one of its alternatives, a socialist economy with central planning, all I can say is that capitalism works most of the time until it doesn’t; but when it doesn’t, victims are ever so eager to replace it with something that never works instead.

Then there was this post at an online news site claiming that it is practically impossible to run an ethical AI company. Well, what can I say? If you are telling me that allowing machine learning algorithms to learn from accumulated human knowledge is unethical, then sure, you are absolutely right. Then again, I suspect that what mainly drives such complaints is blatant ignorance of how machine learning works in the first place.

OK, well, never mind that, there’s good news. A fusion energy breakthrough: Neutron impact on tokamak components uncovered. Er… Say again? You are telling me that after 70+ years of research, we are beginning to understand why, or how, a heavy neutron flux rapidly destroys test equipment in the lab? Isn’t that like, say, greeting it as a “steam turbine breakthrough” when a prehistoric tribe manages to draw a spark from slamming together two rocks?

Oh well. On mornings like this, I feel I am beginning to comprehend the mood of the late, great Kurt Vonnegut who once told the CBC’s Anna Maria Tremonti to go jump in a lake.

 Posted by at 1:12 pm

A Mind Forever Voyaging

 Canada, Computer Games, Local Ottawa, Politics  2 Responses »
Aug 012024
 

I mentioned this before: A Mind Forever Voyaging, a computer game from the 1980s, one of the text adventures of the legendary Infocom, a game in which you play an AI protagonist, sent to simulations of the future to explore the factors behind the decay and collapse of society.

As you venture further and further into the future, things get worse. Inequality, homelessness, violence.

I was again reminded of this game this morning when I saw the news: New mortgage rules are in effect, allowing borrowers less down payment and longer terms. As a result, the monthly mortgate payment for a $500,000 home is “only” around $2,700, give or take.

Has it occurred to anyone that perhaps the problem is not on the borrowing side but on the supply side? That if we lack affordable housing, making it easier for people to borrow money that they cannot afford to repay is not really a solution?

The same newscast again mentioned an increasingly frequent problem, “renoviction”, when people are evicted from their rent-controlled apartments because the landlord renovates, only to learn that they can no longer find a place of residence that they can afford.

Also on the news: yet another old business (opened 1954) is shutting down at the ByWard Market. In their case, it’s the changing nature of the business post-COVID but for many others, it’s the deteriorating public safety. Increased police presence only pushes the problem elsewhere, like Centretown. I had to drive across town today to our car dealership, for an oil change. I saw panhandlers at every major intersection. Not too long ago, such sights were rare, dare I say even nonexistent here in Ottawa. Now, downtown sidewalks are full of homeless folks.

I have said it before when I lamented about AMFV here in my blog: It’s a piece of (interactive) fiction. Please do not mistake it for an instruction manual. Let’s come back from the brink before it is too late. Unless it is too late already…

 Posted by at 10:48 pm

Hungarian foreign policy

 History, Hungary, Politics  2 Responses »
Jul 272024
 

As a dual citizen of Canada and Hungary, I am of course delighted to hold an EU passport. Even though I have no plans to do so in the foreseeable future, it is nice to know that I have freedom of movement within the EU, and that in most places I could also claim permanent residence and work.

Unfortunately, as a person firmly committed to the values and interests of our Western alliance, I am increasingly concerned about Viktor Orban’s antics. His coziness with Russia’s dictator, his willingness to embrace undemocratic, “illiberal” policies for the sake of holding on to power, his warm relationship with Trump, his misuse of his position as Hungary holds the rotating EU presidency, exemplified by his rogue visits to Moscow and Beijing… Plain and simple, he is becoming a security threat to the Western alliance.

I have often called Orban in the past a horse trader (a particularly apt expression in the Hungarian language is “lókupec”). The implication, of course, was that even as Orban is deeply corrupt and unscrupulous, he is driven in the end by rational self-interest, and thus remains predictable and reliable.

But lately, I’ve been wondering if that is still true. What we are witnessing, I do not fully comprehend. Is he a Putin asset? Did he simply bet on the wrong horse this time around, now doubling down on a bad bet?

Whatever it is, he is not only doing tangible harm to his own country and, of course, the Western alliance, he is also making amateurish mistakes. The most recent example concerns his journey to Kyiv and Moscow. Parading around as a champion of peace, he forgot to talk to his hosts about the one thing that can severely impact Hungary’s economy: The uninterrupted supply of Russian oil through a pipeline that traverses Ukrainian territory. Oops!

Orban is now widely despised in the West and with good reason. At home, however, he remains firmly in charge. The secret, beyond his “illiberal” concentration of powers and his success at undermining independent media and the independence of the judiciary, is the flawed historical self-assessment of his nation. Many Hungarians still view themselves as victims of the Paris peace treaty of 1919, which they see as massively unfair, robbing the country of roughly two thirds of its historical territory. Which undeniably happened, of course, but context is everything. The last time those historical borders of Hungary existed as the borders of an independent political entity was in 1526, when Hungary suffered a devastating loss fighting the Ottoman Empire (a self-inflicted wound, arguably, as it was Hungary that broke a peace treaty with the Ottomans.) Fast forward to the 20th century: we have a map created by a famous Hungarian cartographer, Károly Kogutowitz who, using data from the last pre-war census of 1910, compiled this ethnographic map of the country:

Although there are clearly visible areas of the map outside the country’s present-day borders that had majority Hungarian populations, the borders are roughly in the right place. We can argue about specific patches of land in the border regions of Slovakia, in northern Transylvania, and a few other locations (hey, my father’s family is from Temesvár, now Timisoara, Romania, and I’ve had friends and relatives from famous, formerly Hungarian towns like Kolozsvár/Cluj or Marosvásárhely/Tirgu Mures, so it’s not like I am unaware of their plight, especially under Ceausescu’s regime), but one thing is clear: most of the territory of the historical Kingdom of Hungary was not dominated by a Hungarian ethnic majority. Should not be surprising: medieval kingdoms were not ethnic nation-states. Whether or not it is wise to base borders on ethnicity is another question, but so long as we accept that premise, the borders speak for themselves: they may not be fair but they certainly represent ethnic realities far more closely than the historical borders many Hungarians still dream about.

Orban of course can whip up nationalist feelings. He can easily explain his stance on Ukraine to his domestic audience by alluding to how badly ethnic Hungarians are supposedly treated in that country. The Orban of the past: the young leader of a youthful movement (Fidesz stands for Alliance of Young Democrats in Hungarian) is long forgotten. Instead, we now have a leader that adores Russia’s dictator. A leader whose actions appear to echo a past when, nearly a century ago, another Hungarian leader, Horthy, maneuvered the country into a foreign policy cul-de-sac. I fear that something similar is going to happen again, and the country will suffer, just as it suffered during that fateful winter of 1944-45 when it was ravaged by war and by brutal Nazi rule, only to be followed by more than four decades of communist oppression.

 Posted by at 11:25 pm

Why Russia was less affected by CrowdStrike

 Computer Security, Politics  1 Response »
Jul 252024
 

I heard a rumor: Russia was significantly less affected by the CrowdStrike cyberoutage. Could it be that they were behind it?

Of course not. Never attribute to evil that which you can explain by stupidity. But in this case, backwardness was also on Russia’s side. You might have seen memes about Southwest Airlines, largely unaffected on account of the fact that many of their systems still run on Windows 3.1. Well, it Russia it’s… like that, even more so. As an example, here’s a CrowdStrike-affected display panel from a few days ago at JFK airport in New York City:

In contrast, here’s a departures board from a small Russian airport:

Kind of hard to hack, that one.

 Posted by at 12:29 am

How is it their business, pray tell?

 Personal, Politics  No Responses »
Jul 192024
 

I admit I almost lost it last night.

I was attempting to sign up as an author with a notable scientific journal (who shall remain nameless as I am cowardly and I hope to remain in their good graces.) I was confronted with a questionnaire asking about some personal details.

Okay, so they want to know about my name, e-mail address, office phone and institution. All perfectly reasonable, even though I do not have a formal affiliation which sometimes means going through extra hoops, trying to convince the software that I am nonetheless legit. Then came more personal questions such as my gender and age. But then… race, ethnicity, sexual orientation…

Sexual orientation???

I beg your pardon?

Say what? I apologize for language that’s rude and crude, but what the fuck do my scientific contributions have to do with the privacy of my bedroom and how is that your fucking business?

I generally consider my ideological affiliation left-of-center, which is to say more likely leaning towards a progressive liberal attitude. But this? Granted, there was the option, “prefer not to answer”. Nonetheless, I was beyond offended. In this context, the question is downright creepy. What are they going to ask next from prospective authors? How often do you masturbate? Do you prefer conventional or unconventional positions while copulating? Are you into S&M?

I mean, seriously, all I am trying to do is to submit a physics paper to a scientific publication. Not interrogated about my bedroom habits.

Of course I know the answer. This is checkbox-driven DEI virtue-signaling. Someone, somewhere, will write a report about how well (or how badly) this scientific publication represents various communities. Never mind that the actual science should have absolutely nothing to do with race, ethnicity, or sexual orientation. They now have checkboxes, and no doubt, folks patting themselves on the back being proud of what they have accomplished, making the world more inclusive and all.

Except that they didn’t. Except that these forms of aggressive, self-serving episodes of virtue signaling achieve the exact opposite: instead of steering the world towards a future in which such superficial characteristics no longer matter, instead of a world in which we are all judged by the content of our character, they not only keep divisions alive, they are actively deepening them.

And that’s why we can’t have nice things anymore.

 Posted by at 6:16 pm
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