Only half way through November – here is an “October in Review” post.
Most frightening and/or depressing story: When it comes to the #1 climate change impact on ordinary people, it’s the food stupid. (Dear reader, I’m not calling you stupid, and I don’t consider myself stupid, but somehow we individually intelligent humans are all managing to be stupid together.) This is the shit that is probably going to hit the fan first while we are shouting stupid slogans like “drill baby drill” (okay, if you are cheering when you hear a politician shout that you might not be stupid, but you are at least uninformed.)
Most hopeful story: AI, at least in theory, should be able to help us manage physical assets like buildings and infrastructure more efficiently. Humans still need to have some up-front vision of what we would like our infrastructure systems to look like in the long term, but then AI should be able to help us make optimal repair-replace-upgrade-abandon decisions that nudge the system toward the vision over time as individual components wear out.
Most interesting story, that was not particularly frightening or hopeful, or perhaps was a mixture of both: Some explanations proposed for the very high cost of building infrastructure in the U.S. are (1) lack of competition in the construction industry and (2) political fragmentation leading to many relatively small agencies doing many relatively small projects. Some logical solutions then are to encourage the formation of more firms in the U.S., allow foreign firms and foreign workers to compete (hardly consistent with the current political climate!), and consolidate projects into a smaller number of much larger ones where economies of scale can be realized. There is some tension though between scale and competition, because the larger and more complex a project gets, the fewer bidders it will tend to attract who are willing to take the risk.
I was sitting down to do my “October in Review” post and realized I never got around to September. So better late than never. I’m writing this on November 9, 2024 after the U.S. election but I’ll try to give U.S. politics a rest in this post (update: I almost succeeded although I couldn’t resist an interesting point about the U.S. Constitution).
Most interesting story, that was not particularly frightening or hopeful, or perhaps was a mixture of both: Countries around the world update their constitutions about every 20 years on average. They have organized, legal processes for doing this spelled out in the constitutions themselves. The U.S. constitution is considered the world’s most difficult constitution to update and modernize.
I’ve had a few days to process the election now. I’ve heard and pondered a variety of explanations for why it went so decisively in Trump’s favor. Here are a few thoughts.
“A referendum on the Biden administration.” The economic pain felt by a large majority of voters is real. The root cause, somewhat obviously, is inequality. The inequality in turn is the result of decades of poor policy choices resulting in erosion in real wages for working people, regressive taxation, lack of government services and benefits that citizens of other developed countries take for granted, and destabilization of our planet’s biophysical life support system which allows us to grow food and live near coast lines. The thing is, people don’t react strongly to gradual changes. A complex system like the economy can be under stress for a long time and then break when subjected to an extreme event. The extreme event in this case was Covid-19 and the worldwide inflation that followed. This caused a very real and painful reduction in peoples’ disposable income, and they are understandably pissed off. Trump offers simple (but wrong) explanations and people to blame: Biden. Harris. Democrats. Immigrants. China. Then he offers simple (but wrong and counter-productive) fixes like tariffs and mass deportation of foreigners.
Lack of critical thinking. I think there is something to this. The simplistic answers are wrong, and intelligent people should be able to see this but they are not. There is at least some possibility that Covid or testicle-shrinking chemicals in our food/air/water have made us all stupider than we used to be. But I don’t really believe this. So it is clearly a failure of the education system if a large majority of the people, most of whom are perfectly intelligent, are not able to see through obvious illogical claims and false promises.
Democrats’ lack of a clear alternative. The Democrats did not offer any easy to understand, coherent counter-narrative, and they do not have a track record they can point to suggesting they can reverse the decline in disposable income. I’ll let Bernie Sanders say it: “it should come as no great surprise that a Democratic Party which has abandoned working class people would find that the working class has abandoned them.”
Lack of talented leaders in politics. I loathe Trump and everything he stands for. But I went to the polls on Tuesday feeling like I was voting for the less bad of the two very limited options being offered to me. I did not find Harris to be visionary or inspiring. I can say the same about Donald Trump, Joe Biden, Hillary Clinton, and George W. Bush. Barrack Obama was a talented, visionary, inspiring leader even though his policies were status quo in many ways. I find Bernie Sanders inspiring. I personally found Bill Clinton inspiring, although again his policies were quite conservative on any rational spectrum. And that’s it for the last three decades or so! But I see talented leaders at the state and local level, in corporations and non-profit organizations and universities all the time. In a nation of 350 million odd people, there have to be thousands if not tens of thousands of people with leadership potential. Our political system is not identifying these people, inspiring them to pursue a political career, and bringing them to the forefront for the electorate to choose from.
I’m writing on the morning of election day, November 5, 2024. I have cast my personal vote, in-person since my cracker-ass state will take days to count mail-in ballots and that will allow people who want to cast doubt on the results as they “change” to do so. No results are available yet, so I might as well do one last wrap up of the numbers.
STATE
2020 RESULT
Silver Bulletin (October 1)
Silver Bulletin (November 5)
538 (November 5)
RCP (November 5)
Arizona
Biden +0.4%
Trump +1.5%
Trump +2.4%
Trump +2.1%
Trump +2.8%
Georgia
Biden +0.3%
Trump +1.0
Trump +1.0%
Trump +0.8%
Trump +1.3%
Wisconsin
Biden +0.6%
Harris +1.9%
Harris +1.0%
Harris +1.0%
Harris +0.4%
North Carolina
Trump +1.3%
Trump +0.5%
Trump +1.1%
Trump +0.9%
Trump +1.2%
Pennsylvania
Biden +1.2%
Harris +1.2%
Trump +0.1%
Harris +0.2%
Trump +0.4%
Michigan
Biden +2.8%
Harris +2.1%
Harris +1.2%
Harris +1.0%
Harris +0.5%
Nevada
Biden +2.4%
Harris +1.8%
Trump +0.6%
Trump +0.3%
Trump +0.6%
If we take the Nate Silver numbers as an accurate prediction of the vote, Trump will win the electoral college 287-251. Of course, just flip Pennsylvania to the Harris column and she wins 270-268. If the polling results end up being systematically biased by 1% in either direction, which would be statistically completely unsurprising, it could be a landslide either way. Still, I think I would rather be Trump this morning, because a 1% bias in his direction delivers a huge landslide, whereas a 1% bias in Harris’ direction puts her right on the edge of maybe winning Georgia and Nevada (which Biden won) and North Carolina (which Biden lost). Arizona, which Biden won, would be an even heavier lift. So in other words, these poll numbers suggest she is underperforming 2020 Biden, and that was a close call. It pains me to say all this. And I don’t think it is necessary to even say this: THE ELECTORAL COLLEGE IS A STUPID UNDEMOCRATIC RELIC DESIGNED TO GET 18TH CENTURY SLAVE OWNERS TO AGREE TO BE PART OF THE UNITED STATES, AND WE ARE STILL STUCK WITH IT.
Finally, looking at the betting sites (at 8:50 am EST), PolyMarket is 62% to 38% in favor of Trump, PredictIt is 55 cents to 51 cents, and Kalshi is 60% to 40% in favor of Trump. So whoever bets on these sites seems to agree with the polls more or less. Of course, they are looking at the same polls and other betting sites as everyone else when they decide how to bet, so these are not really independent data points. There may also be shady people manipulating these odds similar to how they are able to manipulate sports odds, who knows.
So I think Harris has a very good chance but I am certainly not confident she will win. We may start to get a sense 12 hours or so from now, or we may not really know for a week or even more.
Do I even need to make my case against Trump again? Well, I will, one last time. These are the really, really bad potential consequences of four more years of Trump.
Climate change has gone from a serious risk that could have been avoided or mitigated to an actively unfolding disaster that needs to be managed to produce the least bad outcome still possible. It is coming for our homes, our cities, and our food supply, and it is going to fuel massive movements of people that are going to cause major social instability. The world can’t afford four more years of denial, propaganda, inaction, and backsliding.
Trump will put incompetent clowns in charge of all major federal departments and programs. Incompetent clowns will not be able to deal with crises and emergencies effectively. The risk of nuclear proliferation, nuclear war, and nuclear terrorism has gone way up over the past decade. This is a huge, imminent existential threat that could bring our country and entire human civilization to its knees. Another major pandemic with a much higher mortality rate among young people, whether bird flu, a Covid relative, or a biological weapon, is another existential threat clowns will not deal with effectively (as they did not last time). Even a major earthquake affecting major population centers, dealt with incompetently or not at all, could deal a body blow to our country.
My list does not include important issues like inequality, health care, child care, education, abortion, gun control, campaign finance reform, or constitutional reform because we can get away with bickering over these things for four more years without the risk of major systemic collapse of our nation and civilization. And neither of the political parties we are allowed to choose from are going to address these issues effectively, although Democrats will attempt some marginal adjustments from time to time. They just make us a little bit poorer and more miserable gradually over time. Hopefully the robot takeover is at least a decade away. What we can’t afford is not having mature, rational grownups running things at a time of growing existential risk.
I am writing this on Halloween, October 31, 2024. You may be reading this after the 2024 U.S. election, in which case you know what happened and I don’t!
Parts of this op-ed in Project Syndicate by a political science professor surprised me.
Others grew alienated during the grueling experience of the Trump presidency. For some Republicans (and independents), the last straw was his loyalty to himself over his party and country when it came to endorsing candidates and dealing with foreign allies and adversaries. For others, it was his pandering to evangelicals, his embrace of isolationism, and his indulgence of racist white nationalists. For still others, it was his attempt to steal the 2020 election, culminating in the uniquely shameful attack on the US Capitol on January 6, 2021. Most Democrats and many independents, of course, have resisted Trump from the start.
Thus, the reason Trump isn’t running away with the 2024 election is Trump himself. It is difficult to escape the conclusion that the Republicans would be the favorites in a normal year with a normal candidate. But 2024 is not a normal year, because Trump is not a normal candidate.
The American electorate’s decision is being influenced both by the quotidian concerns that usually structure election outcomes and by one outsize personality. Never has the latter been such a key consideration. Hundreds of thousands of voters – perhaps millions – are putting aside their party loyalty, policy priorities, and complaints about current conditions to stand against a candidate they consider unfit for the presidency and unworthy of election. We will soon know whether politics as usual or unusual politics will carry the day.
I am surprised by the idea that a “more normal” Republican would be running away with the election. I think it is more likely that an “average Republican” would be hard to distinguish from Kamala Harris who, other than a mildly interesting personal history consisting of being a mixed-race childless cat lady, is a very “average Democrat”.
The Democrats delivered Social Security almost a century ago and Medicare more than half a century ago. These programs are hugely beneficial to voters. However, they have been around for so long that voters take them for granted and do not connect them to the Democratic Party. Since enactment of these programs, Democrats have made many promises to middle class voters and almost entirely failed to deliver on them. (Obamacare might be the biggest success from this period – it was certainly the absolute most that was politically possible at that moment, and much better than nothing, but also much less than fully satisfying. My family would have to pay about $2500 a month out of pocket for coverage, just for the privilege of then paying more when we go to the doctor. This is not affordable or acceptable to the people who need the program most, which are middle income people in the gap between corporate employer-provided coverage and piss-poor quality but free Medicaid for low income people.) So from the Democrats we get positive messages coupled with utter failure to deliver. The Republicans promise nothing and deliver nothing to the middle class. The Democrats’ failure to deliver allows Republicans to focus entirely on negative messaging around things like taxes and immigration, which connects the middle class with people and policies to blame for our misery. The connections are logically and empirically almost entirely false, but the misery is very real. So the election ends up being a referendum against a bland average administration people connect with that misery. My guess would be Trump’s personality turns people on and off in about equal measure, so I suspect substituting a bland average Republican for him (see 2020 Joe Biden) would still result in a near-tossup election.
Don’t get me wrong. My fingers are crossed for Kamala Harris and a Democratic majority in Congress. Another Democratic administration will not deliver for the middle class, but it is much more likely to inch us in the right direction on climate change and manage risk created by the various international crises. These are existential risks, and re-electing Trump just fans the flames of some very, very bad possibilities that could bring down our nation or even our global civilization. To deliver for the middle class, we would need to modernize our constitution, end the control of government policy by wealthy and powerful corporations and billionaires, and get rid of the current insurmountable barriers for candidates outside of the two dominant parties.
We kind of know what we’re supposed to eat, but we still don’t do it consistently, right? At least, I’m speaking for myself here. It doesn’t hurt to see it written down in one place:
Fiber-rich foods such as whole grains, nuts, seeds, beans, fruits and vegetables regulate digestion and nourish beneficial gut bacteria.
Polyphenol-rich foods such as dark chocolate, berries, red grapes, green tea and extra virgin olive oil help reduce inflammation and encourage the growth of healthy gut bacteria.
Unsaturated fats such as omega-3 fats, walnuts, chia seeds, flaxseed, avocados and fatty fish such as salmon can also support a healthy microbiome.
Fermented foods such as sauerkraut, kimchi, yogurt, kefir and miso help replenish beneficial bacteria and restore gut balance.
Thinking about the gut microbiome seems like a trendy new reason to eat the things we were supposed to be eating anyway, but if you eat this way you are probably getting pretty good overall nutrition while limiting calories to something reasonable. And without sending massive herds of animals to the slaughterhouse, which is better for the planet not to mention the animals (although the salmon might feel a bit singled out).
Frontline does great documentaries. This documentary mixes eyewitness interviews with cell phone, security camera, and later journalist footage from the October 7 attacks and the attacks on Gaza that have followed over the last year and counting. It’s powerful, affecting, disturbing stuff, and the human suffering is just unfathomable. I say this with the greatest sympathy to everyone directly affected.
This has only been measured for a few decades, but a detectable increase in the rate of increase in atmospheric methane made me think of tipping points. Could the much-to-be-feared feedback loops in permafrost and methane hydrates thawing be underway right now?
This article doesn’t mention either permafrost or hydrates. It does say that the increases are not a result of leaking natural gas wells or any other fossil fuel industry site. They narrow the cause down to “sources such as wetlands, waste, and agriculture”. I supposed some frozen wetlands could be thawing out, but it seems like the article would have mentioned that. I am skeptical that there has been any drastic worldwide change in landfill operations. A big change in agricultural practices – this could be plausible, I don’t know enough to say it is not.
I have never been to Tokyo, unfortunately. I had a trip planned there in 2011, but the earthquake and nuclear meltdown that year intervened. My condolences to everyone who lost loved ones or was otherwise directly impacted by that event, and I am not suggesting the minor disruption to my vacation plans that year was comparatively important.
Anyway, I was looking forward to seeing Tokyo firsthand and I didn’t get to. But I guess pictures are the next best thing. This article has some nice pictures of railway stations. Now, I spent some time in Singapore recently, and the railway stations there are pretty new and very modern looking. The first thing that strikes me about these Tokyo stations is they are not brand new, and they look pretty similar to older train stations here in the U.S. But the comparison ends there, because they are clean, well maintained, the service is reliable and the population is proud of their public transportation system. I also note that these older stations have been successfully retrofit with barriers so that people can’t fall/be pushed/intentionally jump onto the tracks and die. In the United States, at least here in my home city of Philadelphia, we “can’t afford” these barriers. Meaning of course that human life is not worth enough to us to make this a priority compared to other things we spend enormous amounts of money on, like highways and bombs.
Something called the Global Commission on the Economics of Water says that “half of the world’s food production is at risk of failure within the next 25 years as a rapidly worsening water crisis threatens global agricultural systems”. Even if this group and these numbers turn out to be a bit alarmist, food really is where the climate change shit is likely to meet the fan. There is downward pressure on yields in tropical regions with increasing heat, partially offset on increased yields from longer growing seasons northern regions. Then there is increasing drought in important food-growing and food-consuming regions will be a big issue, and flooding will be an issue in others. This article doesn’t mention sea level rise, but eventually that is going to impact agriculture anywhere near a coastline or dependent on a coastal aquifer.
The poorest people and countries will be directly impacted by any food shortfall first, while the middle classes will feel the pinch at first in the form of higher prices. But longer term I am concerned that food shortages will drive mass migration and anti-immigrant political movements that could get very ugly. We are already seeing some precursors of this in the United States and Europe today. Whether climate change is a key driver today (and it is at least somewhat of a driver for some people aspiring to move from the Middle East to Europe and Central America and North America), it is only going to get worse.
Thank goodness we have had a robust and constructive debate around global food security policy during this year’s U.S. election cycle…oh…right, I just woke up from that dream again.
