Tag Archives: kissinger

Michael Boskin on 2023

Is Michael Boskin an important person to listen to? I don’t know, but I appreciate a variety of people posting about what they think were the important events of 2023. Michael Boskin is “Professor of Economics at Stanford University and Senior Fellow at the Hoover Institution. He was Chairman of George H.W. Bush’s Council of Economic Advisers from 1989 to 1993”. Anyway, he mentions…

the US economy’s “soft landing,” the war of attrition in Ukraine, Hamas’s terrorist attack and its fallout, explosive advances in AI, and the loss of two great American public servants.
Project Syndicate

The two public servants were Henry Kissinger…

Kissinger’s “balance-of-power” realpolitik certainly had its detractors, especially owing to civilian causalities in Cambodia, Vietnam, and East Timor. But history will mark him (along with Shultz) among America’s greatest diplomats – together with Dean Acheson, George Kennan, and George Marshall, who helped President Harry Truman establish the post-World War II economic and security commons.

Okay – I might note that the civilian casualties were numbered in the MILLIONS. And Truman presided over those fire and nuclear bombings of major European and Japanese cities.

and Sandra Day O’Connor…

O’Connor, the first female justice, was pragmatic, conservative, humble, charming, and tough, but never mean. Had she been a liberal Democrat, more statues and public infrastructure would bear her name. As the swing vote on the Court for decades, she often rejected absolutist positions on hot-button issues such as abortion and affirmative action and fashioned compromises that a large majority of Americans could accept.

I’ll admit to being fairly ignorant of Sandra Day O’Connor’s career. One thing I think we can certainly say is that the reputation and legitimacy of the court has declined since her day. I would take “pragmatic, conservative, humble, charming, and tough” over “corrupt as the day is long” like some of the yahoos we have on there now, and for the foreseeable future.

Kissinger – yes, still alive

Kissinger. The Wall Street Journal had an article in which Henry Kissinger made some attention-getting statements about the insanity of current nuclear risk taking. Kissinger is apparently 99 so we may not have the arguable benefits of his instincts much longer. (Although, I suspect he has whatever cyborg implants are keeping Dick Cheney alive.)

Basically, I see Kissinger as an immoral calculated risk taker. He has the blood of millions of human beings in Southeast Asia and South Asia on his hands because he believed the potential benefits to the United States was worth the risk and ultimately suffering and death that resulted. The immoral part was putting next to no value on those lives, in my view. There was a rational calculation involved, at least in his mind.

Assuming he has not become a more moral person with age, and assuming he is still rational, what he is saying is that the risks we are taking now are not worth it and are therefore not rational.

I don’t believe the ends justified the means even in Kissinger’s time, but one thing this highlights is the loss of any significant peace movement in our society and politics. It is rational to work towards peace and stability in the world. This has benefits to our country and to everyone else. Then add the moral layer for those who think morally and it seems like something we should all be able to agree on. Only the irrational AND immoral should support these policies. I consider myself a realist about human nature, but I still believe this is a relatively small minority. Everyone else is being manipulated, marginalized, or drowned out.

Kissinger on the Terminator scenario

Henry Kissinger, whether you think he is a particularly moral person or not, is known to possess a pretty sharp mind. He’s 97 though, so one could question if it is still as sharp as it was. Anyway, he is worried about the combination of advanced nuclear weapons and artificial intelligence.

“For the first time in human history, humanity has the capacity to extinguish itself in a finite period of time,” Kissinger said.
“We have developed the technology of a power that is beyond what anybody imagined even 70 years ago.”
“And now, to the nuclear issue is added the high tech issue, which in the field of artificial intelligence, in its essence is based on the fact that man becomes a partner of machines and that machines can develop their own judgement,” he said.
France 24

What. you don’t read France 24? This is the beauty of RSS feeds, you just get random stuff coming in from many directions, probably still biased to your personal predilections, but at least the odd random view that you have to give some thought. I also have a few sketchy sources (talking to you Breitbart) intentionally coming in that make me uncomfortable.