People Sorting and the Next New Normal

 In my college years I would often find myself on a train from London to Eastbourne. I often had work or some other reason to pass through London, but my mum’s place in Eastbourne remained home.

 

The train always followed the same path with the same stops. First would come East Croydon, a scrappy outer London suburb. The stop after that was Gatwick Airport, and it was followed by Haywards Heath, a posh commuter belt town. Lewes remains a distinctive town of culture, while Polegate and then Eastbourne were seaside retirement places.

 

I would pass the time on the train by playing a harmless game in which I looked at all the passengers and tried to guess which stop they would be getting off at. I could usually score about 80%. The Croydon folk were usually young and casual, in a hurry and not really focused on the journey but the destination. Anybody not lilywhite was a near certainty for East Croydon, as was anybody who looked to be poor. Gatwick was even easier; those passengers had bags or uniforms and would look anxiously at their watches whenever the train slowed down unexpectedly. If travelling in a party they would often be short tempered or arguing.

 

Haywards Heath was for the male corporate warriors, smart in pinstriped suit and tie, and behaving as though they owned the train, which after privatisation they possibly did. The Lewes passengers could be a bit harder to spot. They might dress rather quirkily or appear a little disdainful of the situation they found themselves in. Finally, the Polegate and Eastbourne folk (lumped together in my game) were often old and prone to snoozing on the train. Another clue was that many had come prepared for their visit to hostile London, with ample supply of snacks or tissues or reading material.

 

If I was unsure, I could also find clues in the daily paper they read, a habit that nearly everybody followed back then in the days before mobile phones. Those going to Croydon might have grabbed an Evening Standard before boarding, Gatwick passengers had a book or nothing, The Times was a good indicator for Haywards Heath, The Guardian for Lewes and The Telegraph or Daily Mail for those going as far as Polegate or Eastbourne.

 

The game passed the time and was harmless because it had no real consequences, but of course what I was doing was algorithmic people profiling. In meeting up recently with a boarding school peer I have been reminded that I was into algorithms before anybody even knew what an algorithm was. Seemingly I would sit up in bed devising the school timetable under various invented goals and constraints. Since I recall the primary alternative activities to be fondling other kids, being fondled by other kids, being fondled by schoolteachers, beating up kids or being beaten up, maybe devising algorithms was a smart choice. I do know that many of my missed opportunities for fabulous wealth concerned thinking of valuable algorithms and being too lazy or distracted to follow up the idea. Just one example was devising something that could easily have morphed into an online bridge game that could have cornered the market.

 

Nowadays we all know what algorithms are but most of us still fail to spot when we are being subjected to one, whether it be adverts on websites or journey pricing or even the types of retail outlets that spring up where we live. We also know that there is a fine line between intelligent valid use of an algorithm and unjust discrimination. Most days on the news I see a mugshot of somebody caught on CCTV suspected of committing some offence. Day after day the mugshot shows a coloured man in a hoodie. I am so conditioned to expect that image that I did a double-take this week when the footage of somebody suspected of assaulting a senior turned out to be female, white and dressed in clothes that my wife might wear.

 

Should the police focus resources on the districts where people drawn into crime typically live? Yes, even if a consequence is that some races receive more attention than others. Should they then focus on racial subgroups of residents in those areas? Probably not. Should they single out black guys in hoodies irrespective on any specific evidence? Certainly not.

 

Anyway, this week I devised a new algorithm I could develop while travelling on the subway. Gloriously, New York is rapidly turning back into the bustling city it used to be, and the subways are busy again. Happily, we are in a lull in Covid and some restrictions have reasonably been taken away. But it astonishes me that even after two years of experience most people seem unable and unwilling to make sound personal judgments about Covid risk. A restriction is imposed or removed as an event in time. But the risk changes gradually not suddenly. A removed restriction is not an invitation to recklessness but rather flags a situation to exercise personal judgment. But few seem to want to do that.

 

In recent subway journeys, I notice that mask wearing has reduced to about 50%, even though it is still mandated (though not really enforced). This week I have been trying to devise some predictive indicators towards who is more or less likely to wear a mask.

 

It is not as easy a game as the Eastbourne train game, pr perhaps it is but I have not found the right indicators yet and will need a few more weeks to perfect my algorithm. But I can make a start. There are various possible factors to consider as parameters.

 

One factor must be the actual vulnerability to becoming very sick with Covid. I would expect older and immunocompromised people to be more likely to wear masks. From the other direction, people who have recently recovered or recently had a vaccine might feel safer.

 

That leads to the related factor of self-assessed vulnerability. Young people tend to think they are immortal. Macho types like to boast of how they must die of something as an argument not to protect themselves from Covid. Education and awareness and the sort of conspiracy theories people might swallow will also influence this factor.

 

Then there are the civic factors. Some of us will go to great lengths to avoid any possible confrontation with the NYPD or angry fellow passengers, whereas others seem to actively seek it out. Many might feel relatively safe personally but wear a mask to protect others. Sadly, that category seems to be far from universal in the USA these days.

 

Then there are political factors. In certain quarters, mask wearing (or its absence) is seen as a political statement in this polarised country. Some groups from outside the city might want to protest against a prevailing culture here. Others might just what to stick up a middle finger to the mayor or somebody else they feel lectured by. This group overlaps the so-called libertarians, who in most cases seem to me to be people who just want to do whatever they want without any regard for the impact on others. Sometimes I am surprised that driving on the right side of the road has not yet become optional here.

 

A sad final factor relates the value of a human life, whether that of self, family members or others (subdivided into people like us and other others). A good way to measure societal progress is by estimating how human lives are valued. It drives attitudes to health care, law and order, compliance and much besides. Looking at mortality in the US across a host of categories, I can only conclude that this nation is less developed that it seems to think it is.

 

Many of these factors overlap, but it should be possible to develop an algorithm over the coming weeks to help long subway journeys to pass more pleasantly and quickly. I will keep it to myself and try to avoid judging one group or other, but probably fail in that endeavour. And I do know that I will be wearing a mask myself on those journeys.  

The Ramifications of this War

 This week I have tried the sequence the most significant geopolitical events of my lifetime. I suspect we are currently witnessing one of them.

 

I was the ripe old age of two during the Cuban missile crisis, so was probably rather less frightened than most. The crisis had the potential to destroy large chunks of humanity, but in the end it didn’t. Everything went back more or less where it was before, except for the unfortunate Cubans. This does not qualify.

 

Another event during my pre-school years does; the formation of what became the EU, initially with six members. The EU has defied history and the stability it has enabled has driven Europe and the rest of the world forward, not least in setting standards for commerce and behaviour.

 

Next come a cluster of events in China. There was Nixon’s visit, then Mao’s death, then the choices of his successors to open up the economy. I think this one qualifies, perhaps even as number one. The prospects for 20% of humanity suddenly brightened, the spin-off effects for everybody else were as real, and China has followed through to enable the benefits to multiply.

 

The other obvious candidate is the collapse of the USSR around 1989. This was more dramatic and visual, and surely qualifies as well. I grew up in a landscape of paranoia and propaganda and where large parts of the world, indeed even Europe, were closed to me, and where proxy wars raged around the globe. Then Russia made a fatal mistake in Afghanistan and its empire collapsed. I was given the unbelievably wonderful job in Shell of visiting the previously forbidden places to try to develop petrol station businesses, and could feel the sense of history, both happy and sad history.

 

9/11 might be a candidate, but I don’t think it qualifies. It certainly traumatised America and it has its footprints all over its foreign policy since. But America did more pointless damage in Korea, Cambodia and Vietnam than it did in Afghanistan or Iraq, so its dumb militarism was established before rather than awakened by 9/11. That event was significant, but not at the same scale.

 

IN 2016 the USA elected a deranged narcissist to the most powerful position on the globe. The globe survived. The primary legacy of Trump may be to have accelerated and entrenched the economic and political fight with China. But this trend was already quite marked so I don’t think the event qualifies. 

 

Now Russia has invaded its neighbour with barely a semblance of an excuse and with brutal force. Within two weeks that force has become completely bogged down, making a protracted and messy conflict more likely, with the rump of Ukraine becoming a forward proxy for NATO. It seems certain that a new iron curtain will descend, only its precise path across the landscape still to be determined. After the opening of China and the collapse of the USSR, this might be the third seismic geopolitical event of my lifetime.

 

With the daily pictures and human stories of suffering and cruelty, it is hard to pull back to observe the bigger picture. I have avoided watching TV or reading daily papers, partly because it makes me depressed and partly because I don’t trust all that I read. When I hear of plucky Ukrainians and incompetent Russians the narrative feels a little too convenient. But as usual The Economist has risen to the occasion, and so far seems to have kept the man from MI5 out of the editorial office as well. Who needs propaganda when the opponent gives all the logical ammunition that could possibly be required?

 

The Economist, in a series of articles in many sections, paints a very sanguine picture of the medium-term impact of this war, even if Biden and his state department continue to successfully finesse the Russian position to avoid serious escalation. Rapid rises in the prices of energy and of grain seem almost inevitable, and these tend to trigger famine, recession and civil unrest, often to surprising places and with impacts that snowball. This could be a rocky decade for humanity.

 

As ever, China poses a key conundrum. China is adept at learning from the American playbook, and will have noticed from the last century that keeping out of other people’s wars while making money from both sides is an effective route towards economic power. I don’t see China losing credibility and leverage by leaning too far towards Russia, but will not easily sway too far on the other side of the fence either, without good reason.

 

Once again, this opens a door for the US, if only they have the foresight and guts to open it. To be fair to Biden, he has elections to fight and the congressional opposition has riled up public opinion against China to such an extent that any overtures would probably involve much self-sacrifice. But if the stalemate drags on in Ukraine, as seems quite likely. Perhaps the grand bargain with China can finally be struck. A ceasefire in the economic war, a decisive movement towards the West in political for a and a slow-burning Hong Kong style deal over Taiwan should be an acceptable compromise to both sides. I can live in hope.

 

War does tend to concentrate the mind and clear away a lot of pettiness, and we can already see the beneficial effects. The EU is acting as a bloc, Poland is no longer bickering, Hungary may follow, nationalists are on the wane, Germany has stepped up, Macron will be strengthened, and money laundering may be attacked with authenticity rather than hypocrisy. Who knows, perhaps even the British will decide to re-join the human race if this drags on. We can also already see the EU taking decisive steps towards renewable energy, and that should trigger others in the same necessary direction.

 

In the end, the only way out of this, short of Armageddon, is a change in regime in Moscow. There are clearly dimensions to the politics in Russia that we can only guess at, although the CIA still seems to have a pretty good idea what is going on there. As Putin backs himself further into his corner, he will threaten everybody he can, whether in Ukraine, the US or in Russia. The response within Russia will ultimately determine how quickly a sane path can be found.

 

I sense the denouement in Russia will occur more quickly than Putin may suspect. The eyes of the Russian people have been opened since the last days of the previous regime in the 1980’s. At that time few people in Russia had any view of a world beyond the iron curtain. Nowadays, having experienced the joys of IKEA and i-Phones and having learned to communicate more widely on social media, the police state will be more difficult to maintain. It will take some time and there are horrific risks along the way, as well the likelihood of Ukraine being carved up into non-viable slices all of which resemble rubble, but the exit door from this mess lies within Russia.

 

In the meantime, we will have to accept a new iron curtain, more dangerous than the last one because its borders are murkier and more porous. When I was visiting the former eastern bloc countries in those heady days of the 1990’s, I never imagined that some of those places would become closed again during my lifetime. That is precisely what we are witnessing now. For those of us on the right side of the curtain, that is very sad. For those on the wrong side, it is tragic. 

Splinters and Beams

 What a tragic week this has been for humanity. Reading optimistic authors like Steven Pinker, I like to believe that our species is maturing, albeit fitfully. Then something like the Ukraine invasion occurs to demonstrate just how much we still need to learn.

 

As a European this realisation is especially galling. We are arrogant enough to think that we are more civilised than others. America has its guns and its Trumps, Africa has its despots (admittedly in large part owing to the legacy from we Europeans), Asia has its castes and its ethnicities. True, Europe tore itself apart twice during the last century, and then endured a mini war in the Balkans in the 1990’s, but we like to put that conflict down as clearing up unfinished from the cold war. We are Europe, or most of us are. We have our flag and our anthem and our institutions and our welfare states and our soccer tournaments and even our song contest (as a vehicle to laugh at ourselves). We should be above all this.

 

Indeed, let us spend a moment to reflect on the wonderful creation that is the European Union. We still find it easier to divide along fault lines then to unite around our common humanity. 1947 saw the founding of the UN, but the EU was altogether more ambitious and courageous. History will look very kindly on its originators.

 

The thought that one European nation can trample over another with horrifying violence, well into the 21^stcentury, is sobering indeed. I did not think it would come to this. The Russian leadership must be living in a giant bubble and must have severe mental frailties to even consider such action, leave alone brazenly carrying it out.

 

While the suffering of Ukrainians is frighteningly apparent on our TV screens, it is hard to see how this will end well for Russia or its leaders. Afghanistan was a quagmire that ultimately led to a regime change in Russia in 1989. Surely Ukraine will prove the same. It is just about possible to suppress twenty million Belorussians for thirty years, because one authoritarian regime took over from another and inherited its apparatus of fear. Forty million Ukrainians and a large diaspora have become used to something very different and their rejection will linger long beyond the overt resistance of its armed forces.

 

I can only conclude that there is a dimension to this that is not in the public domain. The Russian leadership are cavalier but they are not usually dumb. There might be a mafia conflict between elite groups in Russia and Ukraine that got out of hand. More likely, the CIA somehow touched one nerve too many. Even that feels unlikely, since US intelligence has been demonstrated as excellent throughout the crisis, unsurprising since Russia had been its single focus since 1945. Still, Trump did more damage than we see on the surface, and perhaps the uneasy equilibrium started to collapse under him and the frenzied restaffing of the state department came too late.

 

Now there can never be any equivalence here, but the gospel on the Sunday after this all started sent me pondering US foreign policy over the last forty years. It is uncanny how often the weekly gospel seems to be apt. The gospel was the famous one about the wisdom of focusing on removing the large wooden beam from our own eye before trying to remove a splinter from that of our neighbour. The last week has seen most of the world accusing Russia of having splinters in its eyes. It has been all about them. It is possible we are missing the beam somehow?

 

Well, of course it is. It is what we do. That is why the gospel is so powerful. It always seems to be right and it is always helpful if we take the time to think deeply enough.

 

While US foreign policy did the world a wonderful service after the last world war and has notched some achievements since then, there have been many areas when it has served its own country badly and left it in a compromised position when trying to cajole others.

 

We can start with Cuba. A threat sixty years ago led to drastic action. The threat level seemed high because of the proximity of the adversary, some ideological differences and the strident views of minority concerning culture and history. Justified or not then, surely such an aggressive embargo against a weak neighbour cannot possibly be justified all of sixty years later? And how can the US lecture Russia over Ukraine or China over Taiwan as a result?

 

Then there all the questionable interventions with troops, both overt and covert. Many an autocratic regime in Africa has been propped up. We all know about Korea, Vietnam, Afghanistan and Iraq. Guantanamo Bay remains a stain on so-called US values, removing legitimacy from many claims. Can we sure that CIA black sites no longer practise torture or even exist?

 

This is manifested in the approach to international institutions. Financial ones are captured to pursue the US view of the appropriate economic order, even if most of the world would disagree. Political ones are treated only to project power, their effect reduced when the US refuses to accept jurisdiction when that does not suit. Many pundits and headlines this week have called for Russia to be tried by various world bodies, failing to mention that the same bodies are not ratified as applying to the US. There has been no attempt to reform UN protocols that have lost legitimacy over time, such as security council membership and vetoes. And every year without fail the general assembly passes a resolution concerning Israel that passes something like 190 to 2. Might the 190 be onto something?

 

Arms control is also seen as only applying selectively. Iran is sanctioned brutally for not following a non-proliferation treaty over which India and Israel were given a pass and which also mentions obligations on nuclear powers which are ignored completely.

 

More recently China policy has been short-sighted and self-defeating. There is little happening in Xinjiang that native Americans would not recognise, so human rights are hardly a strong talking point. But now we have economic bullying in reaction to sense of being overtaken. The Chinese are justly lauded for stealing the playbook of others. There is little doubt that their new prowess in cyber warfare was learned from the CIA.

 

When I even start to explore this list with Americans, I often regret it. First comes the question about whether I actually like America. I do, very much, but that doesn’t mean I have to agree with all its policies, even as a guest rather than a citizen. Next comes a stunned denial. That is no surprise either, because education, culture, churches and especially politics all conspire to prevent Americans asking hard questions of themselves. Next comes a sweeping argument that our side is good while their side is evil and evil must be fought, just like the US (eventually) did against Hitler. Hollywood can answer to that one. Next, everything is blamed on Trump. Well, there is a lot to blame to apportion in that direction, but all of the worst policies predate his presidency. Finally comes the argument with some merit, that of comparison. Yes, we have made mistakes, but look at the other side! That, of course, is precisely the argument that Jesus was warning us against.

 

World weary cynics and those attractive to binary logic about Putin being either a reincarnation of Hitler or Stalin like to argue that there is no practical alternative. In the heat of the moment, that can be true. I feel that the Biden administration has played this crisis very well so far. It is over the longer term that lost opportunities come home to roost. None of the calumnies listed above is beyond restitution. A working deal with China remains possible, while the lack of any attempt to strike one is what has resulted in damage to the west from China abstaining in the current dispute.

 

What would be wonderful would be a true commitment to international institutions with teeth and with no nation above the law. It takes courage to stop bullying and to start treating others with respect. A reformed security council would be a good start, one that would surely have helped this month. What about a commitment that 20% of all military spending, rising over time to 50%, must be allocated to global peace-keeping bodies? Now that would be a game changer.    

Memory

 Last week I received a wonderful gift. A personal letter arrived in the post (how often does that happen nowadays?) from somebody I had not seen for nearly fifty years. When we were both twelve we shared a dormitory in a British boarding school that could have served as a model for Evelyn Waugh. He possessed the foresight to keep some form of diary and during the pandemic he dug it up and found references to me, so he looked me up. Four days after I received the letter we met up for lunch, so our curiosity had certainly been pricked.

 

Ever since the letter arrived my mind, specifically my memory, has been working overtime. It is quite extraordinary how something can trigger a lost memory from long ago. Then the real magic lies how the recollection causes a cascade of other memories to rush back like a flood. Now the process has started I cannot see how it might stop, especially since this former acquaintance seemingly has a large supply of diary entries to share.

 

One aspect of this that I am finding fascinating is how the memories come back from rather indirect triggers and following a strange maze. My former friend included a photo from one of his diary entries in his letter and it was somehow the handwriting, even its precise shade of blue, that contributed to the vividness of recollection of a whole series of incidents not mentioned in the correspondence.

 

To make the experience even more vibrant, after lunch on Sunday we happened to visit the Rubin Museum in Manhattan, where an exhibition explores a type of Himalayan mindfulness called a Mandala. This was all about finding peace and growth from turning negative emotions into things we can use in a positive way. One part of the exhibit asked us to experience a particular smell and to see where our associations of that odour took our minds. I have some familiarity with the concept: I associate Faro airport in Portugal with a particular smell which always makes me blissfully happy whenever I experience a similar smell or even whenever I think about it.

 

I was not the ideal subject for odour exhibit itself, because my sense of smell is so bad. If I lost it during Covid I probably would not have noticed it. It is a disability that I have always considered more of a blessing than a curse, especially living in garbage-wracked New York City. But I sat down and tried to smell the odour the computer was surely emitting and could hardly smell anything.

 

That called to mind one of my go-to cabaret numbers that I sing to the tune of Lloyd-Webber’s memory. I adapted it from somebody else’s skit. It always goes down well with any crowd over fifty years old (but not so old that they can’t catch the words of course). My favourite verse goes like this:

Midnight, not a sound from the pavement.

Well, no sound whatsoever, where’s my hearing aid gone.

I can’t see much, and nowadays I’ve no sense of smell,

And as for sex drive, (spoken in fierce New York accent) fuggetaboutit.

I leave it to the reader to discern which of the claims in this verse are autobiographical and which made up for comedy value.

 

The combination of the Rubin exhibit with the tsunami of memory only raised my sense level to an even higher plane. Now, a week after the initial stimulus, I still find myself recalling the strangest things, and I am usually unsure of where the trigger has come from for many of these memories.

 

One image might be a tree with a trunk and many branches leading to many other branches. The entire tree might be a model for our entire life experience. Most of can remember stuff that recently happened, represented by the lower part of the trunk, and things that had a profound effect on us and are permanently etched on our minds (perhaps inaccurately). But the flow from the trunk base to the outer branches has been cut somehow so the memory is lost. Then a trigger brings something from a small distant leaf into consciousness. That event somehow unblocks lots of other connections and branches all over the tree. More of the tree is richer as a result.

 

There must be a very effective branch of therapy in these insights, and probably many people already practising it. The full collection of possible memories from our life’s experiences is our available database of wisdom, and the more of that wisdom is available to us the better decisions we can make and the richer lives we can lead. Multiply this by the people in the world and the potential for human development is enormous.

 

My last week indicates a few possible approaches. Growing and broadening the triggers would be one promising avenue. Even without the diary, meeting somebody who crossed my path fifty years ago would surely have given plenty of ammunition to clear away the blockages in my memory tree. This approach has far greater potential now thanks to social media, which is making such unlikely connections more likely than ever before. But incentivising schools to host reunions might be a cheap way to unleash connections. Even cheaper would be to encourage the same schools to develop their alumni Facebook pages and to make more effort to find their lost sheep. Then there is the wonderful practice of writing diaries, and then really holding them for years and years. Perhaps the ever-growing supply of photos stored on mobile phones will have a true benefit in later years.

 

My first reaction on receiving my letter offers a different lesson. I was immediately reminded of my memory of my own character at the time, and that included a shameful tendency towards verbal bullying, something I have never been able to fully shake off. Now, I wonder if it is possible that many of those broken connections in my memory tree are because I have chosen to break them because of some traumatic association? That feels quite likely to me. So therapeutic tools to gently face up to the trauma before trying to fix the connections might be a worthwhile approach. That takes us right back to Mandalas, as well as to more traditional kinds of therapy.

 

Understanding dreams is another possible avenue. I used to experience déjà vu a lot when I was younger, and it still occurs occasionally. My own theory for my déjà vu is that an experience in real life is mirroring an earlier dreamt experience. Dreams can be sort of scenarios, where the mind starts with a likely experience and lets it play through. It should not be such a surprise if the dreamt scenario is so well-structured that it really occurs later. Whether my theory has any credence or not, dreams are a part of our wisdom that we could learn to benefit more from.

 

All of this is especially relevant because of the growing prevalence of dementia around the world, a consequence of so many people living to a great age. I see dementia at close quarters at the home where we volunteer, and, after an initial period where it can almost be funny like a comedy sketch, before long it becomes anything but funny. The suffering is acute and painful to observe, and there is little that can be done to alleviate it, only the expensive and depressing practice of sitting with sufferers all day every day: I salute the caring souls that do this, usually for pitiful rewards. Any medical or psychological advance that enables more people to live longer without dementia or to suffer less when it arrives would be a boon to humanity.

 

My erstwhile and perhaps future friend paid me a wonderful service this week. Long may those broken connections be mended.       

Cars have two levers for a reason

 I am astonished at how all of us struggle with the concept that there can be too much of a good thing. In these days of lobbyists and memes, the risk of pushing a cause to an extreme beyond all logic is more present than before. I have no idea how to guard against it, but it seems to be doing more and more damage around the world. It is especially dangerous in the US legislative environment, where incremental change seems to be impossible and where sound bites rule the discourse.

 

Examples abound. One is the idea of helping small businesses. Mentioning small businesses seems to act like a magic wand for politicians. We all call to mind a mom-and-pop store, perhaps selling books or old-fashioned children’s toys, and are minded to offer all the help we can spare. No package or budget nowadays is complete without copious reference to helping small businesses.

 

We should pause. Surely some large businesses need help too? What about businesses that are still dreams? There must come a point where the next tranche of help runs into diminishing returns, as a vast pile of inefficient money is wasted? There is a more fundamental point too. Why are these businesses still small despite all the help showered upon them? Perhaps they serve no economic purpose? It is large and growing businesses that provide jobs and consumer benefits. Are we targeting a load of perennial losers?

 

In the UK, the beloved NHS fulfils the same role. In this case demographic changes mean that it very hard to throw too much money at the institution, but we still try our best. This one is tied up with the political demon of privatization. Privatization is something we either love or hate, like Marmite. One faction wants to impose it everywhere it possibly can, following a dogma of free markets. The other side wants to hold it back. Surely there is a happy medium? In health care, some services, like parking, cleaning or maybe logistics, make much more sense when run by private contractors, able to be flexible and respond with agility to market needs. But privatizing the core parts of healthcare runs headlong into the risk that the primary purpose – keeping people well – becomes subsumed by a profit motive. The US demonstrates this very well.

 

But the UK health debate never seems to move forward, except that everybody wants to be associated with the national treasure and shower it with cash. Privatization becomes a tug of war rather than an assessment of merit. This is unhealthy for both the institution and for its consumers and paymasters.

 

It is like driving a car without the accelerator or without the brake. In the small business example there is no brake, and the car hurtles along without control or balance. In the privatization example, both levers exist but there are multiple drivers, none prepared to use both levers, so whichever power is in the ascendancy either stops the car completely or drives it into danger.

 

The whole debate between capitalism and socialism has the same pitfalls, and arguably the same can be said of democracy and autocracy. There is a happy balance between acceleration and braking, and it is contextual. Certainly, after forty years of acceleration, hitting the brake for a while makes sense. And after fifty years of stasis (cold war Russia), the first application of the accelerator should be gradual and careful.

 

In the US, the adoration of the military is another example of one pedal being lost. No politician makes any headway by questioning a budget for veterans or for military personnel hardware. The military have successfully lobbied themselves into the hearts of the nation, offered unattributed gratuitous mentions even by NFL commentators.

 

The result is downright dangerous. America takes on far too many campaigns brings a military mindset to most situations and is an exemplar of the insult of having more money than sense. There is no efficiency whatsoever in procurement, and one result of all the spending is merely to goad competitors into matching, thereby making the world more dangerous for all of us. Military drones are only the latest example of a technology the USA thoughtlessly developed in naïve hope of creating an advantage, but instead unleashing a cheap and scarcely controllable lethal technology into unscrupulous hands everywhere.

 

An almost comical example of the car with one lever was US Israel policy under Trump. The Israel lobby had succeeded in creating an unbalanced debate over generations, with Israel elevated close to the sympathy level for small businesses. But then Trump simply removed the brake completely, simply giving Israel anything it asked for. The Israelis themselves struggled to work out how to deal with this change.

 

This example illustrates how smart leaders handle the pressures of competing agendas. Life can be one long evolving negotiation. If a concession to one side is timely, use the moment to obtain a concession in return, fixing a stubborn iniquity that matters a lot to you but is less critical to the other side.

 

I used to do this all the time in business. One weapon was to develop an agreed charter for a team or project. As well as goals and approaches, a good charter lays down what team members have a right to expect but is also crystal clear about expectations.

 

In a functioning environment, this is how to achieve evolutionary progress in many areas. Unions and management can each have their agendas and preferred lever but give and take allows both to be used and a stronger overall outcome to be achieved for everybody. So can creditors and debtors, and bail reformers with law-and-order types.

 

Criminal justice policy, especially police policy, is a current example of lost opportunities. In 2020 the brake predominated, with the George Floyd case and other injustices fuelling a movement to defund the police. Then crime spiked and the well-funded police lobbies fought back. In New York, Eric Adams was elected and all talk now is of strengthening and supporting the police, especially when dead police bodies are all over the news.

Surely both sides can be right and an intelligent administration would take this chance to forge a grand bargain. The police do a critical and dangerous job and their service should be adequately funded and protected. But mental health issues would be better dealt with by other professionals, also adequately funded. Further, it is not just a few bad apples who are racist, violent and who fraudulently manipulate evidence. I have yet to have an encounter with the NYPD that did not feel like an abuse of their power. Their behaviour as above the law in petty areas such as placard abuse becomes endemic and spreads into their attitude in weightier matters.

 

It is laudable that Eric Adams leads a campaign to support the police where they warrant support. But surely that creates a moment to rectify abuse on the other side. A clear charter of rights and expectations, with strong enforcement, would be negotiable right now. The many bad apples could be progressively eliminated and the culture changed for the better. Instead we get a relentless pumping of one lever and nothing on the other one. What a waste.

 

Sadly that seems to be our fate in most areas of US society where politicians are involved, which is almost everything. Actually this becomes a powerful argument for autocracy. In China one leadership team, hopefully with the public interest top of mind, can impose beneficial evolutionary change via a series of charters. Both levers are used, apparently rather deftly.

 

Of course, autocracy itself is a single lever operation, and the time will come when some balance is required, yet it is likely that nobody will be able to find and apply the brake in time.   

Russia and Risk

 I love the way that board games become trendy again. I grew up with a tradition of a Sunday afternoon board game with my parents and sister, which usually ended in a tantrum from me whenever I did not win. The day I caught my mum cheating stands among the lasting traumas of my life. All good aides to growing up!

 

We didn’t possess Risk at home and in any case it needs more than four players to work well, but I remember a game of Risk from some point in my thirties.  One player, a very quiet lady, followed a strategy that differed markedly from everybody else. We were all frenetically gambling and fighting and conquering and suffering, while all she did was quietly build her resources. Then she chose her moment and wiped us all out within two moves. I was very impressed and took away more valuable life lessons.

 

I should have known better, because one game from my childhood was called “L’Attaque”. It was a great game, but should more correctly have been called “La Defense”, because the winning strategy was always to let your opponent do all the attacking.

 

I recalled many of these lessons, including the one about authority figures cheating, when reading about Russia’s military build up in Ukraine. There was a wonderful long article about the tangled history of Russia and Ukraine in the Christmas double issue of The Economist, followed up this week with a strong essay concerning the current situation. As always with The Economist, the first thing to do is strip away the MI5 propaganda: fortunately in this case that was relatively easy and the remaining content was still powerful.

 

Most of the article was spent trying to discern Putin’s motives. While more thoughtful than most such pieces, I was still left with the strong impression that the author was from the west, was schooled in the west, and thought like people in the west. When I worked in competitor intelligence our watchword was to walk in the shoes of the competitor. It is astonishing how poor we are at this in our complacent western bubble. Who, for instance, might think that taking out an ISIS leader would do anything but anger a new generation and act as a midwife for more ISIS’s? I was at least heartened by the self-awareness shown by quoting a recent remark of Alexei Navalny: :”Time and again the West falls into Putin’s elementary traps…it just takes my breath away”. What an indictment that is of eighty years of western intelligence!

 

So what traps is Putin setting? If we put ourselves in his shoes and think like Risk players we can find some answers.

 

First, Putin is a tactician more than a strategist. He probably does not know his endgame himself yet, he is simply building resources to give himself options. Hopefully he won’t be like that girl I played Risk with who devoured the rest of us.

 

Next, the long article makes clear that Russia has a unique view of its own history and role in the world. The bear is proud, defensive, fearful, vengeful, feels entitled and takes an expansive view of its own boundaries and role. Everything has to be seen in these contexts.

 

What this means with respect to Ukraine is manifold. Putin does not really accept that Ukraine is a different country, certainly not the parts of it (and there are many, and not just abutting Russia) where Russian is spoken and where there is Russian history. The frightening few weeks when the USSR broke up and an alcoholic Yeltsin and a few acolytes tried to reset the world order left a bitter mark, and we should remember that the west has reneged on many promises made at that time. Russia will see a western orientated Ukraine with military prowess as an unacceptable mortal threat. It is just as easy geographically to invade Moscow from Kyiv as it is to invade Kyiv from Moscow.

 

Most important, this is personal. A lot of politics is personal. 2016 is instructive. Putin did not interfere in the US election primarily because he thought he could outmanoeuvre Trump (though that was a big bonus), it was because he hated Hillary Clinton and bore a massive grudge against her. There are probably several people in Ukraine that we have never heard of that meet the same criteria.

 

Next, Putin is very comfortable with messiness. Most of us have a preference for clean solutions to problems. Indeed being uncomfortable with ambiguity is a limiting factor in many lives. Putin can tolerate a mess for a long time if it suits him. It is Risk all over again. Moldova has been a divided mess for 25 years. That is a lovely asset for Putin sitting ready for him to use when it suits. Chechnya, Azerbaijan, Georgia and now the Donbas follow the same pattern, as does Belorussia and now even Kazakhstan in their different ways. Russians love chess. Don’t look for endgames. They emerge, sometimes very slowly.

 

The Economist guessed that the main objectives of the troop build up might have been to shore things up at home via a manufactured crisis and to snub his nose at the west. Fair enough, and both have been achieved. But I don’t think it is as clean as that. Putin is ex KGB and will have a chessboard full of characters that he is trying to manipulate here, most of them in Russia or Ukraine. He doesn’t understand about communicating to an entire populace – the KGB just locked people up – but he knows how to structure a chessboard of powerful individuals. Many of the true targets here will be some oligarchs we have never heard of.

 

I wish we could analyse this more intelligently in the west. That probably starts by keeping anybody military out of the way. But if people believe what they say, they are so dumb that Navalny is proven correct on a daily basis. Take the gas pipeline from Russia to Germany. Somehow we are supposed to believe that this gives Russia extra leverage. That is nonsense. Europe has a shortage of reliable gas suppliers and supply routes. The new pipeline can only improve things. It does not have to be used. Europe can buy from elsewhere. The ones who lose by the new pipeline are the ones controlling the choke points, because adding a new supply line reduces their leverage. In practice, that means Ukraine, and it is the Hunter Biden’s and other overpaid parasitic consultants who are the ones peddling this nonsense. The sad part is how we continually fall for it.

 

My guess is that Putin will back down, unless he is provoked by something very personal. He is playing a long and messy game of Risk. Building up forces is cheap. Actually fighting is not, and usually ends badly. Putin is already lobbing jobs at the west saying it was us who created the crisis by stoking fear. There is truth to this (and also that there are a lot of troops surrounding Ukraine). Let him say it, and wait for him to withdraw and claim victory.

 

I find a clear parallel here with the west and China, most notably regarding Taiwan. Xi is not Putin: he is smarter, and actually cares for his people as well as his clos confidantes. He has a stronger hand, but is equally patient. I predict that Taiwan will be like Hong Kong. Within ten years China will have practical control, and they won’t fire a bullet to achieve it. The west won’t see it coming, at least won’t see how it is coming. A more detailed prediction is that TSMC, the world’s largest and most successful semiconductor producer, will play a key role in Xi’s strategy.     

Plan B Against Trump

 I still remember my emotions on the day after Trump was elected in 2016. IN common with others, I couldn’t watch as the results started to come in, and on the rainy Wednesday morning I was in a daze, unable to comprehend what had just happened. I went into Manhattan for a matinée and found the most people shared my somber, stunned, mood.

 

Later that week my thoughts moved more towards the implications and the damage that could be inflicted on our precious world, and to counting the months until the nightmare would be over. Each year brought outrage but also relief that somehow war hadn’t broken out and that some societal functions remained resilient against the onslaught. There was grim joy in concluding that Trump’s own gross incompetence had been one reason for the absence of many foretold disasters.

 

Then 2020 dawned and it became clear that the nightmare might indeed not end that year. Trump was at his high point in the polls, the Democrats looked likely to choose a vulnerable Bernie as candidate and the economy was humming along. As we now know, it was only Covid that turned things around, and even with that massive following wind, made only stronger by the deranged president, the election still finished in a near tie.

 

I still shake my head in sadness as I contemplate how over seventy million adults voted to re-elect Trump, how most of those still believe he won and how a frightening subset would contemplate violence to restore their imperium. As we look towards 2024, most commentators concede that a restoration to power is a likely scenario.

 

Just because we survived last time, we should not be complacent about a second dose. Trump himself will be older and would even less predictable and more intolerant. His next generation of yes men would be even more cynical than the last lot, have more nefarious agendas and perhaps be more competent. Weakened institutions, including the election process itself, might crumble under a new assault. China will be ready.

 

It is not disrespectful to democracy to dream up a strategy to stop this horrifying prospect, so long as the means are lawful. Indeed, it would be disrespectful to democracy not to focus huge efforts on such a strategy. So what should that strategy comprise?

 

Plan A was not too bad but is clearly proving insufficient. Apart from the morbid but clearly unreliable aspect of hoping Trump might die or become incapacitated, the components seem to be starving his voice, chipping away at Republicans, succeeding in government and legal avenues.

 

Some of these have had some success. The silencing, executed by social media platforms, must be a huge frustration for the ego-obsessed Trump. He has been driven towards marginal platforms with low resonance and to relying on proxies. Sadly, the main proxies remain effective. Fox News has not changed one iota. Nor has the populist press, and it is no coincidence that Murdoch owns many of those outlets too. The saddest part about all this is that many Americans only receive their news and opinion from this type of source, and the beguiling simple messages are constantly reinforced.

 

The legal approach is starting to bear fruit, but is inevitably slow, since that is how honest law operates. Those of us who hoped Trump might be in jail by now were always likely to be disappointed. There will no doubt be fines aplenty to come, but nothing to legally disqualify him. And any hopes that some of the mud might stick are delusional – Fox and others will only use setbacks as an opportunity for martyr and witch hunt narratives.

 

The other two plan A strategies have had almost no success. Almost no Republicans with any wish to retain or regain power have shown any backbone. To have hoped otherwise was always optimistic. To expect any change, especially after January 6, would be delusional. As for successful governing, this was always doomed. The 50-50 senate could not achieve much in the face of the resolute cynicism of McConnell, what is achieved legislatively will only bear fruit after several years, and the echo chamber will undermine any message. Opposition is much easier than governing, and the easiest part is pedaling strategies that need never be implemented (and even in government most Trump supporters don’t seem to have noticed that little of consequence was implemented). We can forget about Democratic success in government having an impact on voters.

 

So plan A has not really succeeded, though perhaps the legal approach can lead somewhere substantial in the end and must stay as a pillar in plan B too.

 

My main change in strategy would relate to the silent treatment. Having Trump deprived of his personal pulpit remains excellent, but it is not enough. Biden and Democrats seem to have been following a strategy of not mentioning Trump at all, perhaps hoping that this and the silent treatment will take him out of the news completely. This now feels foolhardy. Biden himself seems to have recognised this in recent weeks, especially with his personal attack of Trump in his speech on the anniversary of the insurrection.

 

I think the new strategy should involve more attacks, and be very focused on both Trump and aimed at those in his base. Endless outrage pieces have no impact, because the only ones outraged are the ones in the other echo chamber. The attacks have to chip away at the base somehow. That means repetition, simplicity, and a focus on demonstrating how Trump has no true respect for his own base and only harms them.

 

Trump is a walking scandal, and surely there is much more dirt than can be dug up, and not the lazy kind that only outrages people like me. What has he been on record saying about his own supporters? Who of his own base has he shamelessly robbed? Which of the values that his own base espouses has he trashed? I don’t think this would be an especially tough assignment for investigative journalists. Extend the field to include Trump’s acolytes and the assignment becomes easier still. What has DeSantis been up to? McCarthy? All the little Trumps?

 

This drumbeat of scandal can complement much simpler messaging from the Democrats about policy. It is tough for them to focus their messages, because there is so much they want to do and most of it is laudable. But is complex, hard to demonstrate, and also often easily drowned by some outrage from the other side. Immigration is a powerful Republican talking point. Where is the simple equally powerful (and less racist) message from the other side? I don’t currently see it, and without it the Trump faction could sweep the board, including by winning over many more Latino voters, who have become established in the USA by hard work and don’t see why it should be easier for others.

 

Then there are other potential opinion formers. Sports stars do their bit and there may some traction there. Companies can be stirred into action when their own interests are threatened or they see an interest in being responsible in front of their employees. What about churches? Money talks and habits die hard, but surely the Catholics ought to be progressive from their single issue campaign by now and noticing how the party they seem to lead towards has been captured by somebody whose values are the opposite of those in the Gospels.

 

Will plan B work better than plan A? Perhaps it will, and perhaps not. Playing dirty can feel like betraying values – remember Michelle Obama and “when the go low, we go high”? Perhaps I am panicking, but I think the time to go low has arrived. The stakes for all of us are too high this time.