The Dive - 12/1/21
Your monthly compilation of what's what on global politics, American society, and an assortment of odds and ends
Quote of the Month
“To suffer woes which Hope thinks infinite;
To forgive wrongs darker than death or night;
To defy Power, which seems omnipotent;
To love, and bear; to hope till Hope creates
From its own wreck the thing it contemplates;
Neither to change, nor falter, nor repent;
This, like thy glory, Titan, is to be
Good, great and joyous, beautiful and free;
This is alone Life; Joy, Empire, and Victory!”
- Percy Bysshe Shelley, Prometheus Unbound, IV.570-578
My recent scribblings:
“A Marvel Misfire: How ‘Eternals’ Forgot What Makes the Marvel Cinematic Universe Tick”
“Twelve Percent of a Plan: A review of the ‘Guardians of the Galaxy’ video game”
1. Stop telling kids they’re going to die of climate change
Why you should read it: For Wired’s UK edition, climate activist Hannah Ritchie tells her fellow activists to ease up on the counterproductive and paralyzing climate doomism they espouse.
“Let’s be clear: Climate change is one of the biggest problems we face. It comes with many risks—some certain, some uncertain—and we’re not moving anywhere near fast enough to reduce emissions. But there seems to have been a breakdown in communication of what our future entails. None of the climate scientists I know and trust—who surely know the risks better than almost anyone—are resigned to a future of oblivion. Most of them have children. In fact, they often have several. Young ones, too. Now, having kids is no automatic qualification for rational decision-making. But it signals that those who spend day after day studying climate change are optimistic that their children will have a life worth living.”
“There are a couple of ways I think this doomsday scenario has become commonplace. First, you don’t need to look far to find people with large platforms promoting these messages. Take Roger Hallam, the founder of Extinction Rebellion. In one of his most recent videos—titled ‘Advice to Young People as They Face Annihilation’—he claims we must get emissions to zero within months, otherwise humanity will be wiped out. He claims that this annihilation is now locked in. The worst thing about this message is that, rather than inspiring action, it resigns us to the falsehood that we are already too late. There is now nothing we can do… Second is a miscommunication of targets and thresholds. The 1.5 degrees Celsius target was written into the Paris Agreement in acknowledgement that 2 degrees Celsius of warming would risk the livelihoods of some communities—particularly low-lying island states. It was a call for greater ambition. But the likelihood that we would meet this 1.5 degrees C target was as slim then as it is now. Feasible in the models, but in reality it’s gone. The problem is that many now view 1.5 degrees C as a tipping point threshold. Once we hit it, the game is up. It’s therefore not surprising—given that we will most likely pass 1.5 degrees C in the next few decades—that many people believe we’re too late… Third, the pace of almost-real-time updates means we are bombarded with news of the latest disaster. These stories matter, but they don’t give us an accurate perspective on how the frequency and consequences of disasters are changing overall. In fact, they give us a false perspective. The data tells us a different story: Death rates from disasters have fallen a lot over the past century… Combine these messages with the slow and inadequate action on climate so far, and it's not surprising that so many feel that humanity is doomed.”
Why it matters: “We need a new message for climate change. One that drives action through optimism that things can be better. Or, based on the signs that things are getting better, we might rebrand this optimism as realism. This would be much more effective at driving real change, and would save a lot of mental strife in the process. It’s time to stop telling our children that they’re going to die from climate change. It’s not only cruel, it might actually make it more likely to come true.”
2. How to avoid a “climate shock” in the transition from fossil fuels
Why you should read it: Economist Gordon H. Hanson writes in Foreign Affairs about how the United States can avoid an economic shock comparable to the China trade shock of the 2000s when transitioning away from fossil fuels.
“This experience [of the China shock] is important to remember as U.S. policymakers chart out what could be an equally seismic economic shift: moving the United States away from fossil fuels and toward greener sources of energy. Such a transition may be critical to fight climate change, but it could devastate parts of the country that depend on carbon extraction. In 2019, 2.8 million people worked for companies that extract, process, distribute, and produce electricity from fossil fuels. Many other employers depended on spending by these workers to stay in business. To avoid creating yet more social havoc, the United States must learn from its past mistakes. Rather than counting on markets to sort out the aftermath of shocks, the government will need to proactively invest in policies designed to help regions that bear the brunt of wider transformations in the economy. It will need to design a social welfare system that recognizes that not every community suffers equally and that even when the national economy is growing, some places still struggle. Otherwise, millions more people could be left behind.”
“The extreme job losses caused by hyperglobalization may be in the past. But the Biden administration’s efforts to reduce reliance on fossil fuels, whether via the Build Back Better legislation currently before Congress or through other regulations, could initiate another round of regionalized labor-market disruptions. There are plenty of local economies that still mine coal, drill for oil and gas, and create electricity from these sources. There are plenty more that depend on carbon-intensive industries such as cement and steel, which require enormous amounts of energy to produce. For all the good that decarbonization would do for the world, it represents a seemingly existential threat to these communities. Compounding the potential misery, fossil-fuel-dependent communities in the Midwest sit uncomfortably close to many of the places that were hardest hit by the China trade shock. The regional manufacturing collapse that punished an older cohort of workers may be followed by an energy transformation that punishes a younger group…The geographic concentration of industries that extract, refine, and utilize fossil fuels should be of immediate concern to policymakers intent on decarbonizing the U.S. economy. Increased demand for renewable energy will create new jobs in solar, wind, and hydroelectric power, but these jobs may be located far from existing carbon-based production facilities. New power-intensive industries, such as data centers, may choose to be situated near renewable energy providers, which could also make it more difficult for laid-off workers to find other jobs.”
Why it matters: “U.S. policymakers must respond aggressively to localized job losses irrespective of how the national economy is performing. To do so, the government should make the duration and generosity of unemployment benefits depend on regional rather than national economic conditions: losing a job is simply more painful in local economies where unemployment is already high. The government could also launch a system of national wage insurance, which would buttress the incomes of workers who experience sharp declines in pay, thus protecting against the financial insecurity caused by precarious labor markets… To prevent regional recessions, the government will need to move quickly to encourage new employment in places where jobs disappear en masse. That means taking place-based policies more seriously. One promising example is active labor-market programs, including targeted sectoral training, which provide workers with the skills demanded by industries set to expand nationally… Without such preparations, the energy transition may add to the unfortunate and painful history of regionalized joblessness. It could fuel more misery, broken families, and addiction. Regional economic divides have intensified political polarization in the United States and provided fertile ground for populists. If the federal government is serious about decarbonizing the U.S. economy, then it must also get serious about helping people who will lose their jobs in the process.”
3. Why the world isn’t putting up with China’s bullying any more
Why you should read it: In The Atlantic, journalist Chris Horton observes that the world isn’t much putting up with Beijing’s thin-skinned bullying these days and expanding their ties with Taiwan, citing the popularity of a Chinese-language pop song that takes aim at the ruling Chinese Communist Party’s rhetoric.
“Where the word Beijing once conjured the image of a confident, rising power, today it represents a frowning, finger-pointing, never-erring crank, its constant stream of vitriol diminishing the effectiveness of Chinese anger. One of the implications of this hyperinflation of hurt feelings has been the effective removal of the deterrent against democracies’ improving their unofficial relations with Taiwan. After all, if most moves are likely to anger Beijing, why hold back from any of them?”
“The United States has led the way in expanding ties with Taiwan while grappling with an increasingly prickly China. This began under the Trump administration, and has continued under Joe Biden, who in his first year in office has twice said that the U.S. is committed to defending Taiwan from Chinese attack… Similar dynamics are changing the minds of leaders elsewhere in the world. Europe offers a prime example of how Beijing’s belligerence has worked against its own diplomatic goals while inadvertently boosting Taiwan’s international profile.”
Why it matters: “Beyond Europe, countries in China’s own neighborhood are beginning to more openly embrace their unofficial ties to Taiwan as they grow tired of Beijing’s bellicosity. Japan—which colonized Taiwan for a half century until the end of World War II—has declared Taiwan a national-security interest, and defense officials have suggested that Tokyo would intervene, presumably alongside the U.S., in the event of a Chinese attack on Taiwan. And Australia, which has been subject to Chinese economic coercion ever since Prime Minister Scott Morrison called for an independent investigation into the origins of the global coronavirus pandemic, is beginning to look away from Beijing and toward Taipei.”
4. How Australia and China decoupled
Why you should read it: Australian think tank scholar Jeffrey Wilson argues in Foreign Policy that Australia’s economic and political divorce from China shows what “decoupling” from Beijing might look like in practice.
“When Australia had the temerity to call for an independent inquiry into the origins of COVID-19 last year, China was incensed. It responded with an unprecedented wave of trade restrictions that froze many categories of Australian exports, rapidly decoupling economic ties. But if Beijing hoped to punish Canberra for its defiance with economic pain—and send a warning to other countries not to oppose China—it has failed on both accounts. The impacts on Australia have so far been surprisingly minimal. If this is what decoupling from China looks like, Australia’s resilience suggests the costs are far lower than many have assumed. That fact will not be lost on other countries that have differences with China.”
“If the scale of China’s trade coercion against Australia is unprecedented, it also offers an intriguing experiment: What does a sudden economic decoupling from China look like? With China accounting for nearly 40 percent of Australian exports, one might assume the costs of Canberra’s defiance would be grave… As a result, the cost of decoupling the Australian economy from China has been far lower than anyone had expected. According to Australian Treasury estimates, sectors affected by Chinese trade restrictions lost AU$5.4 billion (around $4 billion) in exports to China during the first full year of sanctions, but they simultaneously found AU$4.4 billion ($3.3 billion) of new markets elsewhere. The net loss of AU$1 billion is a mere 0.25 percent of Australian exports. What’s more, due to surging iron ore prices, the value of Australian exports to China actually grew by 10 percent since sanctions have been in effect. ‘Our economy has … proven to be remarkably resilient,’ Australian Treasurer Josh Frydenberg said.”
Why it matters: “… Australia’s experience offers broader lessons on the strategic implications of decoupling from China. First, governments can no longer count on separating their economic and political relationships with China; difficulties on the political side will quickly be met with economic threats. Second, Australia demonstrates that China’s bark is worse than its bite… Australia has shown the world it can say no to China and still prosper despite trade sanctions and a forced economic decoupling. It may not be long until more countries start to follow.”
5. How Sweden soured on taking in refugees and migrants
Why you should read it: Also in Foreign Policy, columnist James Traub notes that Sweden - previously generous in its willingness to accept refugees and migrants - has turned against accepting large numbers of refugees moving forward.
“Sweden had opened itself to the desperate people fleeing Middle Eastern civil wars and tyranny not because, like Germany, it had a terrible sin to expiate but rather out of a sense of universal moral obligation. Their Europe did not build walls. But, of course, the actual Europe of 2015 did just that, leaving very few countries—above all, Germany and Sweden—to bear the burden of what I then called ‘unshared idealism.’ Nevertheless, Sweden’s leaders, like Germany’s, were prepared to shoulder that burden. Loyal social democrats, I found, were confident, almost complacent, about Sweden’s ability to integrate vast numbers of barely literate Afghan children and deeply pious and conservative Syrians, just as they had with cosmopolitan Bosnians and Iranians in past years… It’s hardly surprising that newcomers lag behind Swedes on every index of well-being, but the gap is very large. In a recent book, Mass Challenge: The Socioeconomic Impact of Migration to a Scandinavian Welfare State, Tino Sanandaji, an economist of Kurdish origin who has become a leading critic of Sweden’s migration policies, writes ‘foreign-born represent 53 percent of individuals with long prison sentences, 58 percent of the unemployed, and receive 65 percent of social welfare expenditures; 77 percent of Sweden’s child poverty is present in households with a foreign background, while 90 percent of suspects in public shootings have immigrant backgrounds.’ Figures like these have become widely known; the number of Swedes who favor increased migration has dropped from 58 percent in 2015 to 40 percent today.”
“Sweden is no longer a welcoming country and does not wish to be seen as one. In June 2016, the country revised its longstanding policy to deny refugees permanent asylum; those admitted were given temporary permits of either three months or three years, figures dictated by the minimum permissible under European Union rules. The law was meant to be a temporary response to the crisis of the previous fall, when the country literally ran out of places to put asylum-seekers; it has since been renewed. Last year, the country accepted only 13,000 refugees, the lowest number in 30 years… Of course, Sweden remains an enormously prosperous, relatively egalitarian, and quite safe country. It is rather some deep Swedish impulse that has died. Sweden asked too much of itself. Over the last 20 years, an ancient and homogeneous culture subjected itself—without any prior intention or even public debate—to a demographic transformation of breathtaking proportions. The United States slammed the gates of immigration shut in 1924 when the percentage of foreign-born citizens reached about 15 percent. That figure in Sweden is now 20 percent; and thanks to ongoing labor migration and family reunification, the number of migrants continues to grow every year by about 100,000 people (or almost 1 percent of the population). Virtually all of these migrants come from societies radically different from Sweden—less educated, less secular. In response, Sweden didn’t ‘die.’ It changed cherished values to survive.”
Why it matters: “Sweden is Europe writ large. The European Union responded to growing backlash against the arrival of more than a million migrants in the late summer and early fall of 2015 by reaching a deal with Turkey in 2016 to prevent refugees from crossing into Europe. That solved the political problem without addressing the underlying humanitarian crisis. Since then, Europe has tried, not very effectually, to help African and Middle Eastern nations that now host the overwhelming majority of those who have fled from violence and repression in the region… Democratic societies do not rest on the abstract principles expressed in their founding documents. They rest—as Americans have now learned, to their great chagrin—on the collective beliefs of their own citizens. Abstract principles exercise a strong hold, but lived experience can unmoor people even from values deemed sacred. It falls to leaders not simply to remind people of those values but to curb, harness, and reshape the forces that most deeply threaten democratic principles.”
6. How hostage-taking came back into fashion as a tool of foreign policy
Why you should read it: Washington Post reporters Kate Woodsome, Jason Rezaian, and Ray Whitehouse detail how taking Americans hostage has become a go-to policy move around the world.
“Foreign governments now surpass terrorist and militant groups as the predominant hostage-takers of U.S. nationals around the globe. Nineteen publicly known U.S. nationals are being held by militants and other criminal groups, while at least 43 are being wrongfully detained abroad as state-sponsored hostage cases, according to Cynthia Loertscher, research director at the James W. Foley Legacy Foundation, which works closely with the State Department on hostage issues. The rise in foreign governments wrongfully detaining Americans to extract concessions, policy changes or prisoner exchanges from the United States is dramatic… Although American hostages are more likely to be killed by terrorist groups such as the Islamic State, they are held longer when detained by foreign governments. But lethality and long sentences alone are not a measure of the cost of these crimes.”
“Experts say China, Cuba, Iran, North Korea and Venezuela are currently the most active hostage-taking states. Just last month, Venezuela retaliated against the United States for its extradition of a Maduro ally by re-imprisoning six U.S. oil executives who had been under house arrest. They have been held captive since 2017. Russia, like allies such as Egypt, Saudi Arabia and Turkey, practices hostage diplomacy, too… If the number of Americans seized by foreign governments has risen steadily over the past two decades, it is in part because Washington has gotten better at counting the cases and in part because the practice is becoming more popular.”
Why it matters: “Secretary of State Antony Blinken has publicly stated that he wants countries to work together to establish norms that prohibit the arbitrary detention of citizens for political purposes. He envisions a global ban similar to the one on chemical weapons that grew out of World War I. In February, Canada took a step toward that, launching the Declaration Against Arbitrary Detention in State-to-State Relations. The statement has 67 signatories… U.S. officials trying to bring U.S. nationals home are combating ever-changing threats without effective tools and a shrinking moral high ground. In the short and long term, Washington and its allies must fundamentally alter how they approach these cases, and the U.S. president must get more creative in his response. If they don’t, the protections once provided by being American will seem more like relics from another time."
7. How anti-nuclear activists stack the rhetorical deck
Why you should read it: Breakthrough Institute executive director Ted Nordhaus blasts the anti-nuclear power faction of the environmental movement for helping impose exorbitant costs on nuclear power and then claiming that it’s too expensive to build out.
“In reality, the true face of the anti-nuclear movement today is a highly credentialed progressive policy wonk, a lawyer, or, academic, or journalist, who often claims not to be opposed to nuclear energy at all. The problem with nuclear energy, in this rendition, is not the risk of a ‘china syndrome’ style meltdown, it’s that nuclear power plants are just too darn expensive to build… Today, it is clear that fossil fuels, not nuclear energy, represent the primary environmental threat to the biosphere and to human flourishing. By contrast, over sixty years, nuclear energy has had an extraordinary record of safe operations. There is little evidence that developing civilian nuclear energy capabilities leads to nuclear weapons proliferation. Despite decades of public support and subsidies and notwithstanding great progress on the cost of manufacturing solar panels and wind turbines, there is little reason to believe that electrical grids can be powered entirely by wind and solar energies anytime soon. Meanwhile, in the wake of dozens of nuclear plant closures over the last decade, and in contradiction to claims by nuclear opponents, it is clear that clean nuclear energy cannot be replaced predominantly with renewable sources.”
“And yet, progressives and environmentalists keep recycling reasons to dismiss nuclear energy, even as a complement to other sources of clean energy, most especially wind and solar. That brings me back to [former Nuclear Regulatory Commission head Allison] Macfarlane…[She] represents what have in fact been long-standing policy choices as challenges that are intrinsic to nuclear technology itself, eliding the role that she, and other progressive experts and technocrats, have played in advocating for those choices… More broadly still, the entire regulatory apparatus atop which Macfarlane briefly sat, a role that she continues to trade upon for her credibility on the subject, has been the primary obstacle to nuclear innovation for decades. The way that NRC’s mission was defined in the mid-70s, the way that the commission has interpreted that mission, and the black hole of regulatory and bureaucratic processes that were constructed based on that interpretation of the mission have, practically, made it nearly impossible to commercialize a new nuclear reactor, advanced or otherwise, since the Commission’s inception in 1975… Those policies were not intrinsic to the atom or the light water reactor. The fact that NRC’s mission, as stipulated by Congress, was to consider only reactor safety and not cost or practicality was a choice. The commission’s decision to assume that all radiation exposure, no matter how small, creates actionable risk that must be regulated was a choice. The decision to, hence, regulate potential exposure to as close to zero as possible, even though that practically means regulating away infinitesimal and theoretical levels of risk that could never be observed in an actual human population, was a choice. The decision to consider all of those risks without any explicit consideration of the risk associated with the provision of energy from alternative technologies, be they fossil-based or, for that matter, wind and solar, was a choice.”
Why it matters: “What has been clear, from the beginning of the nuclear era is that when nations decide that they want or need nuclear energy, they can and have repeatedly taken steps to put programs and regulations in effect that allow them to have it, safely and at a reasonable cost. This has been true in France, Korea, Japan, even Germany, and today in China. The US was always to some degree an outlier. Our great nuclear build-out in the 1960s and 70s was less a response to energy scarcity than a Cold War showpiece. There were always abundant fossil fuels available domestically. When environmental opinion, and then elite opinion more broadly, turned against it, there were plenty of cheap, albeit dirty alternatives available - first coal then, from the late 80’s onward, oil and gas… It turns out that the only thing more costly than trying to build out a zero-carbon grid with nuclear energy, even with all the challenges associated with building large, current generation, light water reactors in the current regulatory and political environment, is trying to build out a zero-carbon grid without nuclear energy… The problem is that the constituencies most committed to tackling climate change are also those most ambivalent about nuclear energy. Similarly, the elite technocrats and experts most skeptical that nuclear energy can overcome the many significant obstacles it faces to broad commercialization have in fact been the architects of most of those obstacles. Of these, the elites, in my opinion, are the greater problem, because they provide the rationalizations that many left-of-center generalists follow and are deeply embedded in universities, environmental NGOs, Democratic politics, and the NRC itself. If nuclear is to have any future in the United States and play a role, as it almost certainly must, in the effort to deeply decarbonize the US economy, they will need to be confronted.”
8. Space Force justifies its existence
Why you should read it: In the Washington Post, Space Force head Gen. John W. “Jay” Raymond justifies his new service’s existence by reference to an increasingly congested and competitive orbital environment.
“Despite nearly seven decades of human exploration and activity in space, rules governing conduct remain a work in progress. Space is a burgeoning economic engine and an essential part of global civil, commercial and military operations, but the current space environment looks something like the early eras of driving or flying, with rapid growth in the number of cars, planes and operators, yet only the most basic traffic laws. Space has its own considerations that increase complexity — including growing congestion and debris, laws of physics that define motion very differently than on Earth, and a lack of international borders.”
“…while we work with our allies and partners to establish norms and standards of behavior, irresponsible actions continue to make space a more dangerous place to operate. In 2007, China tested an anti-satellite missile by blowing up one of its own satellites, creating thousands of pieces of debris that the United States tracks to this day, alerting satellite operators and astronauts from around the world to the hazardous junk. Last year, Russia launched a satellite that ‘birthed’ a smaller satellite right next to one of our own, which ultimately moved away and launched a projectile into outer space. And just two weeks ago, Russia tested its own anti-satellite missile by blowing up one of its defunct satellites and creating yet another debris field in low-Earth orbit, putting the International Space Station and its inhabitants at risk. These actions are dangerous and irresponsible, and cannot be ignored.
Why it matters: “Today, there are close to 5,000 active satellites orbiting Earth, and that number is forecast to grow dramatically in the next two years. By many projections, in 2040 the annual value of the space economy could surpass $1 trillion, with trillions more in global economic activity dependent on space. This enormous growth of and dependence on space technologies make irresponsible actions even more worrisome.”
9. How we’re all forced to pledge allegiance to “leftist fictions”
Why you should read it: New York Times columnist and Columbia University linguist John McWhorter notices that left-wing ideological tests have seeped into areas where they have little if any conceivable purposes.
“These days, an aroma of delusion lingers, with ideas presented to us from a supposedly brave new world that is, in reality, patently nonsensical. Yet we are expected to pretend otherwise. To point out the nakedness of the emperor is the height of impropriety, and I suspect that the sheer degree to which we are asked to engage in this dissimulation will go down as a hallmark of the era: Do you believe that a commitment to diversity should be crucial to the evaluation of a candidate for a physics professorship? Do you believe that it’s mission-critical for doctors to describe people in particular danger of contracting certain diseases not as ‘vulnerable (or disadvantaged)’ but as ‘oppressed (or made vulnerable or disenfranchised)’? Do you believe that being ‘diverse’ does not make an applicant to a selective college or university more likely to be admitted?”
“In some circles these days, you are supposed to say you do… They’re all [diversity activities as a condition of employment] admirable activities and aims. However, they are vastly less applicable to becoming or being a physicist than to, say, social work, education or even disciplines such as anthropology and sociology. That an applicant to the university’s physics department would be required to meet such benchmarks is a very modern proposition, and probably leaves most people now reading this job posting — physicists or not — scratching or shaking their heads… The notion seems to be that practitioners and scholars, across disciplines, must devote a considerable part of their time to putatively antiracist initiatives. It’s a bold proposition, but given how shaky its actual justification is, it is reasonable to think that lately this devotion is being imposed by fiat, as opposed to being an organic outpouring. And if the price for questioning that notion is to be seen as sitting somewhere on a spectrum ranging from retrogressive to racist, it’s a price few are willing to pay. One is, rather, to pretend.”
Why it matters: “All of this typifies a strand running through our times, a thicker one than always, where we think of it as ordinary to not give voice to our questions about things that clearly merit them, terrified by the response that objectors often receive. History teaches us that this is never a good thing.”
Odds and Ends
Why NASA will fly a plush Snoopy on the first uncrewed Artemis mission around the Moon…
When Antarctica was “a land of fire and not ice…”
How group narcissism leads to entitlement, a failure to listen to others, and possibly even violence…
Following Il Cammino di Dante (Dante’s Walk) during the pandemic…
How the DC sewage treatment company is turning human dung into effective fertilizer…
Music of the Month
The ten-minute long version of “All Too Well” from Taylor Swift’s recently released re-recording of her 2012 album Red.
A summer 2021 cover of Alanis Morissette’s classic “You Oughta Know” by Grouplove.
“I’ve Got A Feeling” by the Beatles, off the 2003 stripped down production of their 1970 album Let It Be.
Image of the Month