Ouch, that stings!
Alright, alright, I hear you—Trump is a very bad guy in your book, and my
little joke didn’t exactly get a warm welcome.
I’ll *try* (no promises!) to tiptoe a bit more around your strong feelings
about your president.
On Thu, 6 Mar 2025 at 13:54, Santafe <[email protected]
<mailto:[email protected]>> wrote:
> On Mar 5, 2025, at 9:32 PM, Pieter Steenekamp <[email protected]
<mailto:[email protected]>> wrote:
>
> Ah, now I see how it works!
>
> If Trump's actions accidentally lead to a good outcome—well, that’s just
an unintended consequence.
> If things go south, though—obviously, it’s all Trump’s fault.
> Conclusion? Trump is bad, no matter what.
The last line, though not the syllogism put before it, is indeed part of
the argument, Pieter, and your snideness toward it is misplaced.
We have an increasingly well-reported history of trump’s activities and
their outcomes, across a longish life. He is an abuser, a liar, and a cheat,
toward anybody less powerful in a given exchange. This is relevant
information, and to act as if it were not is not a good standard of argument.
And it’s not all past. A lot is being destroyed right now, new things each
day, which various people here know quite richly, and we have data on the lies
and the distortions about what its destruction is or isn’t doing. Most of this
isn’t even hard; any child can call the lies and the gaslighting for what they
are, and lots of good writing on totalitarianism throughout history accounts
well for the motivations in doing them. The particular and distinctive thing
that various people on this list can offer, because of where and how they have
worked, is a quite detailed understanding of how different kinds of joint work
operate, what they do, and what will result for people when
they are eliminated.
To cherry-pick what you include and what you ignore, for the sake of
putting up a sophist or contrarian argument to show that English syntax will
support it, is not some better standard of argument. Good argument will
inevitably live in this overlay of the directly analytic and the circumstantial
and inferential, precisely because noone possesses the future, and noone has
access to what it is to be somebody else and trapped living somebody else’s
circumstance. And thus it will come down to matters of judgment. That’s the
best offer available.
Eric
>
> How about we skip the pre-packaged outrage and just focus on what he’s
actually doing to end the war in Ukraine? Crazy idea, I know.
>
>
> On Wed, 5 Mar 2025 at 18:16, Marcus Daniels <[email protected]
<mailto:[email protected]>> wrote:
> What did Zelensky get for it? Trump cuts off U.S. ISR. One of the
things that Europe cannot replace.
>
>
>
> From: Friam <[email protected]
<mailto:[email protected]>> On Behalf Of Pieter Steenekamp
> Sent: Wednesday, March 5, 2025 5:28 AM
> To: The Friday Morning Applied Complexity Coffee Group <[email protected]
<mailto:[email protected]>>
> Subject: Re: [FRIAM] Back at the ranch, I'm enjoying the popcorn.
>
>
>
> Another round of popcorn, please—the plot thickens.
>
> After Friday’s tantrum in the White House, Zelensky has decided to toe
the line.
>
> Start quoting Zelensky (https://x.com/ZelenskyyUa/status/1896948147085049916
<https://x.com/ZelenskyyUa/status/1896948147085049916>)
>
> I would like to reiterate Ukraine’s commitment to peace.
>
> None of us wants an endless war. Ukraine is ready to come to the
negotiating table as soon as possible to bring lasting peace closer. Nobody wants
peace more than Ukrainians. My team and I stand ready to work under President
Trump’s strong leadership to get a peace that lasts.
>
> We are ready to work fast to end the war, and the first stages could be
the release of prisoners and a truce in the sky—a ban on missiles, long-range
drones, and bombs on energy and other civilian infrastructure—as well as an
immediate truce at sea, if Russia does the same. Then we want to move very fast
through all the next stages and work with the US to agree on a strong final deal.
>
> We truly value how much America has done to help Ukraine maintain its
sovereignty and independence. And we remember the moment when things changed—when
President Trump provided Ukraine with Javelins. We are grateful for this.
>
> Our meeting in Washington, at the White House on Friday, did not go the
way it was supposed to. It is regrettable that it happened this way. It is time to
make things right. We would like future cooperation and communication to be
constructive.
>
> Regarding the agreement on minerals and security, Ukraine is ready to
sign it anytime and in any convenient format. We see this agreement as a step
toward greater security and solid security guarantees, and I truly hope it will
work effectively.
>
> End quote
>
> I’m particularly pleased about this because I believe Trump’s peace deal
could lead to a very good outcome. Here’s why:
>
> - The war continues to exact a heavy toll on both Ukraine and Russia, in
both human lives and economic impact.
> - The risk of escalation into a catastrophic scenario—such as nuclear
conflict or even World War III—is significantly reduced.
> - In many ways, Russia has already lost. Their goal was to capture Kyiv
and control all of Ukraine, but that is now completely unrealistic. Their economy
is in ruins, they’ve lost thousands of soldiers, and Putin has broken the social
contract with Russian citizens. Another invasion? All but impossible.
> - Putin’s global standing is in shambles. Before the invasion, he and Xi
were the two key leaders of BRICS. Now, Xi stands alone—one less adversary to
worry about.
>
> Take a minute to think about it. Until now, Zelensky seemed determined
to continue the war with no clear end in sight. How long did he think it could go
on? At what cost? Now, he’s backing Trump’s peace initiative. Maybe it will fail,
and the war will continue—but surely, it’s worth a shot. Right?
>
>
>
> On Wed, 5 Mar 2025 at 04:16, Marcus Daniels <[email protected]
<mailto:[email protected]>> wrote:
>
> You’ve got one job Deep State. One Job.
>
>
>
> From: Friam <[email protected] <mailto:[email protected]>> on behalf
of steve smith <[email protected] <mailto:[email protected]>>
> Date: Tuesday, March 4, 2025 at 5:03 PM
> To: [email protected] <mailto:[email protected]> <[email protected]
<mailto:[email protected]>>
> Subject: Re: [FRIAM] Back at the ranch, I'm enjoying the popcorn.
>
>
>
> On 3/4/25 10:15 AM, Tom Johnson wrote:
>
> You're assuming the ongoing presence of Trump and Putin.
>
> I don't know about Putin, but Trump is a cult leader. If something
happens to him, Vance etc al. can't carry the water.
>
> I agree, nobody able to carry Trump's nor Putin's water (as it were)... a bit of a
red=herring at that point... some wild card might appear out of nowhere and (mis)fill the void in some
unexpected way (e.g. Asimov's "Mule" of "theFoundation"?)
>
> One tiny anueurism or a dose of pollonium in the diet coke or some
Ioicane Powder and the modern world diffracts off into some strange new basin of
attraction we haven't even imagined?
>
> Viva la punctuated equllibrium!
>
>
>
> T
>
>
>
>
>
> =======================
> Tom Johnson
> Inst. for Analytic Journalism
> Santa Fe, New Mexico
> 505-577-6482
> =======================
>
>
>
> On Mon, Mar 3, 2025, 9:44 PM steve smith <[email protected]
<mailto:[email protected]>> wrote:
>
> Friday afternoon the simple term "WWIII" took on a whole new
understanding/context for me.
>
> Before that it was some variation on a nuclear exchange between any 2-3
of the major nuclear powers (US/USSR/China) which was held at bay mostly by
variations on MAD. Not only did the possibility of retaliation (before
first-strike lands, or soon after) make it unthinkable, but so did the challenges
of regional and global nuclear contamination and a likely nuclear winter (minimum
of northern hemisphere, but global consequences).
>
> Now I see it being something more like a new European War similar to WWI
& WWII, not involving North America directly (we don't pitch nor catch any)
>
> • Europe sends in air and ground troops (and more equipment) to
Ukraine to squash Putin's vestigal army. Marcus' no-fly-zone.
> • Ukraine continues to punish Russia (e.g. destroying
military assets inside Russia)
> • The European coalition masses conventional forces on Russian
borders with a "ready posture"
> • Russia is humiliated.
> • Putin (not Russia) in his humiliation decides to use his
nukes... craters half the major cities or capitols in UK/EU.
> • France and UK have a *handful* of nukes. I'm out of
date, most or all are on nuclear subs which Russia may or may not know the
location of.
> • Moscow and a few 'grads become craters.
> • Nuclear Winter
> • Misery across Eurasia, the likes of which Russians are
more accustomed
> • Europe can't agree enough to give Ukraine decisive support (as
in 1 above).
> • Russia grinds Ukraine down, while using up yet more of
it's own dwindling military and human capital.
> • Europe and Russia rattle sabers for months or years but
Russia is too depleted to continue a conventional war.
> • Russia (Putin) gets impatient or arrogant and decides to
nuke European powers.
> • Again, the handful of non-US nukes targeted on Russia
are enough to make a bad mess and maybe even win but only if used pre-emptively.
> • (Western) Eurasia is a mess for a century.
> • In either case MAGA (with/without Trump alive/vital/engaged)
sits back and eats popcorn.
> • If MAGA holds US power, they grind away at European and
possibly Russian resources, stealing and war profiteering boldly.
> • Maybe anti-MAGA backlashes MAGA out of power (probably
has to be a strong political win followed by some minor but decisive bloodshed).
Maybe we help them rebuild (similar to post-WWII) or maybe we just sit back on our
side of the Ocean.
> • China waits patiently for the right moment to grab Mongolia for it's
"raw earth" (trump SIC) and/or Taiwan.... possibly are both worth their effort...
possibly the US uses the European distraction as an opportunity to treat China as our only
overt competitor.
> I don't see the world "a better place" for any of this except in the extreme case
of significant depopulation of both (sadly) third-world innocents and first-world belligerents
(military, political, economic), and even then it isn't clear to me just *when* or *how* the
"meek inherit the earth" but I'll be damned if it isn't an outcome I find myself rooting
for! Feels like if COVID had just been slightly more virulent, we might have gotten there by a
vaguely more graceful route?
>
> GAH!
>
>
>
> On 3/3/25 9:10 PM, Marcus Daniels wrote:
>
> • NATO creates a no-fly zone over Ukraine, and destroys any
Russian asset in Ukraine
> • The Ukranians continue to develop their drone programs for
targeted attacks in Russia
> • Europe gives them long-range weapons, Storm Shadow and Taurus
for larger targets
>
>
> Biden should have just done this, knowing that Trump would throw the
world into chaos.
>
>
>
> From: Friam <[email protected]
<mailto:[email protected]>> On Behalf Of Pieter Steenekamp
> Sent: Monday, March 3, 2025 7:50 PM
> To: The Friday Morning Applied Complexity Coffee Group <[email protected]
<mailto:[email protected]>>
> Subject: Re: [FRIAM] Back at the ranch, I'm enjoying the popcorn.
>
>
>
>
> A Case For and Against Trump in the Context of Ukraine
>
> The Case Against Trump
> Russia invaded Ukraine, and Ukraine has been fighting back heroically
for three years. It is crucial to take decisive action against countries that
invade others unprovoked. A good example is the First Gulf War, when Iraq invaded
Kuwait, and the U.S. led a coalition to push Iraq out. That kind of response helps
maintain international order.
>
> However, Trump now portrays Ukraine as the aggressor and openly aligns
himself with Putin. His stance undermines the principle of standing against
aggression and emboldens authoritarian regimes. His willingness to cozy up to
Putin is simply wrong. Period.
>
> The Case For Trump
> Maintaining international order is important, but only if you have the
power to enforce it effectively. If you can't win a war, engaging in it is a
mistake. Consider how the U.S. aligned with Stalin in the later stages of World
War II—not because Stalin was good, but because confronting him directly wasn’t a
realistic option at the time. Putin may be an amateur compared to Stalin, but the
logic remains: if you can’t stop him, you may have to find a way to work with him.
>
> Looking at today's reality, there is no viable path to pushing Russia
out of Ukraine unless the U.S. commits fully—boots on the ground. But no one in
America supports that. Given this, there’s a case for engaging with Russia
pragmatically, much like how the U.S. dealt with Stalin, to bring the war to an
end.
>
> Continuing to support Ukraine half-heartedly, without full military
commitment, has serious downsides. The war could drag on indefinitely, and if
Ukraine eventually wins, Russia would be humiliated. A humiliated nuclear-armed
Russia is a dangerous prospect. History offers a warning—Germany’s humiliation
after World War I directly contributed to the rise of Hitler. The consequences of
a humiliated Russia could be similarly unpredictable and catastrophic.
>
> My Take
> In my lifetime, we had an almost perfect leader in South Africa—Nelson
Mandela. Unfortunately, he is no longer with us. But surely, with today's AI, we
could create a virtual Madiba, and he would know exactly what to do.
>
>
>
> On Mon, 3 Mar 2025 at 22:28, Tom Johnson <[email protected]
<mailto:[email protected]>> wrote:
>
> So as usual: Follow the Money.
> If Trump gets a deal with Ukraine on those rare earth minerals, upon
leaving Ukraine, where does that ore go and to whom? My bet is to some
company(ies) that Trump et al. have interests in.
>
> TJ
>
>
>
> On Mon, Mar 3, 2025 at 12:33 PM Santafe <[email protected]
<mailto:[email protected]>> wrote:
>
> It’s such an encapsulation of that part of the society (including t and
v) to think that they could “humiliate” Zelenskyy. By insisting, in a
conversation with toxic scum, on the relevance of reality, he was about the only
clean thing in the room that could be heard.
>
> There are people like Fareed Zakaria who think that trump can be somehow
managed by a canny player. That doesn’t ring correct to me, unless the player has
a lot of power and money, and it is the power and money that are managing trump.
No agreement with trump is worth the paper it is written on. We all understand
that he will do anything he is not stopped from doing. The problem with the
american presidency is that there become fewer and fewer actors who can stop its
occupant from doing things, in the era of political parties as universalizing
corrupting bodies. If this whole train continues, they will eventually degrade
the u.s. in wealth and power enough that its ability to do damage declines. But
there is so much accumulated right now, that they can do enormous harm before they
undercut themselves.
>
> I am persuaded by those who opine that trump has no intention of doing
anything to aid Ukraine, and that the point of the performance was to put up a
front for not doing anything, for the same audience who interprets any of that as
a humiliation of Zelenskyy. If trump could extort money or resource access, and
then backstab in return for it, I expect he would be interested in that
opportunity. But not more than that.
>
> I also think that people are living a little bit in the past when they
comment that, with trump, it’s always about money. That was before the first
presidency, when his possibilities to exercise abusive power over other people in
a country with some degree of rule of law was limited, relative to the amount of
spending he could do (whether solvent or insolvent). But the access to abusive
power in the presidency, for a sociopath, is on a scale not available to anybody
else. If money was heroin for that addiction, the power of the presidency is
fentanyl, and I don’t think trump is going back now. Money: fine; but that’s now
the second motive.
>
> (I think there are elements of this for Musk as well, but there is
enough about him that is different that I wouldn’t put him in the same category,
or in the same post here.)
>
> I, of course, don’t _know_ anything, and I don’t even have any
sophistication thinking in this sphere. But from my long distance from it, I can
imagine that the calculus is roughly this at the moment: It is still possible
that trump won’t direct the u.s. military to attack Ukraine directly. The
question whether it is possible comes back, entirely, to what force is available
to stop him from ordering it. I don’t doubt for a minute that, if the EU starts
to get scared, and if they have time to act constructively, enough to start to
give Ukraine meaningful ability to hold land or push back a bit, the u.s. under
trump would act as a saboteur of that effort.
>
> If that is the correct vantage point, I would imagine that Zelenskyy’s
challenge is to try to orient the rest of the world into some structure that will
hem trump and the trumpers in as much as possible from direct attack, and where
possible against sabotage. (Sabotage is harder, because to even find out that it
is going on, you need somebody on the inside to report.) If they can get some
weapons out of the weapons contractors and the congressmen, sure; try to do what
you can. But any of that has meaning only when it is in your hands and being
used. Don’t put weight on anything short of that.
>
> (I don’t mean, in this, btw, to downplay the true problem that the
current condition is a WWI-type trench warfare with drones, and the prospect of
extending that to a point of collapse is already so bad, that it takes something
truly awful for that not to be the worst. I don’t see indication that any
good-faith actor anywhere is denying that, though I don’t think saying it, alone,
makes one a good-faith actor.)
>
>
> I had a conversation with a friend over the weekend who is a NASA
program manager, and who interpreted a recent directive they had received, to
discontinue the use of paper straws, and replace them with plastic straws, as a
kickback to some petroleum company that had bribed trump. Given that this is a
smart person I am talking to, the quaintness of that interpretation took my breath
away. It seems clear beyond daylight, to me, that the images of turtles with
straws in their noses, and seabirds dead of them, were the breakthrough that the
environmental groups finally got with the public, to get some action to ban that
specific plastic item as one of the most insidiously dangerous and cruel. The
point of the paper-straw ban was the point of everything with these people. Most
directly, it was an intent to deliver a “defeat” to the environmental groups,
focusing on the image that had succeeded for them precisely because it is so awful
to have to see more of. But more
generally, this is the core of meanness. It is a rage, by those who are
defiled in their nature, against the existence of anything that isn’t defiled.
>
> This is again Hannah Arendt’s summary of the last-century European
political actors: that they didn’t understand the distinction between the parties
and the movements. The parties wanted to control the government, whereas the
movements wanted to destroy the government. Public commentary on this drives me
nuts, because it seems to exactly repeat this error. People talk about the
appointments of degraded morons to agency heads as being about loyalty: take
somebody who couldn’t earn anything in a world of merit, and put him on a plush
perch that he knows he will only retain as long as he can continue to curry favor.
But I believe that only to about a 30% level as the motive. And it is an
inward-facing motive; how to keep various functionaries on a leash. There is an
outward-directed motive, and I think that is about 70% of the drive. These people
are put there, because he couldn’t find anybody worse. It is again the effort to
eliminate the notion of legitimacy
from the concept of society people will adopt and live within.
>
> The word I wanted to use for the latter, thinking over the weekend, was
“vesting”. It’s a bit of a bland word, but it wraps up several things that
otherwise I can’t encompass in one word. The cognitive concept of truth; abstract
notions such as justice; the society as an agreement underpinned by legitimized
institutions. What all these have in common is that people accept restraint to
uphold a prior commitment to these other things as “higher” over the long run.
And when the mob wants to destroy the state — meaning, really to destroy that
concept of society — it is this “higher” that they can keep their attention fixed
on, as all the other particular targets (immigrants, academics, civil servants,
black people, gay people, etc.) get rotated in and out as opportunities arise.
>
> So anyway: if every dealing with trump turns out to be, over time, a
loss for Zelenskyy — the reality behind the literary Faustian Bargain — he may not
be worse off having the break occur earlier. I don’t know what it may buy him to
have humiliated t and v, by having the dignity to not accept those terms of
conversation, in terms of coalition-building with other heads of state.
>
>
> I do continue to wonder what China’s play in this will be. I imagine
they think they will have no trouble “managing” Russia into some kind of
continuing subordinate status, when it is alone with a gigantic land area but a
limited economy and population. If it were even just Russia swallowing Ukraine,
China might still think of that as an okay outcome. I feel pretty sure they want
the rare earths, in view of their relations with Mongolia up to now, and the fact
that the only thing protecting Taiwan is that it holds the entire world’s highest
technology as a trust, and collapsing it would cause such a large global implosion
that it would destabilize China as well, for now. But they probably figure they
can get those from Russian control, where Russia couldn’t develop them internally
anyway. An actual coalition of Russia with the U.S., however, could become more
worrisome for China, even if the U.S. is undergoing a process of self-degradation.
So it is not
inconceivable to me that China could want some stalemate to go on a while
longer, which limits the coordination of the trumpers with other large actors
as much as feasible. Another Faustian bargain for Zelenskyy if it is offered.
But maybe more predictable in the short term.
>
> But there, too, I don’t know anything.
>
> Eric
>
>
>
>> On Mar 3, 2025, at 11:34, steve smith <[email protected]
<mailto:[email protected]>> wrote:
>>
>>
>>> It's way too generous to say "Trump has a case". Trump and Vance's "case"
consists of "You should be grateful to us because we give you money". I.e. suck up to me and I'll deign to
give you more money.
>> I don't think Trump or Vance have backed any significant support for
Ukraine. The US people through our elected representatives and tax dollars *HAVE*
supported Ukraine (albeit a little slowly an a little anemically and a little timidly
sometimes?). Zelensky has been extravagantly and eloquently thankful to all of the
above. Trump and Vance were spoiling for an opportunity to try to humiliate Zelensky
in front of the cameras, so they contrived it.
>>> Maybe someone makes the case you say is Trump's. But it's not Trump
making that case. If he sporadically vomits words that sound like that, it's because
they were put into his mouth by someone else. The question is Who put them there? Putin?
Elno? Thiel?
>>
>> The "raw earth" (sic Trump) deal was extortion. Whether Ukraine's mineral
resources could or should be mortgaged to secure the financial support is one thing, but the idea that
the point of the West supporting Ukraine against the hyper-aggressive Putin-led Russia is about economics
completely misses the point. Zelensky is right to avoid "doing business with" anyone who is
not a clear staunch ally when in this situation.
>>
>> Trump & Allies are clearly "War Profiteers", a fine old tradition among the
industrialists and financiers of the "free world".
>>
>>
>>>
>>> On 3/2/25 7:42 PM, Pieter Steenekamp wrote:
>>>> Just watched a new episode where two toddlers threw their toys out of
the cot.
>>>>
>>>> Zelensky makes a strong case — Putin is unreliable, having broken
numerous agreements in the past, so any peace deal would need ironclad security guarantees.
But lecturing Trump is hardly the way to secure a favorable minerals trade agreement.
>>>>
>>>> Trump also has a valid case — the war is stagnating, there’s no
realistic military path to driving Russia out of Ukraine, and pursuing peace makes sense.
But losing your temper at an international press conference is not the way to get there.
>>>>
>>>> At the end of the day, they’re all human, and it makes for great
real-life drama. I can't wait for the next episode!
>>>>
>>>
