Today is New Year’s Eve.
As 2022 Recedes Into History
Let’s do a quick retrospective of it. What happened that historians will be emphasize a century from now? I have thoughts.
Clip Art image from Openclipart.
The top story of 2022 was:
The Russian Invasion of Ukraine
It was such a huge moral wrong. It was done on such a huge scale. Then there was Russia’s crimes against humanity on the areas of Ukraine that it conquered.
There was the Ukraine’s government response. First, it stayed and fought. The Ukraine people fought. This contrasted to how the Afghan government and people knuckled under to the Taliban as the USA withdrew.
There was the free world’s response. Such resolve against evil by the governments of the free world had not seen in many decades. It was noteworthy because of the level of response (both aid to Ukraine and sanctions against Russia) and how widespread it was.
This war has changed the global balance of power.
Global economic sanctions are wrecking Russia’s economy. As time passes by, it will be harder for it to recover. This problem is worsened when more men have to be taken out of the economy to be conscripted into the army.
The power of Russia’s army has been greatly reduced. Not only does Russian industry loose the ability to supply and support the army but battlefield losses drain Russia’s military effectiveness.
The Axis of Evil (George W. Bush’s term) today can describe the free world’s main adversaries: Russia, China, Iran, and North Korea. Busting Russia down to the level of a secondary power on par with Iran and North Korea, leaves China as the sole remaining super-power against the free world.
No free world military spending (especially by the USA) since the 1960’s have so favorably affected world-wide balance of power (from the free world’s view) as the aid to Ukraine has in 2023.
Fusion Reaction Generates Energy
The Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory in California announced that an experiment that got more energy from a fusion reaction than was used to ignite it. Even though the size of the material was miniscule, the duration was micro-seconds, and the amounts of energy was tiny, this was a major breakthrough.
In the future, if this can be safely done to scale, this could provide all humanity’s energy needs. The scientists said that fusion power would safer than fission power (the power of today’s atomic reactors).
Abortion Returned to Democracy
Abortion policy in the United States was effectively removed from the power of the voters and their democratically elected institutions and taken over by the Supreme Court with its Row vs. Wade decision in 1972. Since then, elections have been waged, legislatures and executives have fought but the democracy’s conflicts were all waged around the edges of this issue.
Supporters of Row vs. Wade never seemed to realize the doom to their cause that they created. By going along with this, they gave a horrible power to the Court. An institution that has the power to legalize abortion then has the power to illegalize it. Fortunately, the Supreme Court did not do that this year. It merely returned the power it had stolen. The democratically elected institutions of government, hence the voters, now have that power once again.
Democrats Fight Election to a Draw
This was the year that in the United States the Republicans were supposed to ride to victory. But the Democrats had a plan.
They had spent the year since January 6, 2021 claiming that the Trump supporters would end democracy in the country. Then the Democrats spent millions of dollars in the primaries to put Trump supporters over the top.
The plan worked. Across the country, Trump supporters won the Republican primary elections and then lost the general elections.
In future elections, the Republican Party may do the same thing to the Democrats. Spend heavily in the Democratic Primaries to elevate the worst, most extreme Democratic candidates so that they can beat them in the general.
What goes around, comes around. Too, bad.
Trump News
In 2023 ex-President Donald Trump was as much in the news as ever. Hounded by prosecutions and lawsuits of every kind, squirreling away secret government documents, his tax returns made public, and a Congressional Committee investigating the January 6, 2021 riot/insurrection.
Varying degrees of justification could be offered for the various anti-Trump actions but the public disclosure of his tax returns was just pure spite.
He announced he’s running for President in 2024. If he wins, heaven help us.
Also:
British Royals Drama
Queen Elizabeth died and Prince Charles became King Charles. That’s all the news of importance on the UK Royals front.
We must, however, take notice of the plethora of news and opinion of the dramas, principally about Prince Harry and Princess Meghan.
They put out a documentary on Netflix wherein they told their story. It was an okay effort and they were sympathetic from it. There was an uproar of controversy, apparently just because people like to fight. – As there was not already enough in the world to fight about.
I follow the Royal’s news just for pleasure but I feel guilty at getting pleasure from other people’s travails. Call it a “guilty pleasure”.
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