A New Aluminum-Graphene Battery has World Changing Potential

• Imagine a cellphone battery that can recharge in seconds needing no recharge for 60-72 hours.
  
  
• Imagine having much higher power capabilities on your cellphone.
  
  
• Imagine an electric SUV that's lighter and needs no cooling, recharging completely in a half hour.
   
• Imagine solar cells that can handle 70-80 percent of energy needs, with long-term energy storage.
  
  
• Imagine such a battery being far cheaper to make, from the second most common solid elements on Earth, rather than rare lithium, which only has a few sources in the world.
  
  
• Imagine if the production of the battery has a fraction of the environmental consequence of lithium-ion cells.
   
• Imagine the battery lasting 2-3 times longer than lithium batteries with no loss of storage capacity.
  
  
• And there's no danger of this battery overheating. None.

These are some of the promises of a new battery cell developed by an Australian company, Graphene Manufacturing Group. The batteries are being test-marketed now, and may be ready for the world market by early 2022. Like the blue LED, they have the potential of transforming the world's energy system, and therefore its economy and politics.

With all the current bad news, sometimes applied science gives us a reason to look forward to the near future. Curiosity keeps me going. 

The Big Anom Sting

It appears there is a vulnerability to organized cyber criminal networks. From NBC news:

"A massive international sting involving 16 countries, including the U.S., has netted more than 800 suspects, the seizure of 8 tons of cocaine and more than $48 million, officials said Tuesday."

With all the hacking that's been going on right now, I would've been happy just to hear that Cybertown even had a sherrif. This news makes my week.

PS. I'm trying to post on my blogs more and on Facebook less. 

Trump's Faithful

The Insurrectionists weren’t “hoodwinked.” They were accomplices. I can’t respect the motives of people who were warned for decades that the media outlets they trusted were neither credible nor honorable; that the Christian Nationalist pastors listened to had un-saintly motives and were false prophets. They despised the people who warned them most. These RW nuts bought their news like consumers, and chose the narrative they wanted to believe. They were complicit because it made them heroes and God’s warriors against conspiracies to destroy the pure goodness the Founders created. They fed their egos off that fantasy. But it wasn't free entertainment; the fantasy had its price.

It’s just now beginning to sink in that, hey, their Fearless Leader didn’t march with them, and that he wasn’t even with them metaphorically. No, they were just his entertainment. He laughed watching them play out the reality show he stage-managed. 

And the worst betrayal of all, he didn’t even pardon for them before he left office. It’s going to take a year or more for all this to sink in, but it’s happening. As they’re going through that, the media outlets they trusted are all being sued into bankruptcy, not just for lying, but for passing on Donald Trump’s lies. In fact, the insurrectionists all lied for him, with him, and about him. This is the basest of the base of Trump’s support, and they might become his worst enemies.

Why Do People Believe in Trump?

 What is Trump's appeal? That's always puzzled me. For some reason, I was able to see through the guy early. I never had a high opinion, but he was always easy to avoid. He was a phony, a greedy con-artist, who had absolutely no skills, and whose lifetime super-ability appeared to be making massive amounts of money disappear. One was lying, another was teaching his base how to lie with, for, and about him.

Trump is going to make whole academic careers. Social psychologists will write their theses on him and the hold that he has on 40% of Americans. Psychopathologists are going to be studying his voluminous Tweets to understand clinical narcissism and socio-pathology. 

Perhaps the most interesting and frightening thing about him was how swiftly he got a faithful following. It was as though I woke up one day in April 2016 and discovered that 40% of Americans had converted to Scientology overnight and L. Ron Hubbard had resurrected to assume leadership.  

Most Republicans still believe Trump, but why wouldn't GOP senators vote to bar him office? A lot of it was that they unemployment more than death itself. Yet, that's not really different from most people.

I have noted before how much Trump swore by vengeance. For anyone who slighted him in the least, Trump would try to destroy them, even in the pettiest ways. Even following the law is no excuse to Trump, as the hit he took out on Mike Pence illustrates. Now, it might be true that other presidents like Lyndon Johnson would get revenge, but never to the point of completely destroying enemies, and he would also forgive people. Trump would have none of that.  

No, it's no coincidence that authoritarians are extremely vengeful people. Putin's the best example. His enemies keep getting poisoned. Fact is, name any dictator/authoritarian and you will find they're all remarkably vindictive. In the underworld, vengeance is a consistent principle.

I believe that Trump's vindictiveness is the key to his rise to success as a demagogue. 

 

A reputation of vindictiveness is an intimidating quality. Trump with his low rasping voice, somehow off-key even in speech, sounding like he's suffering GERD/reflux. It drips with threat and harshness. You could tell he's a bully.

One fictional character who's also vengeful is Yahweh-God, and Allah. In fact, in our culture, we're trained to submit to a vindictive God, and his evangelical base is groomed to fear Hell.

Therefore, I think people sense Trump's constant implied threat and respond to it the same way they respond to fear of Hell. With both, they try to make themselves look virtuous by calling their fear "respect" or even joy. Some deny it to the point that they will literally see him as Godlike, or at least one of Cloudbeard's messengers and prophets.  It's the real reasons evangelicals respond to it: they're already groomed to follow a bully God, and to fear his wrath. It's an emotional, and not a rational or reasoned out influence.

And they fear Trump's followers, who will believe him and serve his every wish. They will keep themselves in denial about how they also fear him, and they'll spin their fear as patriotism. What's more, they'll act as checks on each others' doubts.

Outside the Marvel universe, which is about as unaware of real-world power as fiction can get, a person's power is defined by how many people will follow his wishes, with modifiers for how long they'll follow it, to what difficulty, against at what risk, and how immoral they're willing to be for their master. It doesn't matter how the person does it: through economic power (money, salaries, retainers), through sheer threat and force, political power, bullying, or even just through gentle persuasion. People have social tendencies. They try to form up into groups against other people they fear.  

What's so amazing about Trump is how deeply in denial they bury doubts about him. The most harmful thing about Trump is that he's taught his followers to lie with him, for him, and about him. Once a politician accomplishes that, he need only golf and enjoy his dictatorship. His followers will lie to each other, blinding each other to his every failing and flaw, spinning his defeats into victories. This is why GOP senators are supporting him.

Trump isn't like authoritarians we see in fiction. He's not a criminal mastermind. He had some good instincts about power, but it came from a background of having power handed, and being allowed to bully people with it. He never quite had the grasp of political power, especially in a democracy like the US. I believe he always thought the presidency was a dictatorship and couldn't understand why other presidents were always so restrained. As a sociopath, he could only see that restraint as weakness. His narcissism makes him believe that everyone thinks just like him, only they're weak and dumb.

He honestly thought Clinton, Biden and whoever stood in his way were guilty of something because he was. He believed all he had to do was focus people's attention on it, and their crimes would become plain. No coincidence this is exactly how the GOP acted about Hillary Clinton. No matter how many times she was proved not guilty, the GOP base became more convinced of her wrongdoing. The fact that they didn't find any simply meant that she was also a criminal mastermind.    

Trump definitely wasn't one. He wasn't intelligent: i.e. he sent a confession of his Ukraine caper to Nancy Pelosi, and was then stunned that he was immediately impeached. He was a liar, but he had no subtlety or guile. You could see his insurrection coming months away. His influence over his followers is still great, but his power is mortally wounded.

Once people begin to realize that his power to take revenge is in eclipse, his people will grow distracted and doubtful. Give it six months to a year, and ambitious politician like Cruz or Hawley will begin to pick apart his following.

Unfortunately, those two have learned from Trump, and they're much more intelligent. If Republicans win the next presidential election, it'll be the last election. A marginal win in one election won't get the US out of this crisis. The Dems must win the next three elections, by higher and higher margins.

Impeachment Trial: The Rematch

Today, in barely less than two hours, we'll see the political bout of the still (sigh😞) young millennium. In one corner, the current champion, only-once defeated, Don "The Cro-Magnon Demagogue" Trump. In this corner are eight Democratic Pencil Necks. The biased referee is the once-greatest legislative body in the world, the US Senate, trying to redeem itself after a decade of Turtle rule. The judge is old enough to be your grandfather's grandfather, bringing wisdom to spare, but with the acuity of a houseplant.

What this means to me personally is I'm not going to get any work done this afternoon, and probably not for the week.

Trump's actions need to be given public trial. It's overdue. The country needs that much.

The consequences of the Senate ratifying the charges? He'll be barred from office, but more immediately, he'll lose his Secret Service protection. This is important because an attempt to arrest Trump will conflict with the Secret Service's mission to protect him. I think the AG of New York is waiting to see if he has to deal with that in his arrest warrant. Straightening out that inter-agency conflict is going to literally take a court-case on its own, or an Act of Congress and then a court case.   

If he's not found guilty, Congress will then vote on invoking the 14th Amendment against Trump, which would prevent him from ever holding office. The constitutionality of that move isn't in question, and it only takes a simple majority of both Houses.

As important as it is for the country to face Trump's guilt in the insurrection, it's as important that he be barred from office.   

UPDATE: Turns out I figured the time zone wrong. The impeachment already started by the time I posted this. The senate did do something very important: it decided that you can impeach someone who's out of office to keep them from taking office ever again, just like the Constitution obviously says. 

 

Voting Rights Act? We Need an Amendment

 Maybe a Voting Rights Act is what we have to settle for in immediately. But really, nothing short of a constitutional amendment will fix the problems in the long-term.

The SCOTUS has shown it can knock down any VRAct that they wish to. However, they do have a good basis for having that power. The original US Constitution says nothing about the popular vote. At the time, popular vote was hardly even a political theory, and it was impossible in 1789 to take a popular vote for president. Because the states had literally created the federal government, they started out with having greater political power than the central government. So, they were left their choice in conducting elections. The results: only 4% of the free male population had any privilege of voting.

It isn't until 1868 that the 14th Amendment was enacted, that a right to vote is mentioned, but without a previous precedent in the constitution, it hangs in mid-air.

The 14th Amendment dictates several rules to the states. In the first section, it says anyone born in or naturalized as a US citizen has equal rights and privileges, the state could not pick and choose which ones had rights. That sets up the second section, that covers specifically the right to vote:

"Representatives shall be apportioned among the several states according to their respective numbers, counting the whole number of persons in each state, excluding Indians not taxed. But when the right to vote at any election for the choice of electors for President and Vice President of the United States, Representatives in Congress, the executive and judicial officers of a state, or the members of the legislature thereof, is denied to any of the male inhabitants of such state, being twenty-one years of age, and citizens of the United States, or in any way abridged, except for participation in rebellion, or other crime, the basis of representation therein shall be reduced in the proportion which the number of such male citizens shall bear to the whole number of male citizens twenty-one years of age in such state." 

[Emphasis mine, the links are from the source, and explain the later amendments made to reflect universal suffrage and the voting age changed to eighteen.]

Prior to this, the states determined who had the right to vote. It did make

Just in case the states didn't get the message (because the ex-Confederate states weren't), the 15th Amendment was ratified in 1870, it said:

Section 1:

"The right of citizens of the United States to vote shall not be denied or abridged by the United States or by any state on account of race, color, or previous condition of servitude."

Section 2:

"The Congress shall have power to enforce this article by appropriate legislation."

At this stage, it's apparent that the general Right to Vote was no longer just a political theory, but would be the practice from then on.

But still, the details pertaining to the right to vote weren't mentioned. This left the states to still select who had the right, as long as it wasn't due to race, color, or previous servitude. If they could find exceptions for other reasons that corresponded approximately to race. This let all kinds of abuses and methods pass through. It also didn't give the states any obligation to make voting easy, nor to gerrymander fairly, nor did it regulate the obligations the states had in regards to the voting rolls.

The SCOTUS pretty much killed the Voting Rights Act in 2013 in the Shelby County vs Holder, repealing two key provisions . These allowed the states that had a history of voter discrimination to start practicing it again.

The conservative constructionists/originalists could do it because the original Constitution doesn't define the right to vote. Therefore, they could say the Founders didn't care about it. Without reference to the intent of the Founders, the conservative SCOTUS felt free to impose its own standard.

Only a Voting Rights Amendment will take the decision out of their hands, and keep the legislative enforcement to the Congress where it belongs. 

 

 

AFTER THE AFTERMATH,: WHAT WE SHOULD LOOK FORWARD TO

 My entry yesterday was depressing. But after the next eight months or so, the future will get brighter. In fact, with a little luck, things will be better than any time since the early '60s.

Disclaimers: accurately conjecturing about the future is impossible and depends only on luck. We live in an inherently random universe. What we see as order is only the things our senses are evolved to perceive.

Also, this presumes that the Biden Administration will be somewhat more than competent, that the mutant strains of COVID are at least tractable, and of course, that another deadly pandemic from a different germ doesn't start.

But it's still fun to look ahead and hope.

About COVID aftereffects:

-A vaccination program will begin to turn the tide of the virus in 2022. COVID will continue diminishing waves. PPE protocols will be enforced depending on the severity of the virus.

-Scientific advances made in fighting this virus will yield advances in treatments of other diseases.

-Public health will be taken much more seriously, and receive a great uptick in funding and employment. We'll be more than ready for the next disease outbreak.

-A new healthcare system will be enacted, building on what's left of Obamacare.

-Religion will diminish in both political power and popularity; if for no other reason but because people will be out of the habit of going to church.*1 Once the habit is broken, most won't get it back. For example, for the first time ever reported a decline in active membership. It'll decline, but won't be extinct.

-Those who scoffed COVID will be hit the hardest when the final body count is counted, causing a decline in rural areas, which will be rescued with government programs.

-When the epidemic is over, expect survivors to come out of their isolation to be ecstatic, almost giddy. Expect things to be absolutely nuts for weeks. Expect a sudden, if modest, baby boom.

-Also, when its over, expect businesses to rebound, and wages offered to be great. But there will be big changes, both from industries that won't come back, and brand new industries. A generation's habits will be permanently changed. Also, expect there to be a government programs to start farms and repopulate rural areas and small towns. There will also be programs.

-And kids will actually love to go to school.

-Expect crime to decline.

-As much as I hate to point this out, in the end, survivors will likely benefit economically from the lower population and the change in age demographics. However, this will be diminished by people permanently disabled by the virus.

 And now the consequent outcomes of the Donald J. Trump and the insurrection:

-The court cases over the Trump-initiated attacks on Dominion Voting Systems have led to lawsuits against conservative outlets/commentators who repeated and amplified Trump's baseless claims. Harassed Dominion staffers were targeted by Trump cadres for harassment and death threats. They have sued Fox News, Lou Dobbs, etc, for defamation, and have forced them to retract. However, the harassment didn't stop. With clear malice and demonstrable damage, the plaintiff have a very strong, almost airtight case. It can put the entire conservative propaganda apparatus out of business. This will further the decline in conservatism.

-After the government gets through putting out all the Trump-ignited fires, reforms in our government will be proposed, at least a few will be constitutional Amendments, and many of them will be passed. Among the changes that might be made: a roll-back of the power of the president and executive branch, and laws which prescribe statutory penalties for dereliction and abuse; the abolishment--or at least a change--in the electoral college; statehood for Washington DC and Puerto Rico, a Voting Rights Constitutional amendment which will include further transparency in elections, limits on gerrymandering, and campaign finance reform; much stronger laws about privacy; and, of course, more laws on domestic terrorism and insurgency.

-Section 230 of the 1996 telecom act will be altered. I won't conjecture on type of change.

-Expect a rethink in the design of computers to at least be initiated by 2024. Also, a project for a redesign of the World Wide Web, Internet 2.0 will at least be in the works. The emphasis for both will be on much tighter security protocols. Expect fiber-optic networks to spread throughout the entire country. All of this in anticipation for quantum computing.

-Expect a worldwide conference, and treaties to be negotiated limiting governments' use of hacking, the use of drones, and the disallowing the development of soldierbots.

-A new treaty with Iran will be in negotiation at least until 2024.

-A new international treaty about climate change will be signed, based on the Paris Accords.

-As things get better, and they will, the Trump years will be remembered as either a nightmare, or the worst part of a 20 or 40-year nightmare. COVID-19 will probably called the Trump Virus. I'm more certain that the historically horrible year of 2020 is going to be associated with Trump, just like the year 1929 belongs to Hoover.

For a final note: we lost a lot of time to mitigate the effects of climate change. I won't conjecture on the effects it will have, and it might have some good effects in some places, as a whole it'll be a negative change for the US and the world. I won't conjecture beyond that.

*1 Clergy and ministers know this, know that their revenues will be in decline which is why some are so stubbornly insisting that their followers must continue with weekly church attendance. All this will do is assure that their flocks are hit worse by COVID, and will know attending church caused it. Also, once away from weekly faith reinforcement, ex-congs will begin to notice just how wealthy televangelists have become, and more importantly, they'll resent it, 

*2 The political Right would've opposed PPE even without Trump's influence. Trump has good instincts about power, and knew he could only ahead of the issue by going extreme anti-mask and underplaying the problem. Conservatives sense that COVID is a direct challenge to their individualism, a cornerstone of their ideology. Epidemics can't be stopped without organized measures and cooperation, totally antithetical to individualism.