I just finished watching the electoral college vote count. The count and the process went smoothly. The count took about thirty minutes, and was uneventful with no surprises. A year or more of campaign, confusion, debate, and celebration all consolidated and summed up in a thirty minute reporting and counting of votes in a cut and dried process. I checked on the popular vote totals. Trump got 49.9 per cent of the votes. That means he is a minority president, and more than half of the voters voted against him. That is not a stunning or overwhelming victory. It means the country is about equally divided on what kind of government it wants and in what direction it wants to go. The Senate and House are about equally divided also. More evidence of a split and division in the country.
As I look around the country I see about half the country looking for a change in direction. They want a smaller government with less government control and regulations, a more secure southern border, an end to the wars in Ukraine and Palestine, more jobs, a smaller deficit, and slower growth or reduction in the national debt. I also see the other half predicting a collapse, failure, a probable loss of democracy, and beginnings of an oligarchy or authoritarian government. That is a pretty big division and split in expectations.
As for me, I don’t agree with any of those thoughts or predictions. My expectations are that the country will continue on about as it has, with the average person noticing little change in their lives. Our economic cycle will continue as it is. This year should see growth, but there is a possibility of a recession starting later this year or next year. That possibility is always present, but there are signals now that make it more probable than usual. With congress split the way it is, I don’t see any possibility of any major legislation being passed. The senate still requires sixty votes to bring legislation to a vote. I don’t see that changing. No radical legislation will pass that hurdle. The House is so divided it will be difficult to get anything passed. The republicans have a slight majority, but they are divided. Any bills passed in either chamber will require bipartisan support.
I don’t see any major change in the next four years. There will probably be a recession, but having a recession within any four year period is not unexpected. That is part of our business cycle. We will continue to have inflation and a decrease in the standard of living, with most of the country struggling financially. That is one thing the election results will not change. That is not good news, but it is not collapse either. I don’t agree with the people predicting either doom or substantial improvement. One big problem is that we are entering a period of energy and other shortages. That is something we will have to live with. It will not be easy. Our expectations will have to change.
The electoral count is now over. Next will come the inauguration and a new administration. We will see how it works out.
Homelessness is a problem in the United States. Many factors are mentioned as contributing factors, but the most often mentioned causes are a housing shortage, and the rising cost of housing. Some reports show that an estimated fifty percent of homeless have jobs, but housing they can afford is not available. Housing values have risen substantially in the last years, and that combined with a housing shortage has resulted in an increase in homelessness. The homelessness is centered to a greater extent in parts of the country that have the highest home values.
The federal government through HUD funds housing by making loans and by providing grants to cities for funding. That program should get additional funding.
City zoning and housing regulations are also partially responsible for the lack of inexpensive holding. Those laws and regulations should be managed to allow for needed inexpensive housing to be constructed and maintained.
Mental illness and addiction are also factors that contribute to the high numbers. The institutional system that house the largest number of mentally ill is the prison system. They are held there and medicated, receiving virtually no other care. When they are released from prison, they go back on the street as homeless. Our federal and state governments should increase funding for care of the mentally who are unable to work. Childhood mental illness also should get additional funding.
Homelessness in the United States can be substantially eliminated but it will require governments on all levels to change their laws, rules, and regulations to allow for inexpensive housing to be built. Action should be taken through government agencies to provide loans and grants for funding. In addition to that, funding should be increased for the prevention and treatment of mental illness, particularly for children. This can be done, be it requires willingness to take the necessary action.
It is the start of a new year and time to make predictions about the future. Long term predictions should not be taken too seriously, but we should think about the future. It is a good idea to have some awareness of what can be expected to happen so that plans can be made.
There are some things that can be expected to happen. There are other things that we can imagine could happen. The biggest concern I have on the future is climate change. I expect that our climate will continue to change as temperatures continue to rise. Weather patterns will continue to become more extreme. The ice will continue to melt and sea levels will rise. Many cities, coastal areas, and islands will be under water. Other areas will become uninhabitable because of the heat and drought.
The next thing we can expect is that both oil and natural gas will be used up in the next 100 years. What effect this will have is unknown. Work is being done to find replacements for oil and gas, but so far, replacements have not been found.
Both of those predictions are physical changes in the environment. The wheels leading to climate change have been set in motion and at this late date I don’t see that human behavior can do anything to make substantial changes in the results. The same is true for the use of oil and gas. I don’t see us doing anything but increasing our use of both until the supplies are deleted.
Those are the only long range predictions about the future I am able to make. Political, technological, social, and scientific changes depend on too many factors to make any attempt to predict. There are too many possibilities of what changes could occur, and too many possibilities to be able to predict with any accuracy. I believe climate change and energy are the two biggest problems that we face in the upcoming decades. We will have to adapt and deal with to these two changes. Both will result in significant changes in our way of life.
I hope in the meantime that 2025 will be a good year and wish everyone well.
The year is ending, and a new one is about to begin. The biggest news this year, as I see it, was the election. For the hard core democrats, the unthinkable happened, Trump won the election, and will soon take office for another four year term. For the hard core republicans, all is well and is as it should be. Time, and four years, will give us the results, and judgments will be made on the wisdom of the outcome. But time will not bring agreement. Many years from now politicians and historians will still be arguing about which outcome would have been better. That will never be known. We will know what will happen with Trump as president, but we will never know what would have happened if Harris had been elected. If things go well for us, we will eventually look back and say things went well because we made the right decisions. If not, then we will blame our misfortune on the administration in power when things began to go badly, not because of bad decisions made by us.
Trump was elected largely on his statements that he will increase manufacturing jobs, secure the border, and end the wars in Ukraine and in Palestine. We will see what happens once he takes office.
Predictions on the media, by economists, on you tube, and popular podcasts, range greatly in their prediction. Most are optimistic and predict continued growth in our economy over the next year. Some predictions are not as optimistic but see a decline in our economy. There are other problems that are discussed. Climate change, decreasing supply of oil and other fossil fuels, too much by plastic waste, and other problems.
The new year begins with hope that 2025 will be a good year. The events in the distant future will take place as they will. We can’t predict what will occur except in broad outlines. Humans have been around for a long time, and how long our future will be is unknown. We can enjoy the present and the things we now have, our friends, and families. I hope everyone has a good new year.
It’s that time of the year again. No, not Christmas. Well, it is, but that is not what I mean. Under the current interpretation of federal law, it is time for part of government spending to stop unless a budget or Continuing Resolution bill is passed by congress and signed by the president. How and why and why only part of the spending is stopped is complicated. The shutdown is based on a 1980 opinion of the then Attorney General. The opinion was based on interpretation of our constitution and the Antideficiency Act, enacted in 1884, amended in 1950 and 1982. Prior to that opinion, the executive branch would keep the government open until the new budget was passed, based on the assumption that that was the intent of congress. The 1980 opinion challenged that assumption and changed the practice of keeping the government running in accordance with the expired budget after expiration of the budget appropriations. The exception to shutting down is that the parts of the government that can remain open are those parts essential for the health and safety of the country. The non essential agencies have to be be shut down, and the non essential employees can not be paid or allowed to work.
The argument for the shutdown is that no government money can be spent without the prior approval of congress. The language in the constitution is that no money can be spent until appropriated by congress.
The congress is working toward passing a continuing resolution bill to keep the government fully open. Let us hope they are able to do that soon. A good bill was called to a vote Thursday that would have funded the government and prevented a shutdown. It was voted down by those who had rather shut the government down than compromise and agree to the views of those with whom they disagree. That is how governments collapse and cease to function. The job of congressmen is to make and pass laws that keep the country going, not shut it down for partisan or petty reasons.
The country just made a big decision in deciding who the next president will be. Making decisions is a complicated process. One of the biggest problems is to state a rule to go by in deciding the basis, standard, or rule to use when making decisions. That includes the question of how, when faced with a choice, do we decide what is the thing to do. That is not always an easy decision to make, or an easy question to answer. Sometimes it is, but other times it is not.
Psychologists have conducted numerous studies and conducted experiments what decisions people make in stressful situations. Some are real experiments, others are thought experiments with the subjects answering questions about what they would do in situations faced with difficult choices. They have conducted numerous experiments with different species of apes in situations faced with unequal and unfair treatment, and have studied how apes treat each other in their natural environments. The results of all these studies and experiments have been interesting and productive in determining how decisions are made.
For humans decisions the choices we make seem to be based on instinct of emotion, tempered by teachings, experience, tradition, and reason. When events occur, first we have our emotional response. We experience stress, and a decision is made as to the course of action or response to be made. If the stress is high enough, the reaction takes place based solely on emotion and instinct. If the stress is not that not that high, then our past teaching is part of the process. The things we have been taught form the basis of our behavior. Experience comes in later when we see through experience that some of the things we were taught don’t work out, or come into conflict with other things we learn. Then we have to use reason to reconcile out these inconsistencies and deal with the knowledge we learn by experience.
When it comes to politics, all four of those factors come into play. All four factors can come into conflict. Tradition may cause us to have loyalty to one political party. That can be very strong. We can have an emotion reaction to the candidate that conflicts with our tradition of being with that candidates party. Recent experience may lead us in a different direction. We use reason to try to sort through it all and decide what we will do. If the emotional response is strong enough it will override all the other factors and will determine what we will do. We use our reason to bring all the factors into alignment with the others. That is necessary to enable us to rationalize and explain our actions in reasonable terms, as if we were creatures of reason. That process also enables us to reconcile our actions with our feelings, teachings, tradition, and reason. Reaching decisions is a complicated process.
The biggest problem I see us facing now is climate change. Estimates as to how bad the effects will become vary widely. Part of the problem with predicting the damage is that the extent of the damage depends on our future behavior. If we start reducing the amount of energy we use from burning if fossil fuels we can reduce the amount of future damage. The more we reduce the use of fossil fuels the less the future damage there will be. If we continue to increase our use of energy from fossil fuels, the greater the extent of damage that will occur. We still do not gave a definite answer as go how much relative damage there will be in any case. but we know the damage will be severe, and we know the damage is already taking place.
There are a lot of things that we as individuals can do to reduce the amount of energy we use, and there are a lot of things the government can do to reduce energy use. I don’t see a lot of effort being used to reduce energy use either by individuals, or by governments. There is some effort being made by both, but compared to the amount of effort needed, it does not appear to me to be a lot.
One of the things we need is a change in government policy regarding housing. The pick for the next Secretary of Housing and Urban Development is an indication of a change in government policy in the wrong direction. His experience in the past has been in the private development of single family homes. His appointment to head HUD says there will be less interest and investment in multifamily housing developments. That is not what we need. We need multi use developments featuring multifamily housing combined with commercial, office, and shopping areas. This type of planning is more efficient and uses less energy.
There are many other things government could do to reduce the amount of fossil fuels burned and energy consumption reduced. The Department of Defense and foreign policy are examples. Major changes are needed in those areas. The Department of Defense is greatly overextended, both in waste and in policy. Foreign policy is un beed if change to reduce our interventions in foreign countries andp their affairs. Individuals can conserve a lot of energy by making choices and lifestyle changes, but governmental policy change is also necessary and needed.
Did the United States just have a revolution? Maybe so. The idea of representative democracy is that a country can change its government by voting and electing new officials with different ideas and beliefs, without having to have an armed revolt to overthrow the existing government and make necessary, or just wanted or desired changes. We may have just done that. Or maybe not. There would gave been a revolution only if there was a major difference between the two candidates and their parties. My argument is that there was not. After all the speeches and rhetoric, the differences are not substantial. We will work under the same constitution, with the same structure of government. Only some personnel will change. The White House personnel will change, so will cabinet members, and there will be a few new members of congress, but the vast number of people running our government will remain in place, and the rules for running it will not change. The business of the government and of the country will continue over the next few years operating greatly the same as it has been over the last four years.
The reason I say there will not be substantial change is because our government is run by legislation. Legislation has to be passed by congress, and congress has not seen substantial change. That means there will be no legislation passed that will cause any immediate changes. Without new legislation, the new administration will be extremely limited in what they will be able to do. Members of congress will be carful on what they vote for because they have to explain their votes to their constituents back home. The same is true when senators vote to confirm cabinet picks. They take their jobs seriously and respect the voters that elect them and their responsibilities to them, and to the country.
We will see changes in matters controlled by the executive branch. Those include foreign policy, immigration and border security, tariffs, execution and enforcing existing laws, and judicial appointments. There will changes in these areas, but I don’t foresee or expect any changes to the structure and workings of the government. I don’t expect any collapse of our republic.
The main changes in United States in the past as far as government is concerned has occurred through legislation. Major changes occurred in the depression during the 1930s resulting from intense pressure placed on the government to take action. Major changes occur as a result of national emergences, mass discontent , mass movements, or mass unrest. Changes have occurred through changed in public attitudes and beliefs, with public opinions informing and guiding the outcome of elections, changing of laws, and direction of the country. Public opinion is shaped by leaders and thinkers who see problems that need changes and solutions, and communicate to the public through whatever sources and avenues that are available. Based on all that, I don’t see any major changes ahead.
The ideas of our country were set out in the Declaration of Independence. They are that all men are crested equal and have certain inalienable rights, including the rights to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.
The document was drafted by Thomas Jefferson. It was edited and revised into its completed form by the men who attended the convention. Not everyone there was willing to sign the document in its final form, but a majority did. When Jefferson wrote that all men are created equal, he was referring to social status. England and other European countries had classes by birth. There were kings, aristocrats, nobles, royalty, and commoners. Those were some of the several layers of rank in the social order. The founders of the United States were stating that they were rejecting layers of rank. The idea was based in the belief that all men were created by the creator and therefore no individual had a superior status than any other. This idea was not original with Jefferson. He was well read, educated and tutored by men with those beliefs. There would be no titles granted of ranks of social order established by birth or. granted in the United States. Every person would have an equal right to participate in government. That is the origin of the term American exceptionalism. The United States would be different, or exceptional from the countries in Europe because they would not have ranks or social classes.
Jefferson wrote this as a idea to be worked toward. He knew the world at the time was different. He also knew he could not change it, but that it would have to be left for later generations to change.
This idea of equal creation led to the belief that each individual had equal rights. They could live their lives, were all entitled to the same freedom, could decide for themselves their own personal beliefs, and set their own goals to achieve according to their own understanding about what was important to them, as guided by their own unique abilities, talents, and limitations.
At the time the document was written, fighting had already begun in different places. The men who met together did so to unite the colonies and establish principles, purpose and goals that all thirteen colonies could unite around. The declaration had to be written so it would be acceptable to all the colonies. The finished document did not contain everything Jefferson wanted, but he did get it to include the ideas of equality of rights. He should get credit for that. He believed once these ideas were accepted, the rest would follow. Our goal and progress since Jefferson’s time has been to make that vision real.
The framers of the constitution did not plan for the United States to have a two party system. They opposed having any political parties. They did not write the constitution to have a two party system. The question, then, is why do we have two parties, or any parties at all, if the framers did not want political parties, and there is nothing in the constitution that states we should have two political parties.
The formation of two parties started after George Washington left office. There was a difference of opinion on how strong and powerful the federal government should be. One group, led by Alexander Hamilton, thought the federal government should be strong. Hamilton and his followers favored cities, business, and industry. Another group, led by James Madison and Thomas Jefferson wanted a weaker central government, with more power left to the state governments. Madison’s and Jefferson’s group consisted of leaders who represented the interest of farmers and agriculture. The split and party formation was over the size, power, and function of the federal government. The country is still split and divided over that same issue..
That was how it began, and since then politics in the United States has been largely about two major parties competing with each other. Some parties have disbanded and been replaced, and in some elections, third parties have been a factor. This year there were a number of parties in addition to the main two parties on the ballots. The number varied state by state, depending of state laws and qualifying requirements for getting the on the ballot.
The two main parties are divided over a number of major issues. The main division now is between rural and urban. People living in rural areas tend to believe that relying on government to solve problems leads to dependence and failure. They want to reduce the size and power of the federal government. People who live in urban locations tend to want greater government control and regulation.
Our present system of choosing party candidates by primaries relatively new. As late as 1968, only thirteen states held primaries. Hubert Humphrey won the Democratic party nomination at the national convention despite not having entered a single one of those primaries. After 1968, both parties began instituting primaries in more states, until today candidates are selected by winning primaries. My belief is that the two parties having separate primaries has been the main factor contributing to the hostility, and division we see between the parties today.
There is a lot of dissatisfaction in the country as to how our political system works. I think our system will continue to evolve, but cannot predict in what direction it will go, or how it will change. Change is inevitable, but difficult to predict.
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