Climate Change in India

An New York Times article, India’s Ominous Future: Too Little Water, or Far Too Much, points out that climate change has altered the monsoon season. Now, the rains are less predictable and can be more prolonged when they arrive. That leaves large areas of the country in crippling drought or in floods. On top of that, decades of inept government policies leave millions of people mostly defenseless in the face of climate changes and hopeless levels of pollution, garbage and plastic waste.

Dry creek bed choked with litter

Foam from industrial runoff pass worshipers in the Yamuna River

Watching flood water

Collecting water for drinking and cooking

Flood in Mumbai

A resident of New Delhi washing under a broken municipal water line


Flood in Mumbai

A recent report on climate change is arguing that too little is being done. The Washington Post reports:

The world has squandered so much time mustering the action necessary to combat climate change that rapid, unprecedented cuts in greenhouse gas emissions offer the only hope of averting an ever-intensifying cascade of consequences, according to new findings from the United Nations. 

Amid that growing pressure to act, Tuesday’s U.N. report offers a grim assessment of how off-track the world remains. Global temperatures are on pace to rise as much as 3.9 degrees Celsius (7 degrees Fahrenheit) by the end of the century, according to the United Nations’ annual “emissions gap” report, which assesses the difference between the world’s current path and the changes needed to meet the goals of the 2015 Paris climate accord.

The sobering report comes at a critical moment, when it remains unclear whether world leaders can summon the political will to take the ambitious action scientists say is essential. So far, the answer has been no.

No doubt that climate change science deniers will trot out the usual arguments in defense of doing nothing, just like gun violence deniers trot out their arguments for less gun control after each mass slaughter of innocents. India looks to be well and truly hosed.

A Massive Data Hack: Google Cloud Server Was Unprotected

Tech-Xplore reports a massive database was left unprotected:

"The data left unprotected was actually a database, aggregating 1.2 billion users' personal information, e.g., social media accounts, email addresses and phone numbers. The incident was relayed on the Data Viper blog. 

Bloomberg quoted Troia. "There are no passwords related to this data, but having a new, fresh set of passwords isn't that exciting anymore. Having all of this social media stuff in one place is a useful weapon and investigative tool."

After all, just nabbing names, phone numbers and account URLs delivers ample information to get attackers started."

Data Viper writes:

"On October 16, 2019 Bob Diachenko and Vinny Troia discovered a wide-open Elasticsearch server containing an unprecedented 4 billion user accounts spanning more than 4 terabytes of data. 

A total count of unique people across all data sets reached more than 1.2 billion people, making this one of the largest data leaks from a single source organization in history. The leaked data contained names, email addresses, phone numbers, LinkedIN and Facebook profile information. 

What makes this data leak unique is that it contains data sets that appear to originate from 2 different data enrichment companies. 

For a very low price, data enrichment companies allow you to take a single piece of information on a person (such as a name or email address), and expand (or enrich) that user profile to include hundreds of additional new data points of information. As seen with the Exactis data breach, collected information on a single person can include information such as household sizes, finances and income, political and religious preferences, and even a person’s preferred social activities. 

Each time a company chooses to “enrich” a user profile, they are also agreeing to provide what they know about the person to the enriching organization (thereby increasing the validity of the organization’s future results). Despite efforts from social media organizations like Facebook, the resulting data continues to be compounded, creating a situation with no oversight that ultimately allows all of a person’s social and personal information to be easily downloaded."

Wired magazine writes:

"For well over a decade, identity thieves, phishers, and other online scammers have created a black market of stolen and aggregated consumer data that they used to break into people's accounts, steal their money, or impersonate them. In October, dark web researcher Vinny Troia found one such trove sitting exposed and easily accessible on an unsecured server, comprising 4 terabytes of personal information—about 1.2 billion records in all. 

While the collection is impressive for its sheer volume, the data doesn't include sensitive information like passwords, credit card numbers, or Social Security numbers."

One can only hope that other cloud servers, e.g., ones the Social Security Administration or the US military uses, aren't just left open like that for anyone to play with. Past performance has not been confidence-inspiring and it probably does predict future performance.

Conspiracy Theory Wars

In the coming months, American can reasonably expect that some new information will surface that supports currently debunked conspiracy theories. One is the false theory that the Ukraine, not Russia, attacked the US election in 2106.

 This New York Times article suggests that fabricating evidence is what Giuliani is angling to do:

VIENNA — They were two Ukrainian oligarchs with American legal problems. One had been indicted on federal bribery charges. The other was embroiled in a vast banking scandal and was reported to be under investigation by the F.B.I. 

And they had one more thing in common: Both had been singled out by Rudolph W. Giuliani and pressed to assist in his wide-ranging hunt for information damaging to one of President Trump’s leading political rivals, former Vice President Joseph R. Biden Jr. 

That effort culminated in the July 25 phone call between the American and Ukrainian presidents that has taken Mr. Trump to the brink of impeachment and inexorably brought Mr. Giuliani’s Ukrainian shadow campaign into the light.

But interviews with the two Ukrainian oligarchs — Dmitry Firtash and Ihor Kolomoisky — as well as with several other people with knowledge of Mr. Giuliani’s dealings, point to a new dimension in his exertions on behalf of his client, Mr. Trump. Taken together, they depict a strategy clearly aimed at leveraging information from politically powerful but legally vulnerable foreign citizens.

How to assess new information: Don't ignore the old information

When the new information surfaces, one can ask by what measure should the new information by assessed? That is an excellent question. It's the key question.

The answer is to apply reasonable, logical measures of transparency and credibility to the new information in view of existing information. If the Senate investigation finds legitimate evidence of significant bad acts by Biden and/or Ukraine in the 2016 election, and is transparent about the sources and their credibility, then that evidence has to be accepted as real and given whatever reasonable probative weight it deserves.

However, one can reasonably expect that any new evidence that comes out from the Senate investigation will have to contradict existing contrary evidence. That's the point of building new conspiracy theories. If the origins or sources of the new evidence are not credible, and/or opaque or not revealed, e.g., for 'national security' reasons, then one can reasonably conclude that the GOP has now fallen so far into immorality that it is now willing to fabricate or rely on fabricated false evidence to lie to and deceive the American people for purely partisan gain.

If one wants to be fair and rational about this, these facts (not opinions) need to be kept in mind. Solid evidence already exists that shows (1) the Ukraine was not involved in the 2016 attacks on the US election, (2) Russia orchestrated the 2016 attacks on the US election, and (3) Trump[1] and his enablers, e.g., Rudy Giuliani,[2] are chronic liars who do not hesitate to lie, withhold information and emotionally manipulate to distract, deceive and confuse the American people. Those people would not hesitate to fabricate evidence to support the new conspiracy theory.

Whatever evidence the Senate comes up with has to (a) properly take existing evidence into account and render it not persuasive, and (b) be transparent in view of the mountain of lies and deceit the GOP has operated with since Trump came to power. In other words, existing evidence of lies, deceit and manipulation by Trump and the GOP means that they get no benefit of any doubt because they earned and fully deserve deep public distrust.

Footnotes:
1. The president's track record of false and misleading statements to the public is staggering. That constitutes solid evidence of his deeply immoral character. The existing herd of admitted or convicted felons the president has surrounded himself is more evidence of the president's immoral character.

2. In response to being asked what he would do if the president decided to 'throw him under the bus', Mr Giuliani responded with this retort: "I have insurance". That means that Mr. Giuliani probably has information that incriminated the president in illegal acts. What other kind of insurance would the president fear? It is hard to embarrass a man who isn't fazed by his acts and lies, e.g., sex with porn stars or the tape where he brags about sexually assaulting women. This is more evidence of the sleaze and immorality that the president and his enablers operate by. Given his behavior after prior gaffes, it is reasonable to expect Giuliani will deflect or distort his insurance comment by saying he did not mean that he had any evidence against the president.

False Conspiracy Theories On Tap

False conspiracy theories are probably going to be front and center from now until the November 2020 election. As discussed before, the GOP Senate claims it will investigate the debunked conspiracy about Joe Biden's allegedly corrupt activities in Ukraine. Unless that investigation relies on falsified information, it will probably not turn up anything new that is significant.

Other false conspiracies include (1) unsubstantiated allegations that the FBI was protecting the Clinton campaign, which (2) illegally sought dirt on Trump from foreign sources, and (3) the FBI used unsubstantiated allegations for FISA authority to spy on the Trump campaign, which (4) somehow hurt the Trump campaign, despite it being conducted in secret until several months after the November 2016 election. As far as I know, none of those narratives is true. Instead, the FBI protected Trump by not making its investigation of him public, but damaged the the Clinton campaign by making its investigation of hers public just a few weeks before the election. Those are matters of public record.

Also, it is still legal to hire people, including foreigners in other countries, to get dirt on political opponents. The effort to get damaging information on Trump was originally funded by a conservative source, The Washington Free Beacon, to find potentially damaging information about Trump. The Beacon hired Fusion GPS, a company that clients hire to find dirt on political opponents. The Beacon was funded by a major donor to Sen. Marco Rubio. Rubio told Fusion GPS to stop compiling a dossier of Trump dirt in May 2016 once it became clear that Trump would win the GOP nomination. All of that was legal. After that time, the DNC continued compiling a dossier on Trump. The New York Times describes the DNC involvement:

After Mr. Trump secured the nomination, Fusion GPS was hired on behalf of Mrs. Clinton’s campaign and the D.N.C. by their law firm, Perkins Coie, to compile research about Mr. Trump, his businesses and associates — including possible connections with Russia. It was at that point that Fusion GPS hired Mr. Steele, who has deep sourcing in Russia, to gather information. ..... Campaigns and party committees frequently pay companies to assemble what’s known in politics as opposition research — essentially damaging information about their opponents — and nothing is illegal about the practice.

Wikipedia comments on Fusion GPS:

Fusion GPS is a commercial research and strategic intelligence firm based in Washington, D.C. The company conducts open-source investigations and provides research and strategic advice for businesses, law firms and investors, as well as for political inquiries, such as opposition research. The "GPS" initialism is derived from "Global research, Political analysis, Strategic insight".

None of this is illegal under current law and regulations. Candidates for major offices routinely look for dirt to attack and smear their opponents with. The situation would change if (1) the Federal Election Commission ruled that accepting campaign dirt from a foreigner constitutes a "thing of value", or (2) congress passed a law making it illegal for a campaign ro accept or use dirt a foreigner provides.

Also relevant are the facts that (1) Trump himself has publicly stated that he would use dirt on an opponent if a foreigner offered it to him before the 2020 election, and (2) Trump actually tried to get the Ukraine to find dirt on Joe Biden in advance of the 2020 campaign. One source reports on Trump's public statement that he would use foreign-sourced dirt to attack an opponent:

In an interview with ABC News on Wednesday, Trump said he’d consider any foreign-sourced information that would help his 2020 re-election bid.

“There is nothing wrong with listening,” Trump said. “If somebody called from a country — Norway — ‘We have information on your opponent.’ Oh. I think I’d want to hear it.” ..... But simply “listening” to information derived from foreign sources may not rise to the level of a campaign finance violation.

That makes it clear that, at least under current law, the president himself has no concern about obtaining and using dirt to attack a political opponent, regardless of its source. It is good to note that use of dirt from a foreigner to smear an opponent need to be directly used. Such information can be leaked to friendly sources who would be happy to smear the target candidate. Plausible deniability would likely protect all involved.

Unsubstantiated assertion of no FISA authority

Allegations that there was no FISA authority to investigate the Trump campaign or the investigation damaged the president's campaign are not supported by facts. Those assertion raises two questions: (1) what evidence is there to support that assertion, and (2) how could the FBI investigation have made any difference in the 2016 election outcome because it was in secret? Since the FBI investigation of Trump was not revealed to the public until March of 2017, about four months after the November 2016 election. Also, there was no evidence that Obama had wiretapped Trump, which Trump had falsely claimed.

One source writes about the origin of the investigation and authority for FISA surveillance:

The heavily redacted documents released Saturday comprise an application to, and subsequent renewals by, judges on the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court allowing the FBI to investigate Page, a foreign policy aide to the Trump campaign. But it's already been established by the House Intelligence Committee that the Russia investigation began after the FBI learned that another campaign aide, George Papadopoulos, had been approached by a Russian agent. The agent told Papadopoulos the Russians had incriminating information about Hillary Clinton, including emails, according to court documents.. Papadopoulos then mentioned to an Australian diplomat that the Russians had "dirt" on Clinton, the Australians contacted the U.S. government, and the FBI began to take a look.

One source reports on Papadopoulos:

In July 2017, Papadopoulos was secretly arrested for lying to FBI investigators about his correspondence with foreign nationals with close ties to senior Russian government officials. His indictment was revealed to the public after he pleaded guilty in October 2017. In September 2018, Papadopoulos was sentenced to 14 days incarceration, 200 hours of community service and a $9,500 fine.

That is evidence that the FBI had proper FISA authority for its investigation of the Trump campaign.

Despite the evidence outlined above, it is likely that all these false conspiracy theories, and probably many others, will be tested on the public in coming months to see which ones gain traction. This election is going to be very ugly.

Senate Starts Bidens in Ukraine Investigation

The Daily Beast and other sources are announcing that the Senate is starting an investigation into the Biden's actions in the Ukraine. The DB writes:

“Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Lindsey Graham (R-SC) sent a letter to Secretary of State Mike Pompeo on Thursday requesting documents related to Joe Biden’s communications with Ukrainian officials. Graham’s inquiry focuses on any calls Biden may have had with former Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko about the firing of the country’s top prosecutor, or any calls that referenced Burisma, the Ukrainian gas company where Biden’s son Hunter sat on the board. The Washington Post reports that Graham’s letter appears to begin an investigation into Trump’s widely debunked claim that Biden, who at the time was vice president, put pressure on Ukraine to fire its top prosecutor in an attempt to protect his son.”

This is an interesting move by the Senate. If there is the same level of openness about this investigation there was in the House impeachment inquiry, it should add to the amount of information the public has access to. So far, the president and State Department has refused to cooperate and thus additional evidence about the GOP alleged Biden-Ukraine conspiracy should come to light. Presumably the conspiracy will remain debunked, which should help dispel the GOP’s Biden corruption in Ukraine narrative.

The concern is that if the Senate proceedings are not made public as the House has done, then there is a significant likelihood that false information will be faked and used to smear Biden.

Debunking false conspiracies and other forms of nonsense

By now, it is clear to nearly all reasonably open-minded observers that the two sides in Washington are not going to cooperate with each other. There is too much hate and distrust for that for the time being, maybe for a very long time. One side in particular, the GOP, keeps relying on debunked conspiracies and other forms of false and misleading information to create false realities and advance their flawed, reality-detached messages.

Since the two sides won't cooperate, the next best thing to get at truth for the public is for the Senate to run its investigations and the House to run its investigations. Between the two of them, so long as the investigations aren't corrupt, the public should get the benefits of whatever information comes to light.

Honest investigations vs. dishonest investigations

If it turns out that Joe Biden did act illegally or improperly in the Ukraine, then the public needs to know that. Unfortunately, the Senate is just now starting its investigation. They can choose to drag it out and dribble out whatever damaging material there may be, or damaging false information they assert, until the election. In that scenario, the GOP can do to Biden’s 2020 campaign exactly what the Russians and Wikileaks did to Hillary Clinton’s 2016 campaign. Just keep dripping out damaging material just before the election to damage Biden’s campaign as much as possible.

No doubt, the Russians are planning to attack the democratic nominee, regardless of who that turns out to be. If Biden is nominated, he could be under attack by both a dishonest GOP investigation and an illegal Russian lies and smear campaign.

Can one point the same finger of blame at the current House investigation? Are the democrats dragging their impeachment investigation out? Arguably they are not yet at that point. That investigation is focused on potentially impeachable information that became publicly known in recent months, i.e., the September 2019 release of the president’s phone call partial transcript and the whistleblower report in September of this year of improper actions by the president. The House is not pursuing anything in the Mueller report, which seems to put evidence of the president’s obstruction of justice and conspiracy with Russia off limits. If the House drags their investigation out until, say May, then an allegation of a dishonest, purely partisan investigation becomes reasonable.

By contrast with the House investigation of the president’s actions in Ukraine, the Biden-Ukraine conspiracy theory has been around for years. The GOP could have started this investigation while Obama was still in office. Instead of investigating Biden years ago, the GOP chose to ignore it until now. One has to ask why now?

So far, the House investigation looks to be mostly honest, but arguably significantly (but not completely) partisan. Whether the Senate investigation turns out to be honest or dishonest cannot be known now. It is fair to have some skepticism about GOP motives in waiting for years to begin an investigation the party showed no serious interest in until now. The GOP’s timing is curious, to say the least. Time will tell how the Senate chooses to conduct itself.

Sounds Like Projection & Misinformation

Human scum

The president tweeted this today: “Corrupt politician Adam Schiff’s lies are growing by the day. Keep fighting tough, Republicans, you are dealing with human scum who have taken Due Process and all of the Republican Party’s rights away from us during the most unfair hearings in American History. But we are winning big, and they will soon be on our turf.”

Human scum? Given all the felony indictments, guilty pleas and convictions that the felons the president surrounded himself with, that sounds like the president is projecting his own moral character and temperament. Psychological projection is a defence mechanism the ego uses to defend itself against unconscious impulses or qualities by denying their existence in themselves but attributing them to others.

Not working

Other projections from the GOP are common at present. One is the false assertion that democrats are not working but are wasting time with impeachment hearings. One of the things that constitutes working for congress is legislating and legislating in a democracy requires compromising. If there is no compromise, then it's not democracy and instead is some form of tyranny, oligarchy or single-party rule.

At present, congressional GOP members refuse to compromise and when there is legislation, the GOP Senate ignores it instead of opening up communications on compromises. In fact, while democrats have done their job the GOP is proud of not doing its job. For example, Senate majority leader McConnell openly calls himself the ‘grim reaper’ who will kill any House legislation he dislikes. As of about six months ago, the Grim Reaper had killed over 100 pieces of legislation the House had passed. Legislation requires compromise when the House and Senate are controlled by different parties.

It goes without saying that when circumstances demand it, the House needs to hold an impeachment inquiry. That is working under House rules, despite GOP allegations of single party unfairness and refusal to compromise. The Senate will deal with impeachment in its own way according to its own rules. Legislation requires compromise when the House and Senate are controlled by different parties. Impeachment does not require compromise between the parties.

Lies

The president’s tweet quoted above accuses Adam Schiff of lying. In view of the president’s staggering public record of making over 13,000 false and misleading statements as of October 9, 2019, he is arguably projecting once again. No other president in recent history has come close to this level of blatant contempt for truth and disrespect for people who do value honesty. With a track record like that, the president has earned and deserves no trust from anyone. That some people choose to trust him despite a record of chronic lying is their own choice made for their own reasons.

Some House GOP members are advancing a debunked narrative that the Ukraine, not Russia, interfered with the 2016 election to help the president win the Electoral College vote. In her opening statement this morning, Fiona Hill, former White House Russia expert testified that this narrative is false and harmful to US interests and to the Ukraine. Her written speech on this point reads as follows:

“Based on questions and statements I have heard, some of you on this committee appear to believe that Russia and its security services did not conduct a campaign against our country—and that perhaps, somehow, for some reason, Ukraine did. This is a fictional narrative that has been perpetrated and propagated by the Russian security services themselves.

The unfortunate truth is that Russia was the foreign power that systematically attacked our democratic institutions in 2016. This is the public conclusion of our intelligence agencies, confirmed in bipartisan Congressional reports. It is beyond dispute, even if some of the underlying details must remain classified.

The impact of the successful 2016 Russian campaign remains evident today. Our nation is being torn apart. Truth is questioned. Our highly professional and expert career foreign service is being undermined.

..... 

I say this not as an alarmist, but as a realist.” (emphasis added)

In view of existing evidence, the false GOP Ukraine interference narrative is at least misinformation and lies at worst.