Friday 20 June 2014
Photo, above: Irukandji jellyfish are small and extremely venomous jellyfish that inhabit marine waters of Australia and which are able to fire their stingers into their victim, causing symptoms collectively known as Irukandji syndrome. Their size is roughly a cubic centimetre (1 cm3). There are four known species of Irukandji: Carukia barnesi, Malo kingi, Alatina alata and the recently discovered Malo maxima. See Hour 3, Block D, Gwynn Guilford, Quartz (qz.com). Image credit:
JOHN BATCHELOR SHOW
Hour One
Friday 20 June 2014 / Hour 1, Block A: Megan McArdle, Bloomberg View, in re: Want to Be Popular? Don't Be President. Sometimes it’s hard to see why presidents want to wait around for a second term; that seems to be the point where it all goes to heck. Nixon had Watergate; Reagan, Iran-Contra; Clinton, impeachment; Bush, Katrina and the steady decline of Iraq. Now Barack Obama, too, seems to be entering into the unpleasant, scandal- and headache-ridden phase of his presidency.
My father, who is a wise man, once pointed out to me that scandals are practically inevitable in a second presidential term because there are a lot of people in an administration, and as the years wear on, the probability that one of them has done something insalubriously newsworthy approaches certainty. Such as creating special, off-the-books waiting lists at their Veterans Administration hospitals in order to collect their performance bonuses. Or experiencing a series of unfortunate events rendering them unable to provide subpoena’d documents.
Meanwhile, as George W. Bush also discovered, foreign policy tends to get more annoying and complicated. In your first term, you can feel as though you're planting seeds and waiting for them to bear fruit. In your second term, whatever happens around the world will be attributed to you by voters (however fairly or unfairly). If it's bad, then your approval ratings will go down, and there’s not much you can do, because the U.S. president is not the world’s parent and cannot send other countries to their room until they behave themselves. Meanwhile, in your second term, you lose the ability to . . . [more]
Friday 20 June 2014 / Hour 1, Block B: Harry Siegel, NY Daily News, in re: A tale of two cities in the de Blasios's home borough. . . . Any remaining dese, dose and dem bums nostalgia aside, Brooklyn has always been, at heart, a place to escape from or be trapped in — defined by its nearness to, and distance from, the city, which in the outer boroughs still means Manhattan.
Friday 20 June 2014 / Hour 1, Block C: Pam Belluck, NYT, in re: The guest has written a powerful two-part story about maternal mental illness. Part one looks at studies, which are revealing a more complex view of maternal mental illness, including the fact that what is known as postpartum depression often begins during pregnancy. Part two looks at one woman’s wrenching struggle, and illuminates recent findings that postpartum mental disorders can emerge later than expected and include a broader range of symptoms.
Friday 20 June 2014 / Hour 1, Block D: David Yanofsky, Quartz (qz.com), in re: Foreign tourists choose to travel in a very different India from that of locals
Hour Two
Friday 20 June 2014 / Hour 2, Block A: Michael Vlahos, Naval War College (1 of 2), in re: On 12 May 1961, Vice President Lyndon B. Johnson met with South Vietnamese President Ngo Dinh Diem in Saigon during his tour of Asian countries. Calling Diem the "Churchill of Asia," he encouraged the South Vietnamese president to view himself as indispensable to the United States and promised additional military aid to assist his government in fighting the communists. On his return home, Johnson echoed domino theorists, saying that the loss of Vietnam would compel the United States to fight "on the beaches of Waikiki" and eventually on "our own shores." With the assassination of President John F. Kennedy in November 1963, Johnson became president and inherited a deteriorating situation in South Vietnam. Over time, he escalated the war, ultimately committing more than 500,000 U.S. troops to Vietnam.
Friday 20 June 2014 / Hour 2, Block B: Michael Vlahos, Naval War College (2 of 2), in re: Eight years in the saga of "a few advisors":
May 12, 1961 Lyndon B. Johnson visits South Vietnam
May 12, 1971 Heavy fighting erupts in A Shau Valley
May 13, 1971 Paris peace talks at standstill
May 13, 1972 Heavy fighting continues at Quang Tri and Kontum
May 14, 1969 President Nixon responds to National Liberation Front proposal
May 14, 1970 South Vietnamese sustain second highest casualties of war
May 15, 1967 U.S. positions south of the DMZ come under heavy fire
May 15, 1970 Air Force sergeant awarded Medal of Honor
May 16, 1965 Accident at Bien Hoa kills 27 U.S. servicemen
May 16, 1968 Navy Corpsman receives Medal of Honor for action
May 16, 1972 U.S. bombing destroys main fuel line
May 17, 1970 Operations continue in Cambodia
May 17, 1972 South Vietnamese reinforcements near An Loc
May 18, 1966 Laird charges
May 18, 1969 Communists attack Xuan Loc
Friday 20 June 2014 / Hour 2, Block C: Damien Cave, NYT, in re: We're on Day 20 in The Way North series. The reporter Damien Cave and photographer Todd Heisler are travelling the length of I-35, from Laredo, Tex., to Duluth, Minn., to explore how immigration has changed America. (For about two or three decades, I-35 has been a major thoroughfare for Mexicans travelling, legally and illegally, to the United States.) This is a real-time journey, with new stories every day. The pair is about halfway through the journey, which will end on or about June 22.
Friday 20 June 2014 / Hour 2, Block D: Terry Anderson, Hoover & PERC, in re: The Congressionally mandated “National Climate Assessment” has been capturing headlines with gloom and doom, and President Obama is using it as ammunition for his climate war, including his determination to block approval of the Keystone XL pipeline. According to the report, climate change will adversely affect “Americans’ health and livelihoods and the ecosystems that sustain us” by bringing “more frequent and/or intense . . . heat waves, heavy downpours and, in some regions, floods and droughts.” Whether you believe or deny the apocalyptic predictions of the National Climate Assessment, it is unlikely that most of them will come to pass—not because of government-sponsored mitigation, but because of entrepreneurial adaptation . . .
Hour Three
Friday 20 June 2014 / Hour 3, Block A: Seb Gorka, Seb Gorka, Breitbart, FDD, in re: HOW US POLICY ENABLED THE RISE OF AL QAEDA 2.0 AND THE COLLAPSE OF IRAQ Policy decisions and politically driven censorship of the American national security establishment have helped strengthen Al Qaeda's successor and hastened the collapse of the nation of Iraq.
The current administration and the President represented Operation Iraqi Freedom as the "wrong war," as opposed to the "good war" that was Afghanistan. The Vice President even called the end of our involvement in Iraq one of the great achievements of Obama's . . . [more]
Friday 20 June 2014 / Hour 3, Block B: Henry I Miller, M.D., Hoover & Forbes.com, in re: "You Can't Sugarcoat Distasteful Legislation"
Friday 20 June 2014 / Hour 3, Block C: Javier Hernandez, NYT, in re: the guest has written a compelling, 8,000-word article on the Common Core that follows a child in Brooklyn as he struggles to keep up with the new demands. The Common Core, a set of tougher academic standards, is a hot topic in politics, education, and at the dinner table these days --- the biggest change to schools in a generation. It's been in the news lately as presidential candidates stake out positions and conservative states threaten to abandon the effort.
Friday 20 June 2014 / Hour 3, Block D: Gwynn Guilford, Quartz (qz.com), in re: WINDS OF CHANGE The planet’s most venomous animal costs Australia millions a year—here’s what might stop it. . . . Irukandji jellyfish are small and extremely venomous jellyfish that inhabit marine waters of Australia [and now Hawaii and Florida] and which are able to fire their stingers into their victim, causing symptoms collectively known as Irukandji syndrome. Their size is roughly a cubic centimetre (1 cm3). There are four known species of Irukandji: Carukia barnesi, Malo kingi, Alatina alata and the recently discovered Malo maxima.
From a valued listener: I lived in Hawaii for 35 years and swam daily in the ocean (Ala Moana Beach). It is common knowledge that about 9 days past each full moon each month, there was an invasion of box jellyfish. Their stings could send victims to the hospital. University of Hawaii researchers for years have been trying to find a connection between each month's full moon and the influx of these jellyfish. But just like clockwork, each month they arrived. After about a week, they vanished. Here's the monthly calendar put out by the city and county: http://www.to-hawaii.com/jellyfishcalendar.html
Hour Four
Friday 20 June 2014 / Hour 4, Block A: Chuck Blahous, Hoover, in re: Social Security Adds to the Deficit; Stop Saying I Said Otherwise
Friday 20 June 2014 / Hour 4, Block B: Robert Zimmerman, behindtheblack.com, in re:
Friday 20 June 2014 / Hour 4, Block C: Jed Babbin, American Spectator, in re: The BDS War Against Israel: The Orwellian Campaign to Destroy Israel Through the Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions... by Jed Babbin and Herbert London (1 of 2)
Friday 20 June 2014 / Hour 4, Block D: Jed Babbin, American Spectator, in re: The BDS War Against Israel: The Orwellian Campaign to Destroy Israel Through the Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions... by Jed Babbin and Herbert London (2 of 2)