Dwain Northey (Gen X)

North Atlantic Treaty Organization has been in the news a quite a lot this past week, mostly because our President is fully on board with strengthening the alliance not dismantling like the former guy.

For those of you that have heard about NATO but aren’t sure what they actually do here is a short history lesson…

The North Atlantic Treaty Organization was created in 1949 by the United States, Canada, and several Western European nations to provide collective security against the Soviet Union.

Yes, even though the Soviet Union of part of the allied powers in WWII that helped save the world from Hitler and Nazi Germany, they very quickly became the Big Bad Wolf that was threatening Europe.

NATOs mission is to secure a lasting peace in Europe, based on its member countries’ common values of individual liberty, democracy, human rights and the rule of law.

Those all seem like good objectives for a multi country alliance… so why is it that Donny Dumb Ass and his alliance of the willing (the ‘freedom’ caucus’) are so adamantly opposed to it?

Here are the current members of NATO.

The 31 NATO members are Albania, Belgium, Bulgaria, Canada, Croatia, Czech Republic, Denmark, Estonia, Finland, France, Germany, Greece, Hungary, Iceland, Italy, Latvia, Lithuania, Luxembourg, Montenegro, Netherlands, Norway, Poland, Portugal, the Republic of Macedonia, Romania, Slovakia, Slovenia, Spain, Turkey, the United Kingdom, and the United States.

The ratification process for Sweden is ongoing. Ukraine applied for NATO membership in September 2022 after Russia proclaimed the annexation of its territory. Two other states have formally informed NATO of their membership aspirations: Bosnia and Herzegovina and Georgia.

The big kerfuffle this year was why they didn’t admit Ukraine into NATO… The easy answer is because of Article 5: The principle of collective defense is enshrined in Article 5 of the North Atlantic Treaty. NATO invoked Article 5 for the first and only time in its history after the 9/11 terrorist attacks against the United States.

Ukraine joining NATO immediately was a non-starter because several NATO members—most notably Germany and the United States—are worried about what it would mean to bring a country into the alliance engaged in an active war. So this was always about finding the right space in between.

Trump and his ILK have issues with NATO because they say that we are the primary funders of the Alliance. Here is how NATO is funded NATO is resourced through the direct and indirect contributions of its members. NATO’s common funds are composed of direct contributions to collective budgets and programs, which equate to only 0.3% of total Allied defense spending.

More easily put each member nation give 0.3% of their defense budget to NATO…

Of member nations the U.S. has the highest defense budget; The current U.S. defense budget is for fiscal year 2023, the bill provides $136.7 billion, an increase of $9.8 billion above the budget request and an increase of $20.5 billion above the fiscal year 2022 enacted level. The second highest country was the UK in 2021/22, the UK spent £45.9 billion on defense, that is roughly $60 billion.

So just based on math it is quite obvious why we contribute more than let’s say Lithuanian which probably only has a maybe $10 million defense budget. If we didn’t have such a bloated defense budget, we wouldn’t contribute as much.  

Maybe since Russia has proven itself to not be a big a threat as they made themselves out to be there can be a joint resolution to lower the contributing percentage, but we will still be the largest funder.

The only countries that want to see the end of NATO are the school yard bullies, Russia being the number one offender. I am not a conspiracy person but those current members of our government and the former guy that want to withdraw from NATO (?) если обувь подходит (if the shoe fits).

Thanks again for joining me on the rant…

Dwain Northey (Gen X)

Another sign that things are changing… Here in Phoenix, we had a very mild winter, for native Phoenicians they would have said it was cold, but I really don’t consider days with high temperatures the low 60° range cold. It was even nice up until the end of June but that’s where the story turns, we are now on our 13^th day over 110°F and there is no end in sight.

50 years ago, the longest stretch of days in Phoenix that reached 110°or more was 18 days… in 2020 we had 53 days that reached or exceeded that mark.

I talked briefly in a prior post that the global average temperature reached 62.9°F. Global average surface temperature has risen at an average rate of 0.17°F per decade since 1901, similar to the rate of warming within the contiguous 48 states. Since the late 1970s, however, the United States has warmed faster than the global rate. Over the last century, the average surface temperature of the Earth has increased by about 1.0^o F. The eleven warmest years this century have all occurred since 1980, with 1995 the warmest on record. The higher latitudes have warmed more than the equatorial regions. Global temperature is projected to warm by about 1.5 degrees Celsius (2.7° degrees Fahrenheit) by 2050 and 2-4 degrees Celsius (3.6-7.2 degrees Fahrenheit) by 2100.

The potential future effects of global climate change include more frequent wildfires, longer periods of drought in some regions, and an increase in the wind intensity and rainfall from tropical cyclones. Scientists have predicted that long-term effects of climate change will include a decrease in sea ice and an increase in permafrost thawing, an increase in heat waves and heavy precipitation, and decreased water resources in semi-arid regions Scientist hypothesize   that humans would suffer and, for the most part, adapt and survive. Not so the millions of species with which we share the planet. Under likely warming scenarios, virtually all the globe’s coral reef, which feed and otherwise benefit a billion people, will be gone.

The question is it too late? I know the one out of a vast majority of climate scientists will argue that mankind has nothing to do with the current extreme changes in our climate, but I am choosing to not listen to that clown. Have we pushed ourselves into a negative feed back loop, that no matter what we do has the damage been done? That is the question for the day…

I will leave that question to climatologists….

Hope I didn’t scare anyone too much. No, I hope I did!!

https://www.space.com/climate-tipping-points-closer-than-realized

Lyle Northey (Silent/Boomer)

   The Mayflower set sail to America with a cargo of people looking for religious freedom. Their original destination was the Virginia Colony. They ran out of beer and had to make a stop or die of thirst and Massachusetts was the place they stopped. They went ahead and settled there and adopted a very rigid moral code and a religion that allowed no latitude but to obey. 

    It seems we are once again out of beer and good sense. There seems to be no latitude for anything, but do as you are told and “I did nothing wrong” … They Conducted the Salem Witch trials and put people to death because a couple girls had their tampon screwed in backwards. Now in 2023 we have someone that has risen to the rank of Governor that also seems to have something screwed in the wrong way around. His idea of freedom is that he is free to do as he damned pleases and the rest of the citizens of Florida must follow his demented ideas.

   The fountain of youth was supposed to be there, no such place has ever been found. It is known for sandy beaches and suntanned bodies.  Apparently, brains are not allowed as it would interfere with the static coming from the state house. One of the reasons to question intelligence is why would anyone put aside 15 years of military service? You can retire at 20 years and have something even if everything else that you try after that falls apart. He is a Bronze Star recipient not annotated as a winner, so it was given as a gold watch when he decided to separate. His military record is not put up as an item to review, wonder why.

   Usually, people that make a name have plenty of others making comments, whether it is that he was a good officer, a prima donna or a total prick, comments get made. With an obvious bent for doing things his way it is a good bet that his career was anything but a smooth journey.

   Such an overcharged ego he most likely has some fetishes that he likes to indulge in, be that cruising nude beaches, strip clubs, hookers or beating his wife, it is a good bet that he has an illness of one kind or another. The trouble with huge egos is that the idea is that “I can do anything, and it will be approved of by everyone else because they know I have the power.”

   The number of negatives of running a state or nation with an iron fist is that at some point the leader must let go and when that happens the shit will hit the fan.

   There is such an abundance of paranoia running rampant with the constant use of the idea that agencies and now AI is being “weaponized” against conservatives. No one wants to be a target but when you run around sticking your nose in everyone’s business because you have a position on a subject and that position is going to be the law of the land, you get what you asked for. When your empire topples and you have to find a priest hole to hide in then you will truly know what it is like to be on the “I can beat you on the head because” feeling is all about.

If it does not impact you personally why do you need to force others to conform to your will?

   Weaponizing seems to be the thing, it basically means that you are picking on me and somehow you are able to do it in a legal way and that is not fair. My standards as a conservative are that I am able to force upon all my will. When you fight me on that point you are picking on poor little pitiful me.

   Being conservative seems to go down the path that allows for a single party, single leader to run the country. The countries that are putting up with this type of malignancy are being treated as if every person in the country is either a criminal or related to one. They report on one another over things that should be of no interest to the leadership, there are massive arrests and jailings of people that do not agree with the status quo. Several states in this country have passed laws that should have been revoked by the Supreme Court but since that body is also of the mind that control is necessary those laws are on the books.

   It has been said that there will be a revolution if Trump does not get elected and I would bet that there will be one if he does. So either way we may be on our way to a climatic end to the freedom we have known and on our way to destruction and rebuilding.

Dwain Northey (Gen X)

I know this is a big word that most of us never use but it seems apropos in the context that I am going to use it. Antithetical means two things that could not be more different, just a different word meaning contradictory, which may be a word that gets more use in the English language.

I am stuck on words because I continually hear and am told things that are antithetical. I was told by ‘the former guys’ supporters that he should get full credit for the COVID19 vaccine but that it was also a global conspiracy by Bill Gates to implant tracking devices in everyone. I was also reliably told, by many, that COVID itself was a hoax even after someone they knew died for the virus. The old excuses are that they had pre-existing conditions even though they had been living with that condition for years. The masks don’t work mantra was a good one but when someone coughed around that anti-mask propagandist, they were the first ones to cover their mouth and nose inside the collar of their shirt.

I am sure you have all heard the Donny Dumbass is the most intelligent and honest President that this country has ever had and that his strength as a leader is both respected and feared by every nation. Confusing how the most intelligent man has a vocabulary of a middle school child that is trying to pass a spelling test or that an honest man is banned by the court from running a charity because he was stealing from it. As far as his strength and leadership, anyone that watched him on stage with Putin could see who was welding strength and influence and it wasn’t the baggy suit sitting with his fingers laced together. In his syphilitic mind he has influence and for some reason his followers that are stuck in an information eco-chamber believe it as well.

Now lets explore the Biden insults… He is sleepy Joe, a senile old man but at the same time his is the mastermind behind a crime family. Biden is a life long Catholic but according to Trump sycophants’ satin resides in the White House and Joe invited the Devil. The most hilarious is that the dime bag of cocaine that was discovered mean that Joe and Hunter are having cocaine fueled parties in the residence… I don’t know if any of the people spouting that B.S. have ever done coke or known anyone who has but high on coke a sleepy do not fit into the same category.

The final antithetical group is the House and Senate GOP that nearly unanimously votes against the infrastructure bill but are now in their home states and districts taking credit for the very thing they were against… I would really like a democrat to pull an Al Franken when he was in the Senate that went to a groundbreaking for a bridge in his state and he thanked everyone and then directly asked his republican counterpart, who had voted against the bill, why they were there. I suppose Sleepy Joe did do that in George when talking about an infrastructure project in Greene’s district and stated he would be there for the groundbreaking.

I wish that everyone would go back to the Sesame Street song ‘One of these things is not like the other’ and look past their adversarial team divisiveness and come to the realization that, as Lincoln stated, together we stand divided we fall.

Thanks again for suffering through my mental breakdown.