Democracies are so fragile

Seeing the U.S. Senate trying to vote on Brett Kavanaugh to the Supreme Court is just so depressing.

Elected officials are supposed to be acting on behalf of the people who elected them, doing their best to protect those who elected them. So when decisions are based on party lines instead of the people's interests, it is just so depressing.

Because it shows that democracy is so very fragile.

However they vote, the result is the same: the highest elected officials of the land does not take accusations from women seriously. They are not willing to give women the same due process they would give to white men. They are not willing to let the professional investigators in the FBI, career people who make a living from conducting investigations, do their jobs. In short, they do not respect or trust in the FBI's professionalism.

Women being denied due process. A justice system that does not respect nor trust its own investigative agency. Can anyone feel safe under the law anymore? One cannot help but feel that the law seems to be selective in who it protects.

Democracies, when done right, can be very powerful, for it empowers the people. But democracies can also be easily hijacked.

I just hope people continue to keep their eyes and ears open. Because ultimately, in democracies, the people still have a way to take back power from those who hijack their systems. But they can only do that if they are informed and concerned.

Do not let others use our differences to divide us

Our founding fathers knew that as a nation diverse in race and religion, any difference can be exploited to drive a wedge into our society, ripping apart the fabric that holds us together as a nation. Events in other parts of the world in recent years have shown us exactly how a nation can be torn apart by politicians exploiting differences for their own gains. For Singapore to stay strong as a nation, we should be working at ways to find common ground amidst our differences, rather than sit in opposing camps with swords drawn.

Because to do otherwise would mean it is not possible to be both patriotic and religious. And if being both is not possible, the idea of Singapore, based on the ideal of "regardless of race, language, or religion," goes up in smoke.

And that is why I am wary whenever leaders of influential groups seek to put people into two camps, because I do not know if they are trying to exploit those divisions for their own gains. Because there are people who gain from chaos. There are people who seek to stir up emotions so as to cloud what people see.

Do not tell me what is right or wrong. Let me see the arguments and decide for myself. Putting pressure on people to accept your views is just blackmail.

Looking at Trump's U.N. speech

Trump didn't get a good start at the U.N., being laughed at when he tried to give a speech to an audience unlike the friendly crowds at his rallies. Whoever was the speechwriter ought to be sacked for failing to shape the speech for the audience; it was written more for a domestic crowd ready to hear more propaganda. Here are some of my thoughts as I hear his speech.

"Ultimately, it is up to the nations of the region to decide what kind of future they want for themselves and their children."

"The United States has launched a campaign of economic pressure to deny the regime the funds it needs to advance its bloody agenda. Last month, we began re-imposing hard-hitting nuclear sanctions that had been lifted under the Iran deal. Additional sanctions will resume November 5th, and more will follow. And we’re working with countries that import Iranian crude oil to cut their purchases substantially."

So on one hand, he thinks people should decide what they want for themselves, free from external intervention. Yet just minutes later, he talks about taking steps to influence things in another country (Iran). Dude, which is it?

While the United States and many other nations play by the rules, these countries use government-run industrial planning and state-owned enterprises to rig the system in their favor. They engage in relentless product dumping, forced technology transfer, and the theft of intellectual property.

Can't blame someone for being better at playing by the rules, right? When those in power set the rules, they did it to help themselves. A newcomer comes along, shows that he understands the rules well, and can even exploit them to his favor. But you can't blame him; he is just using those rules you set against you. Can only blame yourself for being stupid, for not seeing how the rules can be abused.

The United States lost over 3 million manufacturing jobs, nearly a quarter of all steel jobs, and 60,000 factories after China joined the WTO. And we have racked up $13 trillion in trade deficits over the last two decades.

It is easy to blame China for everything. But has anyone looked at the increase in service sector jobs? Because it may just be a shift in the economy away from manufacturing (which can be onerous) toward provide value-added services. Jobs could have been lost because of automation. Adam Smith told us about competitive advantage. It is better for nations to produce what they are good at producing, and trade with each other. Could it just be that the U.S. is better at producing services instead of goods? You know, the white collar jobs. Those that pay better instead of being stuck working shifts at a factory.

The United States stands ready to export our abundant, affordable supply of oil, clean coal, and natural gas.

Dude, that's your reserve... that's your insurance. The reason the U.S. has been happy to get oil and other stuff from others, instead of depleting its own resources, is that it was keeping those resources as insurance, as a backup plan should things run dry. When the rest of the world is short of oil, and you still have oil, you are going to have a big voice. But if you start using up that oil now, you are just going to run dry together with the rest of them.

Illegal immigration funds criminal networks, ruthless gangs, and the flow of deadly drugs. Illegal immigration exploits vulnerable populations, hurts hardworking citizens, and has produced a vicious cycle of crime, violence, and poverty. Only by upholding national borders, destroying criminal gangs, can we break this cycle and establish a real foundation for prosperity.

Sad to say, this doesn't solve the problem. It is just containing the problem, keeping it away. The problem is still there. The real way is to see what is causing all the poverty that makes illegal immigration profitable to criminals.

The United States is the world’s largest giver in the world, by far, of foreign aid. But few give anything to us. That is why we are taking a hard look at U.S. foreign assistance.

That's why it is called aid and assistance. If you expect something in return, it is called trade.

My biggest apprehension is this: with the U.S. moving more and more toward isolating itself from the rest of the world, someone else will move in to take its place. And when the rest of the world moves along, the U.S. may get left behind. A superpower in decline, who gets left behind, in possession of nuclear weapons, is a force to be feared.

The Imperial Japanese Army used to have a saying: between competent and incompetent leaders, between decisive and indecisive leaders, the most fearful thing is an incompetent leader who is decisive.

We fear what we do not understand

It is human nature to fear what we do not understand.

But we also need to ask ourselves: is our fear hindering our understanding? Is our fear making us reinforce our lack of understanding, to shut us off from seeking understanding so that we can allay our fear?

Are we the servants of our fear?

Or can we learn to face fear, and to master it?

"I must not fear.
Fear is the mind-killer.
Fear is the little-death that brings total obliteration.
I will face my fear.
I will permit it to pass over me and through me.
And when it has gone past I will turn the inner eye to see its path.
Where the fear has gone there will be nothing. Only I will remain."
-- "Litany Against Fear," Dune

One more year, entering a new club

One more year. And a new club. 😂

And so, the musical chair begins

Trade wars: Is Trump lining up Japan next?

A day after I posted this, this article came out in the news.

Like I said, it is a musical chair, because fundamentally, the U.S. relies on imports of goods so that it can export its services. Unless the U.S. fundamentally restructures its economy away from emphasizing services and toward primary and secondary production, it will just need to import. Tariffs will not stop imports unless there are domestic alternatives. If there are no such alternatives, tariffs only serve to increase the costs of businesses, which then gets passed down and eventually increasing the cost of living for consumers.

The question, then, is whether the rest of the world can survive with an economically isolated U.S.? Are there alternatives to things coming from the U.S.? Because if there are, great! We can all just continue to trade with each other, minus the U.S., and carry on with life. There probably will be some restructuring to do, but it won't be a drastic change. And if China is able to do this slight restructuring faster than most, which it may given that the central government has a lot of say in things there, then this may just help to propel China to become the top dog instead. And kill off U.S. hegemony since closed systems don't grow.

If China survives this trade war, it will only come out all the more stronger. If the U.S. survives this trade war, it will just be prolonging its decline if it continues to take an isolationist approach.

Asian firms shifting production out of China, but does it really change things?

Asian firms shuffle production around the region as China tariffs hit

With tariffs being placed by the U.S. on imports from China, companies are shifting production out of China so that their products don't get taxed.

But to me, it is just a musical chair, a matter of time.

While plants usually have existing capabilities for slight increases in production, to sustain this in the long run, they will need to make capital investments for expansion. Which needs money. Which will eventually be reflected in the cost of products. Of course, companies can choose to keep the same price, which means returns on investments will take a longer time.

But as imports from other countries start to increase, their trade balance with the U.S. will change. If it changes enough, the U.S. may go into a trade deficit again, and we all know what the guy in the White House thinks, and may do in such a case. Tariffs.

The fundamental problem is that the U.S. is an importing nation. It imports raw materials and semi-finished products to add value to them, then resell them to consumers both within and outside the U.S. Some of those imports are used by various sectors to provide services, which compared to the imported products, are way bigger earners. Tariffs actually make it less profitable to provide those services, since they increase costs for such companies.

Anyway, until the U.S. fundamentally reshapes its economy toward manufacturing, moving away from services, the trade balance in terms of goods will not really change much.

The case about Section 377A is not about discrimination, but about the rule of law

Singapore society has to decide which direction it wants to take on laws against gay sex: Shanmugam
Decision on Section 377A ‘a matter for Parliament’: Shanmugam
Court challenge filed on 377A arguing that gay sex law ‘violates human dignity’

The current debate in Singapore is about repealing (or keeping) Section 377A of the Penal Code, which basically makes gay sex a crime.

377A.  Any male person who, in public or private, commits, or abets the commission of, or procures or attempts to procure the commission by any male person of, any act of gross indecency with another male person, shall be punished with imprisonment for a term which may extend to 2 years.

To me, the debate about discrimination, equal rights, etc. is valid, but weak.

The key debate, and most alarming point that should be noted, is that the government has made it a stance that while Section 377A is part of the Penal Code, they will not actively enforce it.

Decision to retain Section 377A ‘carefully considered, balanced’

For a country governed by the rule of law, this is an alarming statement. It is saying that while the laws, as set by the legislative (Parliament), reflect the decision of the people, since they choose the Parliament via voting, the government can ultimately choose which laws it will enforce. Which goes totally against the idea of democracy, in which the elected government is supposed to be carrying out the will of the people (as reflected by laws).

Are we a democracy, or not?

Are we going to allow the government to choose which laws to enforce, and which to ignore?

Are we going to allow the government to selectively apply the law?

Are we governed by the rule of law? Or are our laws merely decorations on the wall?

The case is not about the constitutionality of Section 377A. It is about the constitutionality of the government in its decision to not proactively enforce Section 377A. All of them have sworn to discharge their duties according to law. No where in the constitution does it say that the executive branch has the right of selective application of the laws.

Once it has been shown that the government must enforce all laws, then the question of discrimination comes in. Because the constitution states that:

12.—(1)  All persons are equal before the law and entitled to the equal protection of the law.

Discrimination based on sexual orientation targeting only men contravenes this.

So if it was up to me, I would focus on this two-step approach. Long-winded, maybe, but it forces us to address two issues: the executive branch's right to selectively enforce laws, and the discrimination against people based on sex and sexual orientation.

What was the purpose of 9/11?

Al Qaeda Won: Seventeen years after the 9/11 attacks, the terrorists have definitively won the battle for the American mind.

This article made me ponder more about the real purpose behind 9/11.

It was a symbolic attack, we all knew that; even if the attack on the White House had been successful, it would not have paralyzed the U.S. into inaction. So the symbolic attack brought Al Qaeda and its aim into the news. But was that all they were hoping for?

Maybe it was really more diabolic. Maybe they had studied the U.S. long enough, as the article suggests, and knew that the fabric holding American society together is a very thin piece of cloth that can easily be ruptured. Maybe the aim was to create a small tear in that fabric, so that eventually, the cloth rips apart.

If so, they have succeeded. They have brought racial and religious suspicions, something which took decades to suppress, back to the surface of American society. In a land which proclaims that all men are equal, they have sowed the seeds for resentment along racial and religious lines. And each day, that seed grows as the U.S. continued its fight against terrorism in the Middle East, and could not afford to look inward to address this issue. Support the troops, support America, for to do otherwise is unpatriotic. Meanwhile, people become accustomed to the bad guys being Muslims and Arabs. The seed for racial and religious discrimination continues to grow.

Obama tried to win the real war. He tried to bring the U.S. back to a society without racial and religious hatred. But eight years is a short time compared to the decades required to close Pandora's box. If someone who recognized the problem had continued Obama's work, and a string of successors continued to hold on to this stance for the coming decades, Pandora's box may just be closed. But enter Trump with his rhetorics, and his exploitation of those seeds. He did what he needed to win. But at what cost?

Will American society ever recover from the seeds planted by Al Qaeda?

Another year... remember the night 17 years ago

17 years ago, at night, I went for a meeting in preparation for my oncoming duty. After the meeting, I dropped by the duty room, and saw on TV images of an airliner flying into the World Trade Center in New York. This was followed by images of smoke from the Pentagon.

I called my mentor, basically got him out of bed (it was already quite late in Japan), and told him he needed to watch TV. Any channel would do, since it was on all channels.

17 years has gone by. 17 years since the world changed.

Beyond layered networks for deep learning

Machine Learning’s ‘Amazing’ Ability to Predict Chaos

I happened to come across this article as I was searching for "chaos complexity deep learning" due to an impulse while reading about chaos and complexity theory: can chaos and complexity be applied to artificial intelligence in a way similar to deep learning?

While the article is still very much about existing machine learning techniques, I think deep learning using layered networks (the current method) will eventually hit a wall: the number of layers is inherently built into the design. Inside of organizing neurons into layers, and having them more or less hardwired to each other, what if the neurons are represented as agents in a local environment forming and breaking bonds/connections with each other? The depth of links are then no longer limited by the fixed number of layers.

If this idea is to be further explored, there must be a way to define how inputs are fed into the system, and how outputs are represented. These may still be in terms of a layer of neurons currently used in deep learning. There must then be a rule for the forming of connections: how does the neuron choose which neuron in its neighborhood (the size of neighborhood, aka the neuron's reach, must also be defined) to connect to, and which existing connections to break. Back propagation is probably still need to provide neurons on which links to keep.

Such a neural network formed by neural agents may even help us learn more about how our brains actually work. After all, our brains are made of neurons, but they are not organized into fixed layers.

Of course, I can only imagine the amount of computing power this will need...

NY Times publishes anonymous op-ed from senior Trump official

I Am Part of the Resistance Inside the Trump Administration

If you haven't read it yet, take a look at the link above.

Personally, I think it was written by Kelly. But then, only the editors at the NY Times would know for sure.

But why now?

Because the mid-terms are coming up, and they need to assure the Republicans that while Trump may be unpredictable, there are "adults in the room" making sure the Republican agenda is actually carried out. So Trump is the rubber stamp. Put a piece of paper in front of him and he will sign it. And that's what they need, someone who will sign without asking questions. His lack of knowledge makes it all the more easier, as long as they can slip that piece of paper in.

Also, Mueller's report is probably coming out soon.

The message is: Keep him in office, we will make sure he works for the Republican agenda. See, we have already delivered tax cuts and created jobs. If you keep him in office, we keep our jobs, and we can continue to help push through that agenda. If you remove him, there will be someone with a brain in that position, and it won't be as easy to manipulate anymore.

So it looks like a damning op-ed, but it is probably more sinister than that.

Remembering McCain

McCain tributes echo with criticism of Trump
Trump wasn't invited to McCain's funeral, but his presence loomed large as political heavyweights praised McCain for rising above the 'politics of fear'

A funeral service for Senator John Sidney McCain III was held on Sep 1, 2018 at the National Cathedral in Washington D.C.

Eulogies were delivered by his daughter, Meghan, as well as Henry Kissinger, former President George W. Bush, and former President Barack Obama.

While it may be easy to brand some of the eulogies as political jabs at Trump, I think we miss the point.

Meghan's eulogy was emotional, a fitting one from a daughter of a great man. The contrast between this great man and the one currently in the Oval Office only makes it all the more emotional.

Personally, I think Bush's eulogy was quite simple. I guess it stems from them only being rivals for a short while.

Obama's eulogy was the most powerful. Their differences, touched on by Obama himself, served to make their rivalry all the more intense, and therefore made their understanding of each other all the more deep. I don't think Obama was intentionally getting at Trump with what he said; all he did was highlight what made McCain a great man. The fact that it contrasted so much with Trump only made people hear all that Trump criticism, without realizing that Obama was only praising McCain.

When a person stands on flimsy ground, everything must seem like an attack.
When a person stands on firm ground, nothing can topple him.

In a dark room, a burning torch only seems all that much brighter.