What's new
  • ICMag with help from Landrace Warden and The Vault is running a NEW contest in November! You can check it here. Prizes are seeds & forum premium access. Come join in!

top of the heap to third world status in one generation

armedoldhippy

armedoldhippy

Well-known member
Veteran
Gry said:
Alarm over inbreeding after California cougars spotted with crooked tails
Deformities point to unsettling sign of extremely low genetic diversity in isolated population in the Santa Monica mountains

https://www.theguardian.com/environ...ornia-mountain-lions-crooked-tails-inbreeding
Click to expand...

read abut that. Florida had much the same problems with their endangered Florida cougars. they eventually imported some cougars from Texas, i think. the new genetics (while diluting the isolated Florida cats DNA) did save the population there as a whole by erasing the genetic roadlblock they had hit.
 
TychoMonolyth

TychoMonolyth

Boreal Curing
You have to be super careful moving wildlife around to fix a problem. Ticks weren't an issue until the government started moving deer around.
 
Gry

Gry

Well-known member
Veteran
Gry

Gry

Well-known member
Veteran
“I’ve found multiple blatant attempts by foreign national governments to abuse our platform on vast scales to mislead their own citizenry, and caused international news on multiple occasions. I have personally made decisions that affected national presidents without oversight, and taken action to enforce against so many prominent politicians globally that I’ve lost count.” “I Have Blood on My Hands”: A Whistleblower Says Facebook Ignored Global Political Manipulation


https://www.buzzfeednews.com/articl...n-whistleblower-memo?utm_source=pocket-newtab
 
Zeez

Zeez

---------------->
ICMag Donor
armedoldhippy said:
read abut that. Florida had much the same problems with their endangered Florida cougars. they eventually imported some cougars from Texas, i think. the new genetics (while diluting the isolated Florida cats DNA) did save the population there as a whole by erasing the genetic roadlblock they had hit.
Click to expand...

I heard the Florida cougars were getting kind of wrinkley. Just kidding.
 
TychoMonolyth

TychoMonolyth

Boreal Curing
EX-TRUMP INTELLIGENCE CHIEF: IT WAS A NICE DEMOCRACY WHILE WE HAD IT
https://www.vanityfair.com/news/2020/09/ex-trump-intelligence-chief-it-was-a-nice-democracy-while-we-had-it


In a stark warning ahead of November’s election, Dan Coats is calling for a
bipartisan commission to ensure trust in the results. One major obstacle: a
norm-demolishing president and subservient GOP.

With the presidential election only weeks away, several factors are threatening
to undermine it. Among them: a pandemic that has already resulted in several
chaotic primaries; outside interference from Russia and other actors that Donald
Trump and the Republicans have not done enough to prevent; and, of course, the
president himself, who has attempted to capitalize on the first two as he
willfully tries to sow doubt in the legitimacy of November’s vote.

Democrats and others concerned about a potential constitutional crisis this fall
are scrambling to protect the election from Trump’s efforts to disrupt it, with
Joe Biden bracing for a massive legal brawl between election day and the
inauguration. But Dan Coats, Trump’s former director of national intelligence,
is suggesting that may not be enough to ensure the longevity of American
democracy.

In a New York Times op-ed Thursday, Coats calls on lawmakers to establish a
powerful, bipartisan commission to oversee the election and “confirm for the
public that the laws and regulations governing [the electoral process] have been
scrupulously and expeditiously followed...without political prejudice and
without regard to political interests of either party.” The panel, which should
be comprised of “elder statespersons,” would also be tasked with “monitoring
those forces that seek to harm our electoral system through interference, fraud,
disinformation, or other distortion,” Coats wrote.

“The importance of the election is not just which candidate or which party
wins,” Coats wrote. “Voters also face the question of whether the American
democratic experiment, one of the boldest political innovations in human
history, will survive.”

The bedrock of American democracy has been shaken in recent years by Trump, who
has in the last four years obliterated political norms, weakened institutions,
and escaped real oversight by completely bending his party to his will.
Establishment figures like Coats, who seemingly came to see him as unfit for
office, have been ousted in favor of loyalists who have enabled his nascent
authoritarianism. Coats, in his op-ed, stops short of explicitly saying his ex-
boss is what necessitates the need for such a commission, but he doesn’t really
have to; Biden isn’t the one saying any election he doesn’t win is “rigged,” or
straight-up encouraging people to vote more than once, or kneecapping the postal
service to prevent mail-in voting, or trying to shake-down foreign leaders for
election help. Coats is warning that the electoral system could crumble—and
Americans’ trust in the system right along with it—without an oversight
commission because Trump is intentionally eroding it and nobody in his
administration or in his party is able or willing to stop him.

That, of course, is the problem with Coats’ proposal. Such a commission could,
indeed, serve as a formal guardrail for a system that has largely been based on
custom rather than clear covenant; where the electoral system has, to this
point, assumed the peaceful transition of power at the heart of American
democracy, an independent commission like the one pitched by Coats could enforce
it. What he fails to address, however, is what happens if Trump simply plows
through this new institution as he has with the ones that already exist. The
United States needs better, clearer laws governing elections. In many ways,
though, the problem with Trump has not been a lack of rules or norms to
constrain him, but his refusal to comply with them and his party’s failure to
force him to. Perhaps a panel of respected figures—former presidents, retired
judges—would reinforce the pillars of democracy. It is, however, maybe easier to
imagine a jilted Trump decrying the group as deep state swamp creatures who are
biased against him and his supporters, the Republican party lining up behind
him, and the whole process of institutional distrust starting up all over again.

What this president has proved is that a check matters only to the extent that
it is enforced. Impeachment is only a deterrent if there’s a threat of
conviction. Laws, like the Hatch Act that was flagrantly and enthusiastically
violated during the Republican National Convention, exist in a real sense if
they are observed. And Coats’ commission, particularly in our chronically
divided age, can only stop Trump from trying to undermine the election if
Republicans back the institution without condition. Based on the way they have
continued to ignore, enable, or actively participate in his outrageous
malfeasance, it’s hard to have much confidence they would.
 
Gry

Gry

Well-known member
Veteran
TychoMonolyth said:
EX-TRUMP INTELLIGENCE CHIEF: IT WAS A NICE DEMOCRACY WHILE WE HAD IT
https://www.vanityfair.com/news/202...chief-it-was-a-nice-democracy-while-we-had-it


In a stark warning ahead of November’s election, Dan Coats is calling for a
bipartisan commission to ensure trust in the results. One major obstacle: a
norm-demolishing president and subservient GOP.

With the presidential election only weeks away, several factors are threatening
to undermine it. Among them: a pandemic that has already resulted in several
chaotic primaries; outside interference from Russia and other actors that Donald
Trump and the Republicans have not done enough to prevent; and, of course, the
president himself, who has attempted to capitalize on the first two as he
willfully tries to sow doubt in the legitimacy of November’s vote.

Democrats and others concerned about a potential constitutional crisis this fall
are scrambling to protect the election from Trump’s efforts to disrupt it, with
Joe Biden bracing for a massive legal brawl between election day and the
inauguration. But Dan Coats, Trump’s former director of national intelligence,
is suggesting that may not be enough to ensure the longevity of American
democracy.

In a New York Times op-ed Thursday, Coats calls on lawmakers to establish a
powerful, bipartisan commission to oversee the election and “confirm for the
public that the laws and regulations governing [the electoral process] have been
scrupulously and expeditiously followed...without political prejudice and
without regard to political interests of either party.” The panel, which should
be comprised of “elder statespersons,” would also be tasked with “monitoring
those forces that seek to harm our electoral system through interference, fraud,
disinformation, or other distortion,” Coats wrote.

“The importance of the election is not just which candidate or which party
wins,” Coats wrote. “Voters also face the question of whether the American
democratic experiment, one of the boldest political innovations in human
history, will survive.”

The bedrock of American democracy has been shaken in recent years by Trump, who
has in the last four years obliterated political norms, weakened institutions,
and escaped real oversight by completely bending his party to his will.
Establishment figures like Coats, who seemingly came to see him as unfit for
office, have been ousted in favor of loyalists who have enabled his nascent
authoritarianism. Coats, in his op-ed, stops short of explicitly saying his ex-
boss is what necessitates the need for such a commission, but he doesn’t really
have to; Biden isn’t the one saying any election he doesn’t win is “rigged,” or
straight-up encouraging people to vote more than once, or kneecapping the postal
service to prevent mail-in voting, or trying to shake-down foreign leaders for
election help. Coats is warning that the electoral system could crumble—and
Americans’ trust in the system right along with it—without an oversight
commission because Trump is intentionally eroding it and nobody in his
administration or in his party is able or willing to stop him.

That, of course, is the problem with Coats’ proposal. Such a commission could,
indeed, serve as a formal guardrail for a system that has largely been based on
custom rather than clear covenant; where the electoral system has, to this
point, assumed the peaceful transition of power at the heart of American
democracy, an independent commission like the one pitched by Coats could enforce
it. What he fails to address, however, is what happens if Trump simply plows
through this new institution as he has with the ones that already exist. The
United States needs better, clearer laws governing elections. In many ways,
though, the problem with Trump has not been a lack of rules or norms to
constrain him, but his refusal to comply with them and his party’s failure to
force him to. Perhaps a panel of respected figures—former presidents, retired
judges—would reinforce the pillars of democracy. It is, however, maybe easier to
imagine a jilted Trump decrying the group as deep state swamp creatures who are
biased against him and his supporters, the Republican party lining up behind
him, and the whole process of institutional distrust starting up all over again.

What this president has proved is that a check matters only to the extent that
it is enforced. Impeachment is only a deterrent if there’s a threat of
conviction. Laws, like the Hatch Act that was flagrantly and enthusiastically
violated during the Republican National Convention, exist in a real sense if
they are observed. And Coats’ commission, particularly in our chronically
divided age, can only stop Trump from trying to undermine the election if
Republicans back the institution without condition. Based on the way they have
continued to ignore, enable, or actively participate in his outrageous
malfeasance, it’s hard to have much confidence they would.
Click to expand...
Powerful material. I salute you for the post.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.

Latest posts

Latest posts

Top