Black and White

Is that the way God sees it? Does He favor those who are good at killing? Or those who are not?

Monday, 06 May, 2024

Bill Bonner, writing today from Dublin, Ireland...  

And did they get you to trade 
Your heroes for ghosts? 
Hot ashes for trees? 
Hot air for a cool breeze? 

— Pink Floyd (1975) 

Whoa! 

Here we have what appears to be a landmark reversal. 

For many years, Americans have been accustomed to thinking of Israelis as the ‘good guys.’ The Saudis, meanwhile, were the ‘bad guys.’ In our simple-minded, un-nuanced way, that was all we needed to know. But now, even New York Times’ columnist Tom Friedman says they might have changed places: 

“To put it bluntly, Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman has put his country’s worst religious extremists in jail, while Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has put his country’s worst religious extremists in his cabinet.” 

We do not claim to know God’s Plan.  And we’re suspicious of those who do. Their world is too tight, too neat…with only two colors — black and white — very unlike the real world. 

In the real world, colors fade... run... and turn gray. And God keeps His plans to Himself. 

Encouraging support for the latest $93 billion ‘foreign aid’ bill, Mike Johnson, House Speaker, identified Hamas as a “terrorist organization.” His heroes were fighting ‘terrorism;’ end of story.  

Johnson neither increases our respect for Congress, nor diminishes it. But an honest family man often doubts that he is doing the right thing for his own children; does Johnson really think he knows the right thing for the children of Israel or Gaza? 

Hamas is the elected government of Gaza, a small area effectively, but not entirely, under Israeli military control. Hamas has little conventional military capability — no tanks, no bombers, no serious artillery or navy, no be-medaled generals, no nuclear submarines or ‘Iron Dome’ to protect it from aerial attack. Vastly outgunned, its campaigns tend to be of a ‘terrorist’ nature, along with Al Qaeda, Islamic Jihad, Hezbollah and other ‘terrorist’ groups.  

Even at terrorism, Hamas is not especially good. Up until September of last year (if we read the data correctly) it was responsible for 1,455 deaths. Often, Hamas attacked Israeli military installations. A campaign against a military target should not be counted as a genuine act of ‘terrorism,’ anyway; it is an act of war. Often as not, there were no casualties on the Israeli side. 

By contrast, Larry Johnson, an ex-CIA analyst, counts the number of Palestinian deaths, at the hands of the Israelis, at 8,660, almost six times as many. If America wanted to be on the winning side, surely Israel was the way to go. 

But is that the way God sees it? Does He favor those who are good at killing? Or those who are not? Larry Johnson: 

“A fair analyst would conclude that the Palestinians are more victimized than the Israelis based on the lop-sided number of killed and wounded on the Palestinian side.” 

That was the score up until September of 2023. Since then, the balance of killing has tipped even further in favor of the Israelis. In the attack launched by Hamas in October, some 1,143 people were killed. It appears that many of those who died, however, were actually killed by “friendly fire” from the Israelis themselves... we don’t know how many. 

Israel counterattacked. About 35,000 Palestinians — most of them women and children — have died so far (many of them still uncounted under the rubble.) This brings the total number of souls snuffed by Hamas terrorism to around 2,598, while those killed by Israel‘s military tote to more than 43,000. Based on the body-bag count alone, the Israeli army is 16 times more of a threat to human life than “terrorists.” 

And how about the rest of the world? 

Statista reports that in an average year of the 21st century about 20,000 people died from ‘terrorism.’ Most of these incidents, as you would expect, occurred in the Middle East or Africa. 

Meanwhile, Brown University’s “Cost of War” project puts the number of people directly killed by America’s ‘War on Terror’ at 929,000, about a third of them civilians. 

In other words, for every victim of terrorists, the US and its allies killed two people. 

An even broader view comes to us from Professor R.J. Rummel, who estimated and summed the number of innocent people killed, not by terrorists, but by legitimate governments. In the 20th century, there were intentional famines, for example, both in the Soviet Union (Holodomor) and in China (Cultural Revolution).  

There were also purges, genocide, ethnic cleansing, concentration camps... killing fields, and mass murderers whose crimes take our breath away — Stalin, Hitler, Pol Pot, Mao... and many others. Rummel puts the total number of dead from communist regimes alone at 148 million. 

James A. Lucas, meanwhile, doesn’t let Americans off the hook. He puts the number of dead in America’s unnecessary wars since WWII — Korea, Vietnam, Guatemala, Nicaragua, Iraq, Afghanistan et al — at 20 million. 

‘We are killing the bad guys,’ Mr. Mike Johnson might reply, ‘and thank God, we’re killing a lot of them.’ 

And who knows; maybe God agrees with him. Or, maybe He doesn’t. 

Regards, 

Bill Bonner 

---

Market Note, by Dan Denning

Here’s an excerpt from my note to paid subscribers on Friday. On Thursday of this week, I’m hosting Rick Rule, host of this year’s Natural Resource Symposium in Boca Raton, FL, for Private Briefing. We’ll discuss uranium, copper, the recent move in gold, and much more. Paying subscribers can send their questions for Rick to bpr@bonnerprivateresearch.com

Demand for uranium is running hot. Japanese authorities have authorized the Kashiwazaki-Kariwa nuclear plant to begin refueling in April. It’s the world’s largest nuclear plant, with a capacity of 8.2 gigawatts (one gigawatt powers about 750,000 households). The plant was shut down in 2012 after the Fukushima disaster in 2011. Japan imports 90% of its energy.

Japan isn’t the only country planning on more nuclear power. Italy is in a fight with Germany to make nuclear power part of a realistic strategy in the European Union. You’re going to need nuclear if you want to eliminate the use of coal and still keep the lights of civilization on (not to mention charging electric vehicles and powering data centers for AI).

Energy and climate ministers from the G-7 countries met in Turin, Italy at the end of last month. These meetings are mostly a waste of time. They have unrealistic policy goals like ‘net zero’ emissions and expensive dinners paid for by taxpayers. But the communique issued at the end of the summit had several paragraphs of what the kids call ‘real talk’ about nuclear power (emphasis added is mine):

Countries that opt to use nuclear energy or support its use recognize its potential as clean/zero-emissions energy source that can reduce dependence on fossil fuels to address the climate crises and improve global energy security. These countries recognise nuclear energy as a source of baseload power, providing grid stability and flexibility, and optimizing use of grid capacity…

We note the global declaration to triple global nuclear energy capacity by 2050 launched during COP28 and recognise that for countries that opt to use it nuclear energy will play a role in reducing dependence on fossil fuels, supporting the transition to net-zero and ensuring energy security, while other countries choose other energy sources to achieve these goals. 

We note that advanced reactors and innovative technologies, such as advanced and small modular reactors, including microreactors, and new designs that are under development could bring in the future additional benefits such as improved safety and sustainability, reduced cost of production, reduced project risk, waste management improvement, better social acceptance, opportunities for industry by providing at the same time energy, high temperature heat, hydrogen. 

Is reality hitting home for politicians?

Remember in late March, the Biden Administration approved a $1.5 billion loan from the Department of Energy to help the State of Michigan Restart the Palisades nuclear plant in Covert Township, about 40 miles West of Kalamazoo (I’m sure this has nothing to do with Michigan’s crucial 15 electoral votes come this November).

Both reactors at Georgia’s new nuclear plant are now in operation. But with no new major plants under construction, and plants at Indian Point in New York and San Onofre in Los Angeles being shut down, the Department of Energy is talking about MORE loans to restart mothballed plants (including Three Mile Island!).

As you can see, there’s a lot to talk about with Rick. And that’s just nuclear energy. I’ll ask him about new lows in natural gas and whether we should be looking there. We’ll talk about BlackRock’s recent report that copper prices need to reach $12,000/ton to incentivize new mining (it’s around $9,655 right now)