Vale Bruce Moon (1930-2025)

Renegade historian Bruce Moon passed away peacefully yesterday morning. Many NOT PC readers will be aware of his work, perhaps from his contributions to the books 'Twisting the Treaty' or 'One Treaty, One Nation' (to which I also contributed), or from one of his many articles, letters, or submissions to Parliament.

Roger Child's obituary below gives us a glimpse of the man we have lost. 

The passing of leading historian Bruce Moon

By Roger Childs

"Of all the fake history with which New Zealand is swamped today, nothing is more

blatant than the claim that “Aotearoa” is, or was, the Maori name for our country."

~ Bruce Moon

Sadly I never met Bruce Moon face to face, but we did exchange scores of e-mails. Like Waikanae’s John Robinson, Bruce was a mathematician and scientist who came to history later in life. Like many of us, he couldn’t believe how many so called “respected historians” like Anne Salmond, Jock Phillips and Vincent O’Malley twisted elements of our country’s story, notably the history of Maori-Settler relations, and of Te Tiriti o Waitangi.

Bruce was a stickler for evidence-based history—taking notice of what people who witnessed the actual events had to say. (In his writing he was meticulous in citing his sources.) He rejected “presentism” and the dishonesty of many Maori activists and their fellow-travelers in looking back at events from a one-sided point of view, often without quoting references.

He was also dismayed at the obsession of the mainstream media in promoting the view that Natives/New Zealanders (only called “Maori” from the 1840s), had been given a hard time by settler governments, when in the Treaty of Waitangi —and in subsequent legislation like the establishment of four special seats in parliament and votes for women —they had been treated humanely.

No Maori land was “stolen,” his writing argued, and confiscations only occurred when forewarned tribes rebelled against the government. Compare the Maori’s experience of colonisation with Aborigines in Australia, the black tribes of South Africa and Native Americans in the United States.

A distinguished career

Bruce Moon was born in Christchurch in 1930 and after attending Southland Boys High School he took his degree at Otago University, majoring in mathematics. He pursued a career in computer science, working in this field in England, Australia and New Zealand. In 1981 he became General Manger of Business Computers Limited. He was a Past President of the NZ Computer Society.

Later he lectured in mathematics at Canterbury University, rising to become Associate Professor. After retiring he taught mathematics and science in a mission school in Vanuatu; was a volunteer in an Indian village for disabled people; and taught English and physics to Tibetan refugees.

When he started looking closely at New Zealand history late in life, he was amazed at how some historians twisted the truth,  basing their conclusions too often on unreliable oral history.

Bruce was also appalled at Maori academics making connections between modern-day events and past treatment of Maori.  In commenting on the 2019 Christchurch terrorist attacks, for example, Waikato University’s Leonie Pihama and Tom Roa claimed that Maori had been victims to acts of terrorism in Aotearoa in the past. Bruce took them to task in a long open letter which ended: "I accuse you of using the tragic events in Christchurch for an inexcusable attempt to advance a racist political agenda and in contempt of the fine principles of scholarship which a university should stand by."

Speaking the truth to all

For some people, Bruce Moon was a man to fear! Some years ago he was scheduled to speak on 'Twisting the Treaty and other Fake History' in Nelson, but the Council was worried there would be trouble, so would not allow one of their venues to be used. The talk now called 'A Jaundiced View of the Treaty' was held later with no problems. Not surprisingly, the House Full sign went up.

The fight at Rangiaohia for the recovery of McHale’s body. February 21 1864, by L.A. Wilson

A few years back Stuff made the ludicrous decision to apologise to Maori for nasty things Stuff-owned papers had said in the past. These articles, claiming to correct untruths of the past, used as their sources people like  tribal leaders and "woke" historian Vincent O’Malley. One article repeated the lies about a “massacre” at Rangiaowhia in 1864. Quite independently, Bruce and I protested in letters to the paper. Unsurprisingly neither was published.  [One of Bruce's articles on which his letter is based is here. My own piece on the incidents at Rangiaowhia, and some of their context, is here. - Ed.]

When Hamilton’s Bishop Stephen Lowe preached a sermon in 2021 about the “massacre,” he also wrote to the Catholic bishops of New Zealand. In the letter he explained the truth about General Cameron’s largely peaceful occupation of the town, and dispelled the myths about a “massacre.” In Bruce’s words, the bishops addressed had neither the courtesy nor the courage to reply.

Bruce will be greatly missed

It is wonderful that Bruce lasted into his mid-nineties. To the end he remained a staunch advocate for getting our history right, and ensuring that our children are taught the truth.

He was a contributor to the excellent Tross publication One Treaty, One Nation with articles on 'There is Only One Treaty' and 'A Very Greedy Tribe – Ngai Tahu.' He also assembled the best of his writings and letters in a collection titled New Zealand: The Fair Colony.

A stickler for truth, evidence, honesty and fairness, Bruce will long be remembered as one of New Zealand’s greatest historians— one with courage and integrity and decency.  He was truly both a gentleman and a scholar.

* * * * 

Roger Childs is a writer and freelance journalist. 

He is a former history and geography teacher, who wrote or co-authored 10 school textbooks. 

His article previously appeared at the Waikenae Watch website.

"I cannot see how anyone could possibly object to a bill committing our country to racial equality and to the sovereignty of Parliament"

"I myself cannot see how anyone could possibly object to a bill committing our country to racial equality and to the sovereignty of the Crown and Parliament.
    "Nor can I see any constitutional objection to our sovereign parliament — the very parliament that has made reference over the years to the ‘principles of the Treaty’ — taking the logical and necessary next step of explaining what those principles are.
    "Nor can I see any objection to leaving the final decision on the matter to a referendum of ordinary citizens ~ whom we do, after all, trust every three years to decide on our rulers for the next Parliamentary term....
    "Nevertheless, some people obviously do object to this bill. Unless they occupy a different reality, however, they must be aware that the bill is, rightly or wrongly, strongly supported by very many other New Zealanders. That is an undoubted and indisputable fact. Those New Zealanders supporting the bill may be misguided, but the fact of their support is absolutely clear. ...
    "[Some objectors argue] that since governments since 1987 ‘have abdicated responsibility’ for interpreting [sections of law containing these principles], that job has been left to the courts — which has now led, allegedly, to ‘clear understandings’ of what [such a section] means. [For example,] that ‘[t]his Act shall so be interpreted and administered as to give effect to the principles of the Treaty…’ ...
    "[Some objectors complain] that governments have ‘abdicated responsibility’ for interpreting [these 'principles' sections], but also complain that Parliament, by this bill, is attempting to interpret the section! [They] cannot have it both ways. Surely Mr Seymour’s bill is an acceptance — not before time! — of Parliament’s responsibility to say what the principles of the Treaty are."

~ David Round from his article 'The Decline of Conservation'

Which is the best Logical Fallacy?

(A list going around on email, originally credited to Brian McGroarty. Hat tips and additions to and from Stephen Hicks, Paul Hsieh, Nancy Tang, Bob Marks, Steven Den Beste, Mike Williams, Justin Weinberg, James Dominguez)

Ad Hominem: This is the best logical fallacy, and if you disagree with me, well, you suck.

Affirming the Consequent: If it is proven that Affirming the Consequent is the best, then I will be very happy. I am feeling very happy, so obviously Affirming the Consequent is the best fallacy.

Appeal to Authority: Your logical fallacies aren’t logical fallacies at all because Einstein said so. Einstein also said that this one is better.

Appeal to Emotion: See, my mom, she had to work three jobs on account of my dad leaving and refusing to support us, and me with my elephantitis and all, all our money went to doctor’s bills so I never was able to get proper schooling. So really, if you look deep down inside yourself, you’ll see that my fallacy here is the best.

Appeal to Fear: If you don’t accept Appeal to Fear as the greatest fallacy, then THE TERRORISTS WILL HAVE WON. Do you want that on your conscience, that THE TERRORISTS WILL HAVE WON because you were a pansy who didn’t really think that Appeal to Fear was worth voting for, and you wanted to vote for something else? Of course not, and neither would the people you let die because THE TERRORISTS WILL HAVE WON.

Appeal to Flattery: If you agree with me that Appeal to Flattery is the greatest fallacy, it shows that you are intelligent and good looking and really good in bed. And a snappy dresser.

Appeal to Force: If you don’t agree that Appeal to Force is the greatest logical fallacy, I will kick your arse.

Appeal to Ignorance: No one has been able to prove that another fallacy is better than Appeal to Ignorance, so it must be the best.

Appeal to Majority: Most people think that this fallacy is the best, so clearly it is.

Appeal to Novelty: The Appeal to Novelty’s a new fallacy, and it blows all your crappy old fallacies out the water! All the cool kids are using it: it’s OBVIOUSLY the best.

Appeal to Numbers: Millions think that this fallacy is the best, so clearly it is.

Appeal to Pity: If you don't agree that Appeal to Pity is the greatest fallacy, think how it will hurt the feelings of me and the others who like it!

Appeal to Tradition: We’ve used Appeal to Tradition for centuries: how can it possibly be wrong?

Argumentum Ad Nauseam:
Argumentum ad nauseam is the best logical fallacy.
Argumentum ad nauseam is the best logical fallacy.
Argumentum ad nauseam is the best logical fallacy.
Argumentum ad nauseam is the best logical fallacy.
Argumentum ad nauseam is the best logical fallacy.
Argumentum ad nauseam is the best logical fallacy.
Argumentum ad nauseam is the best logical fallacy.

Bandwagon Fallacy: It's obvious that Bandwagon is going to win as the greatest fallacy. You wouldn't want to be one of the losers who choose something else, would you?

Begging The Question:
Circular reasoning is the best fallacy and is capable of proving anything.
Since it can prove anything, it can obviously prove the above statement.
Since it can prove the first statement, it must be true.
Therefore, circular reasoning is the best fallacy and is capable of proving anything.

Biased Sample: I just did a poll of all the people in the "Biased Sample Fan Club" and 95% of them agree that Biased Sample is the best fallacy. Obviously it's going to win.

Burden Of Proof: Can you prove that Burden of Proof isn’t the best logical fallacy?

Complex Question: Isn't it terrible that so many people disparage the Complex Question fallacy and beat their wives?

Composition: Each of the other fallacies suck. The Fallacy of Composition is therefore better than the whole lot of them combined.

Denying the Antecedent: If Denying the Antecedent were not the best fallacy, then I would be sad. I am actually in quite a good mood right now, so obviously Denying the Antecedent is the best.

Division: This is the best list of fallacies. It follows that there could be no better description of the Fallacy of Division than this.

Equivocation: The best fallacy is on this list. Equivocation is on this list. Therefore, the best fallacy is equivocation.

The Fallacy Fallacy: Some have argued that the Fallacy Fallacy couldn't be the best fallacy because some arguments for it being the best fallacy are themselves fallacious. Clearly, this is a fallacious argument, from which we can only conclude that the Fallacy Fallacy is indeed the best fallacy.

False Analogy: Just as the jelly donut is the best donut, so too is False Analogy the best fallacy.

False Dilemma: I’ve found that either you think False Dilemma is the best fallacy, or you’re a terrorist.

False Premise: All of the other fallacies are decent, but clearly not the best as they didn’t come from my incredibly large and sexy brain.

Gambler’s Fallacy: In all the previous talks about this subject, Gambler’s Fallacy lost, so the Gambler’s Fallacy is going to win this time because it's the Gambler's Fallacy's turn to win!


Genetic Fallacy is best because all those other people who proposed fallacies only believe them because of their social conditioning.

Guilt by Association: You know who else preferred those other logical fallacies? *(insert pictures of Hitler, Stalin, and Pol Pot here)*

Hypostatisation (personification): Go, Hypostatisation Fallacy, you can do it! If you just try hard enough you can be the best fallacy there is! Oh come on now, don't look at me like that

Non Sequitur: Non Sequitur is the best fallacy because none of my meals so far today have involved asparagus.

Post Hoc/False Cause: Since I’ve started presuming that correlation equals causation, violent crime has gone down 54%.

Red Herring: They say that to prove your fallacy is the best requires extraordinary evidence, because it’s an extraordinary claim. Well, I’d like to note that “Extraordinary claims demand extraordinary evidence” is itself an extraordinary claim.

Relativism: Well maybe all those other fallacies are the best for you, but to me, the relativist fallacy is the greatest logical fallacy ever.

Slippery slope is the best logical fallacy, and if you disagree with that, well, it’s a few short steps to the total collapse of the logical abilities of mankind and consequent downfall of society in general.

Special Pleading: I know that everyone is posting about their favorite fallacies, but Special Pleading is out-and-out the best, so it should just win with no contest.

Straw Man Argument: Apparently you think the Straw Man Argument is bad because you have something against the Wizard of Oz. Well, you know what? It doesn't have anything to do with the Wizard of Oz! Therefore, the Straw Man Argument must be the best fallacy.

In praise of Gerry Brownlee (IPoGB)

It seems necessary to write a post praising Gerry Brownlee.

Neither a sentence, nor a sentiment, I ever thought I would express.

It turns out however that Mr Brownlee is as contemptuous of the over-use of acronyms as I am. And as opposed as David Seymour appears approving. Bob Edlin takes up the story:

In Parliament this week, ACT MP Mark Cameron lobbed a patsy question at his leader, David Seymour, the Minister for Regulation:

    What recent announcements has he made about cutting red tape?

Seymour replied:

    [an answer filled with acronym-filled gobbledy-gook]

Andrew Hoggard: What particular recommendations did the review make regarding the approvals process under the ACVM?

Speaker Brownlee intervened before the reply was given:

SPEAKER: What’s the ACVM? I hate acronyms.

Hoggard explained: Agricultural compounds and veterinary medicines.

SPEAKER: It’s easy to say. Carry on.

This is true. Full names are easy to say. And easier for a listener (or reader) to digest.

As evolutionary ecologist Stephen B.Heard explains, acronyms put a cognitive load on readers and listeners that obscure the actual message being said (so you can see why politicians generally love them.)

Writing about his pet peeves six years ago, Heard said that over a two-week period he had written peer reviews for three different manuscripts (MSs).

All three included newly coined acronyms (NCAs) to substitute for repeated short technical phrases (RSTPs). I’ve gotten in the habit, whenever I run across an NCA, to use my word processor’s search function (WPSF) to find and count occurrences of the NCA in the MS. Frequently (including for two of the recent three MSs), my WPSF reveals that the NCA is used only once or twice more in the MS. That makes it an RUA – a rarely used acronym – and RUAs are one of my writing pet peeves (WPPs). 

By now that you probably suspect that I’m deliberately using a lot of acronyms to annoy you. You’re right, and if I’ve succeeded, I’ve made my point.

The problem with acronyms in general, and newly coined ones in particular, Heard said, was that they placed a cognitive load on the reader.

As you read that first paragraph of mine, every time you came to an occurrence of “NCA”, you had to stop to decode the acronym – to remember what it stood for, to replace NCA in the sentence with “newly coined acronym”, and then to reconsider the modified sentence to assess what was being said about those newly coined acronyms.
    When an acronym is brand new, that cognitive load is significant. As an acronym becomes more familiar, the load gets smaller, until an acronym as familiar as DNA or SCUBA doesn’t carry any load at all – it’s simply a word synonymous with the original phrase, and often a simpler one at that. The issue is that few acronyms have the status of DNA – carrying lower cognitive load than the phrase it replaces.
    The extra work imposed by a newly coined acronym is worthwhile only if there’s a payoff for the reader; and if you use the newly coined acronym only once or twice, that’s very unlikely.

In his article, Stephen Heard suggested there are four reasons for people loving acronyms – one good, and three dubious at best.The good reason: because sometimes, acronyms really do save reader effort. I’d rather read “DNA” thirty-seven times in a paper than “deoxyribonucleic acid” thirty-seven times.

• The first dubious reason: because acronyms make it easier to write. I’d rather type “DNA” than “deoxyribonucleic acid”, even if it’s just once. Actually, I use all kinds of newly coined acronyms when I’m writing – but then I use search-and-replace to substitute actual words before I put my manuscript in front of a reader. (A custom macro can do this easily, if you like such things.) No decision about how a manuscript looks should be based on how it’s easiest to write – all decisions are about the reader.
• The second dubious reason: because acronyms make the text shorter. Brevity is indeed important (which is why The Scientist’s Guide to Writing has an entire chapter on it). But: while it’s easy to measure brevity by word count, what really matters is not a manuscript’s word count,*** but how long it takes someone to read and understand it. Here, acronyms (and especially novel ones) can be counterproductive.
• The third and most dubious reason: because acronyms make our writing sound science-y. Like the passive voice, “utilize”, the flattening of authorial voice, and the avoidance of contractions, acronyms are a familiar characteristic of our literature. They’re part of what makes a piece of writing feel like authentic scientific writing to us. As writers, we tend to emulate what we read, and we can be downright uncomfortable with text that doesn’t sound like the rest of the literature. Unfortunately, that means our tedious and turgid literature only gets more tedious and more turgid.

Heard wrapped up his article with a plea to cut it out with newly coined but rarely used acronyms (NCBRUAs).

John Bolton's Advice for Winston Peters

Winston Peters is in Washington DC today.

His best advice would be to not leave his hotel room at all.  To ring in sick. To bust out on room service.

His best advice is to not be noticed.

It's when you're noticed that Washington' Toddler-in Chief starts paying you attention. And that hasn't gone well for any (former) ally.

Nonetheless, as he already has meetings booked with the Trump Administration, Trump's former Secretary of State John Bolton has some advice for him that might be useful.

Perhaps one of you could pass it on.

I think people should understand that Trump is really an aberration in American political life.

Obviously he's president,  so it makes a a big difference. But he has no philosophy, he has no National Security Grand Strategy, he doesn't do policy as we conventionally understand that term. With him everything is transactional, episodic, ad hoc, annd seen through the prism of what benefits Donald Trump.

He has said many times he sees foreign policy as as being equivalent to the relations between the heads of two governments. So if he has a good relationship with Vladimir Putin he thinks the US has good relations with Russia.

Now, I'm not dismissing the role of personal relations in international affairs.  It obviously has a place. But that's not how Putin sees things. He has a pretty clear-eyed view of what he thinks Russia's national interest is, and he thinks he can manipulate Donald Trump. Trump thinks they're friends; Putin sees Trump as an easy mark. Trump just doesn't get it.

Now conversely, if Trump has bad relations with with a foreign head of state then he thinks the US has bad relations with the country. And unfortunately for Ukraine,  because of the famous 'perfect phone call' between Trump and Zelenskyy in the summer of 2019 that led to Trump's first impeachment, I think he he's never had a good relationship with Zelenskyy, notwithstanding Zelenskyy's extensive efforts to try and overcome it.

And I think that is part of what we've seen play out over the past several weeks.

So it is a fact that that Trump has basically reversed the US position, saying even before negotiations began there will not be a full restoration of sovereignty and territorial integrity no NATO membership, no NATO security guarantees, no US security guarantees — you know, these are all Kremlin positions.

The only unhappiness in Moscow these days is that they didn't ask for more. ...

I do think that the debacle in the Oval Office was a manifestation that Trump just doesn't like Zelenskyy, and now I think we're seeing an effort by Secretary of State Rubio and National Security adviser Waltz to try and bridge this over and get things back on an even keel.

Why Trump Misunderstands Putin & Ukraine
As I say, he thinks he's friends with Putin so your friends always tell you the truth, right. Just like he said in Helsinki that he
believed Putin and disagreed with American Intelligence on Russia's role in the 2016 election. Stunning to Americans that he would say that but you know do you trust your friends or do you trust the 'Deep State.' That's the Trump mentality.

I just think that it's important to to try and work with Trump on that understanding: that it's entirely personal. 

That he doesn't conceptualise foreign policy.

There's no strategy behind it.

His supporters say, you know, he plays this complex game of three-dimensional chess. No he doesn't. He plays regular chess one move at a time.

You know, there are theories that he was recruited by the Russians years ago. I don't see any evidence of it. I think his behaviour is explainable unfortunately in simpler ways. ... he operates on a day-to-day basis; there's no bigger picture; there's no hidden agenda. He just doesn't think that way.

When he ran the Trump Organisation in business, I was told he he would never set up a daily schedule. He'd come into the office every day and say, "Well what's going to happen today." Now, that may work in real estate in Manhattan; it doesn't work internationally.

But in many respects, Trump is still that same person.  ...

So in international Affairs other than his affinity for particular foreign leaders, he had no fixed points of reference.

And so, sure, he could adopt ideas, but changed them very shortly thereafter.

I said in my book that of the thousands of decisions that he made in his first term you you could take them all and put them together and they were like a big archipelago of dots out there. Now, you can try and connect the dots if you want to. Good luck. He can't connect the dots.

And, uh, understanding that I think obviously is important. 

Q: How should any of these foreign leaders, whether it's the Canadians, whether it's the Danish, how should should they be interpreting all that Trump is saying and doing, and what would you recommend they do in response?

Well I understand it's very frustrating to have to put up with this. All I can say is I saw it daily for 17 months. ...

But in Trump's world, he doesn't understand how to achieve the objective that he wants, and he may have some idea that it  would enhance his position in history if he could conquer Greenland [say], but it's it's not serious. 

It however shows an erratic, unsteady, and totally transactional presidency that has to unnerve our allies. And the best I can say is just grit your teeth. ...  so we don't do more damage than Trump himself is doing. ... 

From their perspective, they need to try and find ways to work with him. It's hard to predict who will be successful. 

It looks for example like British Prime Minister Keir Starmer has so far pretty good relationship with Trump. I wouldn't necessarily have predicted that, but but it looks like it's off to a good start. Prime Minister Meloni of Italy, I think, has a good relationship. So does Victor Orban of Hungary — that's not a pattern we'd like to see repeated. But I think leaders are going to have to think about, uh, how to flatter Trump.

I mean I'm sorry to have to say that, but that's what gets to him.

So my recommendation [to Zelenskyy for example] would be to do what Shinzo Abe, the Prime Minister of Japan, did in the first term. Nominate Trump for the Nobel Peace Prize — and do it quickly before somebody else thinks of it. 

Generative 'AI' "is "90% marketing and 10% reality"

"You know what,  I think AI is really interesting and I think it is going to change the world. And at the same time I hate the hype cycle so much that I really don't want to go there.

"So my approach to AI right now is, I will basically ignore it, because I think the whole tech industry around AI is in a very bad position. It's 90% marketing and 10% reality.  

"In five years things will change. And and at that point we'll see what of the AI is getting used every day for real workloads instead of just — [you know] Chat GPT makes great demonstrations, and is being used in many areas — graphics design, things like that — but I really hate the hype cycle. And it's not just AI it's I think it's an industry problem." 

~ Linus Torvalds, creator and lead developer of Linux, interviewed at the 'Open Source Summit' in Vienna [37:34]

"Like many other technology waves, a bubble is kind of inevitable. When you pass the stage of initial excitement people would be disappointed that the technology doesn't meet a high expectation generated through the the initial excitement.

"We've seen this many times.  When the internet took off in the mid to late '90s ... and there there was a huge bubble at the end of '99 and until probably March of 2000 [when] the bubble burst. Similar for mobile internet. And this time for generative AI; I think we will also go through that kind of period too.

"But I think it's also healthy; it will wash out a lot of, you know fake innovations or, products that don't have a market fit. 

"But after that probably 1% of the companies will stand out and become huge, and will create tremendous value ... and I think we're just going through this kind of process this year."

~ Robin Li, Baidu CEO, interviewed at Harvard Business Review's 'Future of Business' conference 

THE LONG READ: A Christian Nation?

WHAT’S THE BASIS OF western civilisation? A commenter here at Not PC suggested that the foundation is religion —specifically Christian religion.

Now that's a widespread view to be sure, but being widespread doesn’t mean it’s not totally wrong. Which it is.

As I said in response to that commenter, "I suspect the Classical Greeks might raise some objections to the proposition, as might several historians of both the Dark Ages and the Enlightenment." 

If the basis of western civilisation can be described as a focus on reason, individualism, and happiness on this earth — ideas that were a product not of theologians but of Classical Greeks — ideas which were fortunately rediscovered for the west in the Renaissance, and then developed further in the Enlightenment — then, far from being any sort of foundation for these ideas, Christian religion is at odds with all of them. (More on that below.)

My commenter however suggested that as leading proof of his thesis was the observation that the USA is a "heavily Christian country" Which is true. As one data point in that thesis's favour he notes that "the US produced 173,771 patents in 2006. Check all Islamic countries since 1700 and you might get 1000.” 

Fine. But observe that a leading cause of scientific inquiry is the Enlightenment focus on reason and this earth. It is not being “heavily Christian.”  And the fact is that theocracy — any theocracy — is bad for free-wheeling scientific research.  

It's equally true that religion — any religion — is a hindrance rather than a help to scientific research. (Faith and mysticism are twin handmaidens of religion, but not handmaidens to truth—they so-called shortcuts to knowledge that are nothing but short-circuits destroying the mind, and destroying science if we would let them.) 

To properly assess causes for the claim above then, we might observe that the number of patents issued during the Dark Ages, over which the Christian church presided, can be counted on the fingers of one foot. Given that Islam is now enduring its own Dark Ages, it’s no surprise to find that their religious darkness (and patent production) is just as stultifying as the west's.

Fact is, the reason for the disparity in those quoted figures above is not because there are different religions in the US and in Islamic countries; it is because the influence of religion is far less and far less all-pervasive in the US than it is in the Islamic theocracies. The separation of religion and state was well done by America's Founders.

NOW I CAN ALREADY HEAR the claim that "the US was founded as a Christian country." Well, it simply wasn't. The Founding Fathers themselves were quite clear that they never intended that. John Adams for example declared explicitly, 

“The government of the United States is not in any sense founded on the Christian religion.”

Read that again just so you take it in:

“The government of the United States is not in any sense founded on the Christian religion.”

You can't get too much more of a blunt declaration than that.

Fact is, America's Revolution was not founded on the Christian God or upon any religion at all, but upon a view of human freedom and a declaration of rights that were both a product of the Enlightenment. As Thomas Jefferson explained (and he would know):

“Our civil rights have no dependence on our religious opinions, no more than on our opinions in physics and geometry...”

So declared Thomas Jefferson.

Fact is, the US was not a nation founded on religion at all. It was fully a Nation of the Enlightenment, that proud and unique era in human affairs that represented an overthrow of religion, and a renaissance of reason. [More quotes in this vein here] In fact if religion is anything to America it’s not a bulwark but a handbrake . It’s a threat, not a foundation—which is a what philosopher Leonard Peikoff maintains. 

Think about it: Just what exactly did religion bring to history? Founding Father James Madison has the summary:

“Religious bondage shackles and debilitates the mind and unfits it for every noble enterprise....During almost fifteen centuries has the legal establishment of Christianity been on trial. What have been its fruits? More or less, in all places, pride and indolence in the clergy; ignorance and servility in laity; in both, superstition, bigotry, and persecution.”

Ignorance, superstition, bigotry and persecution. They do not describe western civilisation, but they do describe the Dark Ages to a 'T'; that ordure-strewn wasteland of crosses and graves and misery; those dark centuries over which the Christian church so dolefully presided.

As philosopher Leonard Peikoff explains, 

"The Dark Ages were dark on principle. Augustine fought against secular philosophy, science, art;  he regarded all of it as an abomination to be swept aside; he cursed science in particular as 'the lust of the eyes'. . .
    “As the barbarians were sacking the body of Rome, the Church was struggling to annul the last vestiges of its spirit, wrenching the West away from nature, astronomy, philosophy, nudity, pleasure, instilling in men's souls the adoration of Eternity, with all its temporal consequences.""

The church made Augustine a saint for his views. No wonder. Augustine distinguished between what he called the City of God (based upon faith) and the City of Man (based upon reason) – he praised the former and damned the latter. Concern solely with life on Earth was a sin, he said. For Augustine, man was "crooked and sordid, bespotted and ulcerous." 

"Intellectually speaking [concludes Peikoff], the period of the Middle Ages was the exact opposite of classical Greece. Its leading philosophic spokesman, Augustine,
held that faith was the basis of man's entire mental life. ‘I do not know in
order to believe,’ he said, ‘I believe in order to know.’ In other words,
reason is nothing but a handmaiden of revelation; it is a mere adjunct of
faith, whose task is to clarify, as far as possible, the dogmas of religion.
    "What if a dogma cannot be clarified? So much the better, answered an earlier
Church father, Tertullian. The truly religious man, he said, delights in
thwarting his reason; that shows his commitment to faith. Thus, Tertullian's
famous answer, when asked about the dogma of God's self-sacrifice on the
cross: ‘Creo quia absurdum. (‘I believe because it is absurd.’)
    "As to the realm of physical nature, the medievals characteristically
it as a semi-real haze, a transitory stage in the divine plan, and a
troublesome one at that, a delusion and a snare - a delusion because men
mistake it for reality, a snare because they are tempted by its lures to
jeopardize their immortal souls. What tempts them is the prospect of earthly
pleasure.
    "What kind of life, then, does the immortal soul require on earth? Self-
denial, asceticism, the resolute shunning of this temptation. But isn't unfair
to ask men to throw away their whole enjoyment of life? Augustine's answer is:
what else befits creatures befouled by original sin, creatures who are, as he
put it, 'crooked and sordid, bespotted and ulcerous'." ['Religion vs America,' Leonard Peikoff]

In his book A History of Knowledge, historian Charles Van Doren points out that

"God was the last of the three great medieval challenges [note: others being the “struggle for subsistence” and a “world of enemies”], and the most important. Human beings had always been interested in God and had attempted to understand his ways. But the Greeks, and especially the Romans, had kept this interest under control…In the early Middle Ages it overcame the best and the brightest among Europeans. It can almost be said that they became obsessed with God." [A History of Knowledge, Charles van Doren, p. 100]

What were the practical results of this approach to life? You won't be surprised.

Dutch economic historian Angus Maddison points out that from 500 to 1500 AD Europe suffered from zero-percent economic growth. Zero percent! This in a period in which onea slice of bread per day could be considered a good meal. In which the average infant had a life expectancy of just 24 years -- if, that is, they weren't of that third who failed to live beyond their first year. [See Angus Maddison, Phases of Capitalist Development, pp 4-7, and Angus Maddison, The World Economy: A Millennial Perspective]

Says French historian Fernand Braudel of the pre-eighteenth century era, 

"Famine recurred so insistently for centuries on end that it became incorporated into ma's biological regime and built into his daily life..." [Fernand Braudel, The Structures of Everyday Life: Civilization and Capitalism, 15th-18th Centuries, pp 73-78]

Everything human took a dive, only re-emerging centuries later with the Renaissance (which represented the rediscovery by the west of Aristotle and the Classical Greeks), and then the Enlightenment (which represented the application of Aristotelian reason to human life).

Life during the Dark Ages was shit. Almost literally. Sanitation collapsed, and disease rocketed; agriculture barely fed those who worked the fields, and that in good years; literacy and education plummeted; learning almost vanished; scientific research itself was almost non-existent, replaced instead by arcane theological explorations into the nature of the supernatural; life expectancy as we've said was just barely above the teens ... and the ethic of faith, sacrifice and suffering oversaw it all. The only thing that flourished in this time was the church, and its churchmen.

The result was not at all a flourishing of reason and a devotion to life on earth. Quite the opposite. For that we had to wait for the rediscovery of Aristotle (for the west) in the Renaissance – and for that we do have to thank the world of Islam (whose scholars had preserved Aristotle’s works, and during the period those works and their secular focus were valued Islam enjoyed its own Golden Age.)

W.T. Jones, the 20th century's leading philosophical historian, summarises the state of the west at this time: 

"Because of the indifference and downright hostility of the Christians ... almost the whole body of ancient literature and learning was lost... This destruction was so great and the rate of recovery was so slow that even by the ninth century Europe was still immeasurably behind the classical world in every department of life... This, then, was truly a 'dark' age." [W.T. Jones, A History of Western Philosophy, vol. 2, The Medieval Mind' pp141-142]

And so it was: An age in which ignorance, superstition, bigotry and persecution flourished. 

In no way do those qualities describe western civilisation — but they do describe the Dark Ages to a 'T,' those centuries over which the Christian church so dolefully presided, and whose shackles the west had to break to emerge, like a butterfly, from its pagan chrysalis.

And those qualities also describe to a ‘T’ the present-day Islamic theocracies—who like the west of that Dark era rejected the sunlit secularism of the Greeks only to embrace its polar opposite. We can see in them now what the west's Dark Ages was like then (and, in reverse, see in the West now what the Islamic Golden Age may have become, if not for its destruction by theology.)

SO IN SUMMARY, the basis of western civilisation is not Christian religion. Sure, Christian religion in its Enlightenment clothing contributed art, music, literature and much more. But the foundation on which those contributions were made was contributed by the rediscovery and then the application of Greco-Roman thought and Aristotelian reason. 

Because the leitmotifs of western civilisation are not ignorance, superstition, bigotry and persecution —all the things so associated with the Christian-dominated Dark Ages —but their polar opposites: reason, freedom and individualism.

We got these beneficient ideas from the Greeks. And we had to shake off centuries of religion to rediscover them.

RELATED LINKS: 

• Murdering tall poppies - that's what Easter is all about - NOT PC
• The Founding Fathers on religion - Ayn Rand Institute
• Religion vs America - Leonard Peikoff
• The Universalisability of Western Civilisation - George Reisman
• Christianity’s War against the Mind – Aristotle Versus Religion - Andrew Bernstein
• Gimme That Old Time Religion! - James Valliant
• The Nature of Western Civilisation - George Reisman
• The Tragedy of Theology: How Religion Caused and Extended the Dark Ages. A Critique of Rodney Stark’s The Victory of Reason. – Andrew Bernstein (with responses)
• “So, How Come You Keep Bashing Religion?” - NOT PC

NB: This is a 2007 post, re-posted here slightly edited (and with links updated) from a 2010 update. There's a pretty good comments thread back there, if you'd like to check it out.

"Is there any actual US policy to get Russia to accept a ceasefire? Or is the US is an ally of Russian imperialism?"

"Ukraine has proposed a ceasefire without conditions. Russia will almost certainly reject this and try to dictate to [US Special Envoy Steve] Witkoff that the US help Russia achieve colonial control of Ukraine, something that Russia could never achieve on its own.
    "Then we see if there is any actual US policy to get Russia to do what Ukraine has done, to accept a ceasefire, or if the US is an ally of Russian imperialism and this whole process has just been a cover story for American submission to Russian wishes. If Witkoff comes back from Russia endorsing Russian demands regarding Ukrainian sovereignty we have our answer.
    "Russia has no more right to dictate anything that happens inside Ukraine than Ukraine has to dictate what happens inside Russia. And the 'root causes' of this war are all inside Russia, as the Russians are reminding us."

~ Timothy Snyder

Let's not ban social media for sub-16-year olds

WHEN AUSTRALIA PASSES LEGISLATION, we're often not far behind.

Australia's Orwellianly titled Online Safety Amendment (Social Media Minimum Age) Act was passed last year. 

The Act's aim is to ban under 16-year olds from social media.

The social media ban was rushed through Parliament with no real inquiry into the nature of the problem it was supposed to solve or the likely effects of a ban. Evidence from mental health experts on the question of whether and how social media use is harmful is at best inconclusive, as far as I can determine.
    But the advocates of a ban haven’t worried too much about that. They’ve relied on casual correlation and on the testimony of instant experts, with no particular expertise in the mental health of young people. ... most notably Jean Twenge and Jonathan Haidt.

Twenge peddles bullshit based on so-called "generational analysis"— on the assumption that being a "millennial"/"Gen Z"/"Gen Y"/"Gen Jones" is any more effective than astrology. (Indeed, as one review of her latest book concludes, "for serious scholarly work, five-year birth cohorts, categorised by race, gender and class background, are much more useful. For entertainment purposes, astrology is just as good and less divisive.”)

Jonathan Haidt is other alleged expert relied upon. Haidt was good on teenagers' need for more independence — here he is not only bad at the data, but is arguing against his own earlier conclusion. In Mike Masnick's summary of the situation:

Six years ago, NYU social psychologist and author Jonathan Haidt co-authored 'The Coddling of the American Mind. 'In the book, he and Greg Lukianoff argued that parents are doing a real disservice to their kids by overprotecting (coddling) them, rather than giving them more freedom and allowing them to make mistakes and learn.
    This year, he’s back with a new book, 'The Anxious Generation,' arguing the exact opposite in the digital world: that social media and smartphones have made kids under-protected, rewiring brains and increasing teenage depression rates.
    Haidt tries to address this obvious contradiction in his book with the standard cop-out of the purveyor of every modern moral panic: “This time it’s different!” He provides little evidence to support that.

"Unfortunately for those seeking an easy solution," says Masnick "the data doesn’t support Haidt’s conclusions."

[A]s a quick summary: he’s wrong on the data, which undermines his entire argument. Almost every single expert in the field who does actual research on these issues says so. Candice Odgers ripped apart his misleading use of data in Nature. Andrew Przybylski, who has done multiple, detailed studies using massive amounts of data going back years, and keeps finding little to no evidence of the things Haidt claims, has talked about the problems in Haidt’s data. Ditto Jeff Hancock, at Stanford, who recently helped put together the National Academies of Sciences report on social media and adolescent health (which also did not find what Haidt found).
    Indeed, one thing that came up in looking over the “strongest” research in the book was that (contrary to some of Haidt’s claims), data outside of the US on suicide rates seem to show they’re often (not always) going down, not up. Even worse, the data on depression in the US showing an increase in depression rates among kids is almost certainly due to changes in screening practices for depression and how suicide ideation is recorded.
    As my review notes, though, the problems with the data are only the very beginning of the problems with the book. Because, in the first part of the book, Haidt misleadingly throws around all the data, but in the latter part, he focuses on his policy recommendations.

It's those very policy recommendations that Australia has just followed! 

It's not just pseudo-psychology based on bad data: "even his former co-author, Greg Lukianoff, pointed out that Haidt’s proposals clearly violate [the US's] First Amendment."

So fast and loose on both data and free speech!

CANDICE ODGERS IS ONE researcher whose data, she says, from "studies on the impact of phones and social media on children, including a 'study of studies,' conclude that social media is good for some kids, helping them find like-minded individuals. It’s mostly neutral for many kids, and problematic for only a very small group (studies suggest less than 10 percent)." In other words, as she notes in her review of Haidt’s book 

the evidence suggests the causality is likely in the other direction.

Ouch.

A recent debate pitted Odgers against Haidt, where — as he watched his argument crumble — he had to admit that she knows the data better than he.

This matters, because this bullshit will be coming here soon. You can count on it.

A judge in a Florida court this week summarises how absurd the bullshit is.  Masnick commentates the brawl:

The transcript reads like a master class in dismantling moral panic arguments. When Florida’s lawyers stood up in court to defend the law, they reached for what they clearly thought was their strongest argument: “Well, Your Honor, it is well known in this country that kids are addicted to these platforms.”

But Judge Mark Walker, chief judge of the Northern District of Florida, wasn’t buying what Florida was selling. His response cut straight to the heart of why these kinds of claims deserve skepticism, and some of it was based on his own childhood experience on the other side of a moral panic:

MR. GOLEMBIEWSKI: Well, Your Honor, it is well known in this country that kids are addicted to these platforms. This is a mental health —

THE COURT: It was well known when I was growing up that I was going to become a Satanist because I played Dungeons & Dragons. Is that — I don’t know what really that means. You can say that there’s studies, Judge, and you can’t ignore expert reports that say X.

The D&D reference isn’t just an amusing comeback — it’s a federal judge explaining through personal experience why courts shouldn’t accept “everybody knows” arguments about harm to children. After all, lots of things have been “well known” to harm children over the years. It was “well known” that chess made kids violent. Or that the waltz would be fatal to young women, or that the phone would prevent young men from ever speaking to young women again. I could go on with more examples, because there are so many.

When Florida’s lawyer tried to argue that social media was somehow different — that this time the moral panic was justified — Judge Walker was ready with historical receipts:

MR. GOLEMBIEWSKI: Kids weren’t reading comics — millions and millions of kids weren’t reading comics eight hours a day. Millions and millions of kids weren’t listening to rap music eight hours a day. There’s something different going on here, and there’s a consensus —

THE COURT: The problem, Counsel, that’s a really bad example, the comics, because there is an entire exhibit in Glasgow where they barred comics in the entire country because somebody decided that comics were turning their youth against their parents and were causing them to engage and worship the supernatural and stuff.

So, I mean, I guess that was the point the plaintiffs were making is from the beginning of time, we’ve targeted things under some belief that it’s harming our youth, but doesn’t necessarily make it so.

But, go ahead.

That trailing “but, go ahead” is savage. I think I’d rather curl up in a ball and try to disappear in the middle of a courtroom than “go ahead” after that.

"This is the best recession ever."

"This is the best recession ever. No one has ever created a better recession than me."

~ satirical comment from @evracer, commenting on Trump's risible interview with Maria Bartiromo denying the effect of tariffs' chaos. As another says, "You know it’s bad when the Fox News comments have turned on Trump."

"The Trump administration, citing our own work, proposes a 'benchmark' for an optimal tariff. We think this is a very bad idea."

"The Trump administration ... [is] citing our own work, propos[ing] 20% as a 'benchmark' for the US optimal tariff. We think this is a very bad idea. ...

"The 'optimal tariff argument' builds on the idea that countries have market power, and so can benefit from exercising it. ...

"As a matter of academic debate, it is certainly interesting to understand why, in the absence of any international rules and institutions, a country may have incentives to exploit its market power by being protectionist. As a matter of actual policy, however, such considerations provide a misleading picture of what the overall impact of US tariffs would be. The reason is foreign retaliation.

"The optimal tariff argument assumes that when foreigners face higher trade barriers in the United States, they sit idle, get poorer, and do not impose their own tariffs on US goods. This won't happen. ...

"[T]he new Trump administration ... view[s] tariffs as a game of chicken. ... The game of chicken, however, is the wrong metaphor to think about trade wars.

"Trade wars are best viewed as a prisoner's dilemma. Instead of staying silent, prisoners are always tempted to testify against their partner in crime in exchange for a more lenient sentence. By doing so, however, they all end up in prison for longer. Similarly, because each country has some market power to exploit, they have incentives to raise trade barriers, regardless of what the other countries do. The problem is that, when they all do so, none of them succeed in making their imports cheaper and they all end up being poorer. ...

"The world trading system that emerged after World War II was designed precisely to keep countries' beggar-thy-neighbour impulses in check and avoid repeating the trade wars from the 1930s. It allowed countries to sustain trade cooperation for decades. ...

"Pursuing a policy of raising tariffs would most likely lead to a new global trade war. Its consequences, unfortunately, are not hard to predict. It would mean less trade and, most importantly, less international cooperation on the big issues of the day: war, poverty, and climate change."

~ Andrés Rodríguez-Clare and Arnaud Costinot from their post ''A very bad idea': Two economists respond to White House citing them on 20% tariffs'

"But it is difficult to remain silent in the face of events that affect our lives fundamentally."

"Anne Salmond's ... 'Newsroom' column berat[es] people for having views on the Treaty of Waitangi when they cannot even read the Māori version of the treaty. ... that even when customs, laws or treaties impinge on your daily life, you cannot hold any views on these matters if you are unable to read the relevant documents in their original form.
    "It is safe to say that this view would come as a bit of a surprise to Biblical scholars who are not well versed in all of Aramaic, Greek, Hebrew and Latin. Clearly no Hindu or Buddhist can have any views on their own religion if they cannot read Sanskrit. And no one can say anything about Islam if they are not familiar with Arabic.
    "[Equally] immigrants to countries like France or Germany can express no views on tax or social welfare policies if they cannot read, write or speak the language.
    "This is obviously ridiculous and highly parochial. I have a feeling that even Anne Salmond understands the frivolity of her argument.
    "[She] is engaging in is what the philosopher Harry Frankfurt calls 'bullshit.'
    "This is where intellectuals and policy makers, who have no good answers to valid questions from regular people, essentially resort to using jargon to sidestep the matter....

    "But it is difficult to remain silent in the face of events that affect our lives fundamentally."

~ Prof. Ananish Chaudhari from his post 'Inability to understand te reo Māori does not prevent people from asking questions about race relations in New Zealand'

FACTCHECK: Climate Version

The Climate Realism site fact-checks February's climate stories. These are their top five corrections:

They suggest that "what’s disappearing faster than glaciers is US participation in the United Nations Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC)."

Our prediction is that the glaciers will outlast the climate hoax.

I reckon they'll be right about that too.

PS: Other notable February climate fact-checks:

• The Guardian says, "There Are Identifiable 'Climate Tipping Points' for 'Climate Catastrophes: 
WRONG:"The premise that we are approaching dangerous and unprecedented climate tipping points is unsupported by history or present data."
• Earth.Com says, "climate change is causing cocoa production to fall in West and Central Africa." 
THIS IS FALSE: "Data show that cocoa production has increased during the last few decades of modest warming, rather than falling. Part of the reason for this is improved growing conditions in those regions and carbon dioxide fertilisation."
• The Washington Post says, "Rats Are Thriving in Cities—And Climate Change Is Helping Them.” 
THIS IS FALSE: "Rats have always lived among and thrived with human populations. As cities have grown, so have urban rat populations, benefitting from mismanaged waste, ineffective pest control policies, and urban decay, none of which have anything to do with CO₂ levels."
• The New York Times says that "Climate Change is Causing High Coffee Prices." 
THIS IS NOT BORNE OUT IN THE DATA. "Coffee production data show that there has been a steady increase over time, despite—and perhaps due in part to—increased atmospheric carbon dioxide and the slight warming of recent decades."
• A recently published (and trumpeted) paper identifies a catastrophic "tipping point" for the Greenland ice sheet. 
BUT HERE'S THE PROBLEM: "This scenario is entirely model-driven, with little to no real-world validation. And, more importantly, it hinges on assumptions that stretch the limits of scientific credibility."
• And finally, "for years, climate scientists have assured us that NOAA’s homogenised temperature datasets—particularly the Global Historical Climatology Network (GHCN)—are the gold standard for tracking global warming."
HOWEVER: "A recent study published in Atmosphere has uncovered shocking inconsistencies in NOAA’s adjustments, raising serious concerns about the reliability of homogenised temperature records. ... [The] findings reveal a deeply concerning pattern of inconsistencies and unexplained changes in temperature adjustments, prompting renewed scrutiny of how NOAA processes climate data."

"Europe is at a critical turning point in its history."

“President, Mr. Prime Minister, Ladies and Gentlemen Ministers, My dear colleagues,

"Europe is at a critical turning point in its history. The American shield is crumbling, Ukraine risks being abandoned, Russia strengthened. Washington has become the court of Nero ...

"This is a tragedy for the free world, but it is first and foremost a tragedy for the United States. Trump’s message is that there is no point in being his ally since he will not defend you, he will impose more customs duties on you than on his enemies and will threaten to seize your territories while supporting the dictatorships that invade you.

"The king of the deal is showing what the art of the deal is all about. He thinks he will intimidate China by lying down before Putin—but Xi Jinping, faced with such a shipwreck, is probably accelerating preparations for the invasion of Taiwan.

"Never in history has a President of the United States capitulated to the enemy. Never has anyone supported an aggressor against an ally. Never has anyone trampled on the American Constitution, issued so many illegal decrees, dismissed judges who could have prevented him from doing so, dismissed the military general staff in one fell swoop, weakened all checks and balances, and taken control of social media. 

"This is not an illiberal drift, it is the beginning of the confiscation of democracy. Let us remember that it took only one month, three weeks and two days to bring down the Weimar Republic and its Constitution. 

"I have faith in the strength of American democracy, and the country is already protesting. But in one month, Trump has done more harm to America than in four years of his last presidency. We were at war with a dictator, now we are fighting a dictator backed by a traitor. 

"Eight days ago, at the very moment that Trump was rubbing Macron’s back in the White House, the United States voted at the UN with Russia and North Korea against the Europeans demanding the withdrawal of Russian troops. 

"Two days later, in the Oval Office, the military-service shirker was giving war hero Zelensky lessons in morality and strategy before dismissing him like a groom, ordering him to submit or resign. 

"Tonight, he took another step into infamy by stopping the delivery of weapons that had been promised. What to do in the face of this betrayal? The answer is simple: face it. 

"And first of all, let’s not be mistaken. The defeat of Ukraine would be the defeat of Europe. The Baltic States, Georgia, Moldova are already on the list. Putin’s goal is to return to Yalta, where half the continent was ceded to Stalin. 

"The countries of the South are waiting for the outcome of the conflict to decide whether they should continue to respect Europe or whether they are now free to trample on it. 

"What Putin wants is the end of the order put in place by the United States and its allies 80 years ago, with its first principle being the prohibition of acquiring territory by force. 

"This idea is at the very source of the UN, where today Americans vote in favour of the aggressor and against the attacked, because the Trumpian vision coincides with that of Putin: a return to spheres of influence, the great powers dictating the fate of small countries.

Mine is Greenland, Panama and Canada; yours are Ukraine, the Baltics and Eastern Europe; his is Taiwan and the China Sea. 

"At the parties of the oligarchs of the Gulf of Mar-a-Lago, this is called 'diplomatic realism.' 

"So we are alone. But the talk that Putin cannot be resisted is false. Contrary to the Kremlin’s propaganda, Russia is in bad shape. In three years, the so-called second-largest army in the world has managed to grab only crumbs from a country three times less populated. 

"Interest rates at 25%, the collapse of foreign exchange and gold reserves, the demographic collapse show that it is on the brink of the abyss. The American helping hand to Putin is the biggest strategic mistake ever made in a war. 

"The shock is violent, but it has a virtue. Europeans are coming out of denial. They understood in one day in Munich that the survival of Ukraine and the future of Europe are in their hands ...  

"It is a Herculean task, but it is on its success or failure that the leaders of today’s democratic Europe will be judged in the history books. ...

 

"Europe will only become a military power again by becoming an industrial power again. ... But the real rearmament of Europe is its moral rearmament. 

"We must convince public opinion in the face of war weariness and fear, and especially in the face of Putin’s cronies, the extreme right and the extreme left. 

"They argued again yesterday in the National Assembly ...  They say they want peace. What neither they nor Trump say is that their peace is capitulation, the peace of defeat, the replacement of de Gaulle Zelensky by a Ukrainian Pétain at the beck and call of Putin. ...

"Is this the end of the Atlantic Alliance? The risk is great. But in the last few days, the public humiliation of Zelensky and all the crazy decisions taken in the last month have finally made the Americans react. 

"Polls are falling. Republican lawmakers are being greeted by hostile crowds in their constituencies. Even Fox News is becoming critical. 

"The Trumpists are no longer in their majesty. They control the executive, the Parliament, the Supreme Court and social networks. 

"But in American history, the freedom fighters have always prevailed. They are beginning to raise their heads. 

"The fate of Ukraine is being played out in the trenches, but it also depends on those in the United States who want to defend democracy, and here on our ability to unite Europeans, to find the means for their common defense, and to make Europe the power that it once was in history and that it hesitates to become again. 

"Our parents defeated fascism and communism at great cost. 

"The task of our generation is to defeat the totalitarianisms of the 21st century. 

"Long live free Ukraine, long live democratic Europe.”

-Claude Malhuret speaking to the French Senate Tuesday March 4 2025.

 

Acronym advice

I like the Associated Press’s style guide advice on acronyms:

Do not follow an organisation’s full name with an abbreviation or acronym in parentheses or set off by dashes. If an abbreviation or acronym would not be clear on second reference without this arrangement, do not use it.

Names not commonly before the public should not be reduced to acronyms solely to save a few words.

Good writing must be clear. Too much writing is too often crammed with acronyms for too little space saving, leaving writing filled with ‘jargon monoxide’ or worse. If the acronym is well known—NASA, FBI, CIA—then leave it. Otherwise, write it in full.