Review: Say Nothing: A True Story of Murder and Memory in Northern Ireland by Patrick Keefe

"It is not those who can inflict the most, but those who can suffer the most who shall win" Terence MacSwiney,* who died in a British prison following a hunger strike.

The Troubles in Ireland always have, for some odd reason, fascinated me. A mix of religious and political strife coupled with a strong dose of tribalism and historical enmity, that any resolution could be found is profoundly reassuring. The fear and hatred are still there, but at least they are no longer killing each other -- unless Brexit recreates a hard border once again. When we visited there and we given a tour by my good friend Tony, who lived in Belfast, the paintings on the enclave walls were still fresh, and Tony cautioned that even in 2010 we needed to be careful about what we said in certain areas.

This book is simply riveting. It mixes well-research history with a murder mystery. The mystery involves the abduction of a woman called Jean McConville, a young widow and mother of 10 children, in 1972. (That year was also the bloodiest, killing almost 500 people, many on "Bloody Friday" when the IRA unleashed a whole series of bombs in downtown Belfast.) Northern Ireland was labeled "an autonomous political lunatic asylum" by George Bernard Shaw and Keefe shows us why. I won't say much about McConville's disappearance; you can read about that yourself -- and you should. Keefe gives a real flavor for the mental as well as the physical harm to those who lived through this time. "Tranquilizer use was higher in Northern Ireland than anywhere else in the United Kingdom. In some later era, the condition would likely be described as post-traumatic stress." Both, or should I say, ALL sides, (as there were factions within factions) have little to be proud of in their actions.

The British under command of a general who had literally written the book on how to deal with insurgencies, engaged in all sorts of torture. "The British had learned these techniques by studying the experiences of soldiers who were held as prisoners of war by the Nazis or by the North Koreans and the Chinese during the Korean War." The practice was to take a prisoner, put a hood on him, pretending to throw him out of a helicopter and then subject him to numerous psychological pressures. "When the torture ended, after a week, some of the men were so broken that they could not remember their own names. Their eyes had a haunted, hollow look to them, which one of the men likened to “two pissholes in the snow.” Another detainee, who had gone into the interrogation with jet-black hair, came out of the experience with hair that was completely white. (He died not long after being released, of a heart attack, at forty-five.) When Francie McGuigan was finally returned to Crumlin Road jail, he saw his father, and the older man broke down and cried.

In one of the many sad ironies, "In a controversial 1978 decision, the European Court of Human Rights held that the techniques, while “inhuman and degrading,” did not amount to torture. (In the aftermath of the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001, when the American administration of George W. Bush was fashioning its own “enhanced interrogation” techniques, officials relied explicitly on this decision to justify the use of torture.) Continuing the ironies, it was when both Northern Ireland and the Republic of Ireland became members of the EU that the border became irrelevant, in effect completing what the violence could not ever accomplish.

The conundrum of how governments should deal with zealots and terrorists (which side you are on will determine whether a suicide bomber is a patriot or terrorist) was highlighted by the hunger strike of the Price sisters. They had been involved in planting huge car bombs around London. Fortunately all but one were defused and they were caught quickly. The British government was placed in an impossible situation. They couldn't be seen as backing down, but they didn't want the girls to become martyrs. Force-feeding was tantamount to torture. For the government, this was an impossible crisis. Even as their bodies continued to shrink and wither, the Price sisters took on an iconic dimension. “They were the stuff of which Irish martyrs could be made: two young, slim, dark girls, devout yet dedicated to terrorism,” Jenkins later recalled. He feared that the ramifications of “the death of these charismatic colleens” would be incalculable.

Privately, Jenkins regarded their demand for repatriation to be “not totally unreasonable.” .... But if the alternative was force-feeding, it was turning out to be a public relations fiasco. Many members of the British public regarded the practice as a form of torture. According to their medical records, the Price sisters sometimes fainted during the procedure. On one occasion, when the sisters resisted the feeding, they were forcibly gagged, and a radio was turned up to cover their screams. It's interesting to read of how the IRA "heroes" fared after the Good Friday Agreement. Resentment of Gerry Adams was high along with a feeling of loss that they had accomplished nothing. The Boston College interviews revealed a lot of "carefully scripted myths." Also, the move of Adams from committed terrorist to republican electoral process. Ironically, it may be Brexit that melds north and the Republic together.

A fascinating story that reveals who the actual killer was. The interview with O'Keefe cited below describes the process by which he discovered the killer's identity, who remains unpunished in spite of the efforts of Jean's children to get justice. With Brexit we may soon see the fruition of thirty years of border disputation. Or, it will result in more violence.

*"According to MacSwiney’s biographer, Dave Hannigan, a young Vietnamese man named Nguyen Tat Thanhn was working in the kitchen of a central London hotel at the time. Upon hearing the news of MacSwiney’s death, he burst into tears, saying “a country with a citizen like this will never surrender”. He returned to Vietnam, changed his name to Ho Chi Minh, and led the Vietnamese resistance movement for three decades, fighting Japanese and French imperialists and later the United States."

Interview with Patrick Keefe  https://www.irishtimes.com/culture/books/brixton-remembers-one-of-ireland-s-most-famous-hunger-strikers-1.3674378

https://www.podbean.com/podcast-detail/q848u-53f12/The-Lawfare-Podcast

Review: The Code: Silicon Valley and the Remaking of America by Margaret O'Mara

I lived through all of the monumental changes described in this fascinating book, yet much of the politics and inside information had totally escaped me.

I was surprised at the monumental role Stanford University played in the foundation of Silicon Valley. As money poured out of the federal government to support all sorts of military projects during the hot war and then the cold, the university moved to become an engineering school, to the consternation of the Humanities faculty. They developed one of the first research parks, that became a magnet for tech companies like Hewlett-Packard and many others. They were fortunate to have a huge land grant from their founder, some 9,000 acres, that was becoming prime land worth a fortune. Tech companies were thrilled to have top engineers at the university whose motto was becoming turning that intellectual capital into engineering real products, at that time mostly military.

Stanford also became the home of the Hoover Institute (Herbert had spent the last few decades of his life there) lavishly supported by Packard one of the original occupants of the research park. A strong proponent of free market capitalism and anti-Communism they were myopic in refusing to see how the government through military grants and contracts was its own form of Marxism. The Valley was also lily white. It was populated almost exclusively by men in white shirts and thin ties who had engineering degrees. Even the blue-collar workers in the assembly plants were close to 100% male and white.

Meanwhile, progress was being made on interconnecting people to mainframes, along with the development of mini computers like those made by DEC. Without the earthshaking FCC decision of 1968, however, most of that would have remained small. The CarterFone was invented by Thomas Carter, a Texas rancher who needed some way to communicate with the employees on the vast expanses of his ranch. It was a device that connected the standard AT&T telephone set to a wireless radio. He may have gotten the idea from phone patches used by Amateur Radio operators (I am WB9VEG and used to entertain the kids while traveling by using my equipment to call a phone patch and then connect to the local phone network to call relatives thus avoiding toll calls; it was a precursor to car phones, all made obsolete by cell phones.) in the early sixties. His invention worked well but Ma Bell insisted that only equipment they made could be connected to their network so they sued. (Hams had been frowned on but were such a small community and experimental they were probably ignored.) Carter fought back and in 1968 the FCC ruled that AT&T could not have a monopoly on equipment and third parties could connect different devices to the network. The Carterfone looked a lot like the phone modems we used to connect to in the eighties to send digital signals over the networks that became the internet. It converted digital signals into analog and vice versa. This ruling unleashed a tidal wave of innovation and progress that would never have happened without that ruling. (The story of the Carterfone is really interesting and more can be found here.)

Venture capitalists played a huge role in building the area. For women, many of whom had been "computers" during and following the war, so it wasn't a question of skill or knowledge, there was no support, mostly because they virtually did not exist. It was a white, male dominated world. The boys all knew each other, had gone to school together, thought the same way, and supported each other.

There were four other factors that provided a fertile ground for the technology explosion: cheap land, changes in the immigration law, non-enforcement of non-compete clauses, and the development of a high quality education system. Cheap land is self-evident. The sweeping changes under Johnson in the sixties removed the old quota system by country and made merit and skills the primary determinant for entry into the U.S. The technology centers profited immensely as bright, determined, and skilled immigrants flooded the U.S. Governors Pat Brown and Earl Warren, of opposite parties, both believed education was important to growth and the system they developed was soon the envy of the world and provided Silicon Valley with a steady stream of well-educated recruits. The factor that surprised me was that California was virtually the only state that would not enforce non-compete clauses. This meant that engineers could jump ship and start their own little company using the skills and knowledge they had acquired at their previous company. This created an incredibly competitive and productive and fast-growing environment that produced new technologies almost overnight.

One quibble is the emphasis on hardware development when I think the most important part of technological advances came from software. Just as Visicalc provided the impetus for businesses to acquire personal computers, the development of LANs and GUIs moved controlled out of the MIS departments into the personal realm, although as we now have seen, in the corporate and educational spheres connectivity is now back in the hands of IT. It's also important to recognize that without the massive infusions of government money almost all of the development would have gone nowhere.

Very enjoyable read.

Review: A Swollen Red Sun by Matthew McBride

Such a sad book, filled with desperate people leading desperate lives. Some of them are just evil, others totally over their heads with no future and an ugly present.

Reading about them is compelling, however, always wondering what other tragedy lies just over the hill.

You won't like any of the characters -- well, perhaps Olen is an exception, -- but you'll feel sorry for some, pity others, and be very glad you play no part in their lives. Most of them I suspect would be waving Confederate flags at a NASCAR race.

I hope McBride writes from imagination and not experience. I fear the latter. His Goodreads' page notes that “These people are the people I know and see every day, and this is the world I know.”

Review: Dead Run: The Murder of a Lawman and the Greatest Manhunt of the Modern American West by Dan Schultz

Listened to this book. It was riveting. A bunch of crazies, filled with the mythological spirit of the old west that celebrated the outlaw, three nuts carrying lots of weapons, shot up and killed a local cop after stealing a water truck. Their ultimate goal remains unclear, but after the shootings, a huge manhunt involving hundreds of police and the army went looking for these guys in the desert. It has been theorized they intended to blow up the Glen Canyon dam. Had they succeeded a torrent of water would have swept everything away in its path for hundreds of miles. (The three were advocates of eco-terrorism. One of them had read the Monkey-Wrench Gang 17 times in which the target is the Glen Canyon Dam.)

From the start, the search was beset with problems. Each agency wanted to be in charge, the FBI, multiple county sheriffs, state cops, not to mention Navajo tribal police. The Navajos had the trackers but they were called off and replaced by dogs and white guys who wanted the credit. Everyone tromped over the trail making tracking almost impossible. The three bad guys, and make no mistake, they were out to kill cops, loved the desert and knew how to move about in it. The police showed up in heavy body army and the wrong clothes making their hunt miserable and life threatening as they suffered from heat exhaustion and dehydration. In one instance, the trackers were on the trail, but night came so they marked the end of their progress with a stick. The cattle who roamed around the area cared little for the stick and during the night trampled and moved it around, obliterating any semblance of trail. The attitude on the part of most law enforcement was to hurry up and catch them to get the glory. They lacked the patience of the Navaho, on whose land much of the search was focused. It was the Navaho who made most of the progress in spite of being shunted to the side by the better funded white LE.

In the end, the author makes a convincing case that one of the suspects was murdered and the scene made to look like a suicide. He cites substantial forensic evidence that support that case. Given the cross jurisdictions, incompetence, and slovenly command structure, not to mention independent actions by some of the police I am not optimistic for a good outcome given the current situation.

For a nice summary by someone who bikes and camps in the area see http://southwestguidebooks.com/fugitives.htm

Updated Proposal Involving the Business Community Regarding Suppression of COVID-19

Update: A cheap, paper test, is already available. See https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h7Sv_pS8MgQ&t=662s Go to around 11:00 for less math.

An open letter to the business leaders of the nation.

We are doing testing all wrong; how to eliminate COVID-19 in 60-90 days

The failure of leadership in Washington is manifest, so it may be up to the business community, in concert with academia and a few astute politicians, to save us from ourselves.

There is a way to stop COVID-19 in its tracks without massive disruptions or waiting for vaccinations. It will, however, require coordination on a national level. It could guarantee returning to normal in 90 days from its inception. It avoids the mask controversy and focuses solely on what is needed to open up the economy. It will require cooperation and dedication, but we have those, it just requires someone or a group to get us to focus. Business needs to take charge.

Daily the reports of the number of cases increases, as does the number of tests being conducted. Yet what happens if you do test positive? Is there a national plan for those who test positive? Are they expected to deal with it on their own? Do they sequester themselves? Their families? Their contacts? Everything seems hit or miss. A recent study published in Nature notes that asymptomatic people viral-shed more and for longer periods than symptomatic individuals so testing has to broaden to include nearly everyone.

A task force of prominent business and academic science leaders needs to convene to design a coherent strategy that would include funding, research and development, and public relations. Washington can’t or won’t do it. Production and distribution a test that is reliable and produces immediate results can be the responsibility of academia. Waiting a week to find out a result is too long. Everyone needs to be tested on the same day and the results have to be known immediately. The University of Illinois has developed a saliva test that gives close to immediate results. Find the funding to validate this test and produce millions of tests. (https://www.modernhealthcare.com/technology/university-illinois-screen-students-covid-test-developed-campus). If our wealthiest businessmen aren’t willing to fund it individually, create a corporate entity that can sell stock. Sell the stock as an investment.

As far as where and when to conduct the tests, develop a procedure. One idea would be to use polling places and/or post offices as testing sites. As soon as they become available, and we would need millions -- there’s a profit motive there -- train and equip volunteers or paid staff to administer the tests. Pick three days, each three weeks apart from the first day. Declare each a holiday, and test everyone on each of those days. Create a caroot-and-stick approach.

Those who test positive will be required to be isolated (enforced by electronic monitoring) with their families for three weeks or until such time as everyone in the family tests negative. They will receive a monetary stipend (or if employed continued salary by their employer) and instructions on how to get food delivered as well as free internet service via hotspot and a laptop if they don’t have one. There will be penalties for those who violate the quarantine. If sick they will receive free medical attention funded by Medicare. Those who don’t show up for testing will be required to isolate for two weeks to be enforced by law enforcement. But build in incentives. If there are enough incentives, participation should be close to 85-90%

Incentives will be needed to get everyone to get tested. It could be just like needing a driver's license to drive a car. Those who test negative will receive a certificate and would be free to go to work or whatever. That will help open the economy and permit opening the schools without any issues. It will pull those who might be contagious out of the public square.

This national testing day will continue every three weeks. . By that time the virus should have been completely isolated and die out.

Yes, it will require leadership, but the result is a thriving economy so the incentives for business to step up should be huge. It would require a non-partisan task force to design and implement, but this needs to be treated as a national emergency that threatens all of us. This is an opportunity for companies to participate in a positive way. They can donate time, materials, whatever so it becomes a matter of national pride and competition to see who can do the most.

The sooner we start the sooner we can get out from under this nightmare.

I collected some concerns from assorted friends and responded to each. I’m sure there are plenty of smart people who could come up with better ideas and solutions if given the opportunity.

Comment: What are the chances of requiring 100% of the population to do the same thing on the same day every two or three weeks for three months? Zero. It's an interesting idea which, sadly, has absolutely no chance of happening.

Response: I think if there were push from the top in concert with national businesses and incentives we could get at least 85% the first week, hopefully more the second. The biggest problem I see is not participation but finding leadership to promote the idea. The polling places are already there and if people see a potentially very positive outcome you might very well get a large enough percentage. I think it's worth a try as the potential outcome is so beneficial for everyone. To do nothing is to wallow in misery and a disastrous economy for at least another year.

Comment: Logistically possible, yes. Politically possible, no. But the idea of testing everyone as often as possible, and allowing those who are negative to go about their business, does makes sense and might be doable.

Response: Isolation for those testing positive is the key, but it would require a carrot as well as a stick. It's the approach used well in South Korea. I think if you got businesses behind it (they have a lot to gain by reducing COVID) it could become the patriotic thing to do. Biden should at least be out there with a plan. Currently, there is nothing, and we can't count on Trump to do anything. Some infrastructure is already there, i.e. polling places, post offices and election judges could be the testers, supplemented with health personnel. The key is to isolate those who are positive, but give them an incentive to isolate themselves and their families.

Comment:I agree all this is good and probably necessary, but you seem to ignore that you live in the land of the anti-vaccers, where something like 70% of the population believes that angels intervene in their daily lives. People here are way too stupid to do anything as sensible as the testing protocol you describe.

Response: Agreed and that's why it would have to be a mandate, but you get businesses on board who agree to hire or reemploy only those people who have the certificates. You don't make it a government by force, rather a carrot, i.e., just like a driver's license you need this to get employed and this is how you get the certificate. It's free and you build in other incentives and make it look like it comes from the business community, not the government even though the government would bear most of the cost, but that cost would be far less than the chaos we now face.

Replies and Responses to my COVID-19 proposal

Comment: What are the chances of requiring 100% of the population to do the same thing on the same day every two or three weeks for three months? Zero. It's an interesting idea which, sadly, has absolutely no chance of happening.

Response: I think if there were push from the top in concert with national businesses and incentives we could get at least 85% the first week, hopefully more the second. The biggest problem I see is not participation but finding leadership to promote the idea. The polling places are already there and if people see a potentially very positive outcome you might very well get a large enough percentage. I think it's worth a try as the potential outcome is so beneficial for everyone. To do nothing is to wallow in misery and a disastrous economy for at least another year.

Comment: Logistically possible, yes. Politically possible, no. But the idea of testing everyone as often as possible, and allowing those who are negative to go about their business, does makes sense and might be doable.

Response: Isolation for those testing positive is the key, but it would require a carrot as well as a stick. It's the approach used well in South Korea. I think if you got businesses behind it (they have a lot to gain by reducing COVID) it could become the patriotic thing to do. Biden should at least be out there with a plan. Currently, there is nothing, and we can't count on Trump to do anything. Some infrastructure is already there, i.e. polling places, post offices and election judges could be the testers, supplemented with health personnel. The key is to isolate those who are positive, but give them an incentive to isolate themselves and their families.

Comment:I agree all this is good and probably necessary, but you seem to ignore that you live in the land of the anti-vaccers, where something like 70% of the population believes that angels intervene in their daily lives. People here are way too stupid to do anything as sensible as the testing protocol you describe.

Response: Agreed and that's why it would have to be a mandate, but you get businesses on board who agree to hire or reemploy only those people who have the certificates. You don't make it a government by force, rather a carrot, i.e., just like a driver's license you need this to get employed and this is how you get the certificate. It's free and you build in other incentives and make it look like it comes from the business community, not the government even though the government would bear most of the cost, but that cost would be far less than the chaos we now face.

We are doing testing all wrong; how to eliminate COVID-19 in 90 days

There is a way to stop COVID in its tracks without massive disruptions or waiting for vaccinations. It will, however require a strong federal presence because it has to be coordinated on a national level. It could guarantee returning to normal in 90 days from its inception.

Every day the number of those testing positive for COVID-19 increases inflaming a multifarious conglomeration of strategies: masks, no masks, herd immunity, vaccines, withdrawal, fear, etc.

Yet what happens if you do test positive? I haven’t seen any protocol for those who do Do they sequester themselves? Their families? Their contacts? Everything seems hit or miss.

Everyone! Needs to be tested on the same day and the results have to be known immediately, not a week later, not 20 minutes later. The University of Illinois has developed a saliva test that gives close to immediate results. Federal funding is needed to validate this test and produce millions of tests. (https://www.modernhealthcare.com/technology/university-illinois-screen-students-covid-test-developed-campus)

We have a national election when most people go to the polls so the idea of having everyone do something on a particular day is not unprecedented. This cannot be a matter of choice. Make it a national holiday. Everyone should report to their local polling place where trained volunteers --in appropriate garb, who have been tested themselves -- will administer the tests.

Those who test positive will be required to be quarantined (enforced by electronic monitoring) with their families for three weeks or until such time as everyone in the family tests negative. They will receive a monetary stipend (or if employed continued salary by their employer) and instructions on how to get food delivered as well as free internet service via hotspot and a laptop if they don’t have one. There will be penalties for those who violate the quarantine. If sick they will receive free medical attention funded by Medicare. Those who don’t show up for testing will be required to isolate for two weeks to be enforced by law enforcement. But if there are enough incentives, participation should be close to 100%

Those who test negative will receive a certificate and are free to go to work or whatever. That will help open the economy and permit opening the schools without any issues.

This national testing day will continue every two weeks for 90 days. By that time the virus should have been completely isolated and die out.

Yes, it will require federal leadership, but the result is a thriving economy so the incentives should be huge. It would require a bi-partisan task force to design and implement, but this needs to be treated as a national emergency that threatens all of us. Presidential commitment is required but he need not do the work, just take the credit for his vocal support. There is an opportunity for companies to participate in a positive way. They can donate time, materials, whatever so it becomes a matter of national pride and competition to see who can do the most.

The sooner we start the sooner we can get out from under this nightmare.