This week an attempt to "swear off" at least some of the Trump-related political news: "Territory Day" in Colorado; troubled waters; a "new" president's day theme; Wallace Stenger; Chinese space station; home alone; new cold war; the shallow state; local organizing; a bureaucratic warning; the coal dilemma.

February 28, 1861: The Territory of Colorado was organized by the US congress from land in the later states of Utah, Nebraska, Kansas, and New Mexico. 

Not so pure. A link to an article about the world's really deep ocean depths. A new study finds that these depths, once thought to be pollution-free, are really not so pristine.

President's Day, 2017. In several cities across the nation, a new wrinkle was added to the national holiday with "Not My President's Day" demonstrations. On a truly, non-political, personal note, my students always wondered why I did not take two days off for my birthday: my actual birth day, shared with George Washington (22nd), and whatever date was "celebrated" as the national President's Day. "Gee, Mr. Abell, why are you here today?"

Wallace Stenger, friend of the West. On the occasion of his 108th birthday, Matthew Stuart penned a remembrance of Stenger in High Country News. As details (and concerns) swirl around  President Trump's new Secretary of the Interior, Ryan Zinke (formerly US House R, MT), Stuart remembers what Stenger meant to the West and his readers world wide. Stenger won a Pulitzer in fiction (1972) for Angle of Repose and a National Book Award in fiction (1977) for Spectator Bird.

The CSS. The Economist reports that the Chinese are very much interested in getting to Mars. Whether driven by national pride (as the US was) or irrational fear of other nation's space programs (principally India's) , China's scientific and industrial wherewithal will undoubtedly be part of mankind's march into the solar system.

Home alone? Astronomers have discovered a nearby sun orbited by seven planets, three of which may be indeed earth-like with liquid water. The system is known as Trappist - 1. Continued observations will help give a more accurate "picture" of this cool, brown dwarf star and its planets. Also, "nearby" is a relative term: the sun and its planets are 39 light years, 229 trillion miles, from us, not really just around the corner. Do not make travel plans.

Foreign policy. Just what is our foreign policy? Here is one commentator's thoughts in a piece entitled, "The worst and the dimmest: The wheels are falling off Donald Trump’s foreign policy, and the adults aren’t at the wheel." It seems that precise explication is not one of the White House's long suits.
     Here is a friend's analogy.  1917 : Tsar Alexander II : Rasputin  ::  2017 : President Trump : Steve Bannon.

A new Cold War? This article from the London Review of Books discusses four recent books that examine current US - Russian relations. One in particular will ring a bell with anyone familiar with America's post-WW II foreign policy: Who Lost Russia? How the World Entered a New Cold War (Peter Conradi). As Chang Kai Shek's Nationalist Chinese government was overwhelmed by Mao Tse-dong's (nee Mao Zedong) Communist Chinese People's Liberation Army, a cry went up in the halls of Congress demanding to know, "Who lost China?" Alas, the fault lay largely in the long-running inability to Occidentals to read the tea leaves of Chinese politics. Sadly, the Russians, too, love their tea. History has a curious way of repeating itself.

Shallow vs. deep. Foreign Policy's David Rothkopf talks of "shallow" and "deep" states. Unlike the swimming pool, the shallow end may not be your friend, nor the deep end your enemy.

The “deep state” is the flavor of the month for conspiracy theorists, the “black helicopters” of 2017. The idea of career intelligence and military officers and bureaucrats marshaling the institutional power they have spent decades mastering to advance their goals regardless of the whims or wants of elected public officials or the people at large is irresistible....The shallow state, on the other hand, is unsettling because not only are the signs of it ever more visible but because its influence is clearly growing. It is made scarier still because it not only actively eschews experience, knowledge, relationships, insight, craft, special skills, tradition, and shared values but because it celebrates its ignorance of and disdain for those things. 

Two recent examples: how well did President Trump really understand the foreign policy concepts of "one China" or "one vs two states [Israel - Palestinian]" before he so flippantly got on the phone with Taiwan''s president, Tsai Ing-wen and China's Xi Jinping or walked to the lectern with Israel's Netanyahu? Was he fully briefed and by whom?

Local organizing? As this PBS News Hour segment with Shields and Brooks aptly relates, local organizing has come full circle: the Republican-leaning Tea Party movement is providing the blueprint for various Democratic-leaning groups springing up nationwide seeking to challenge the Trump-led forces at all levels, from the nation's villages to the Capitol.
     Though, as David Brooks (and others) has pointed out, the Tea Party initially went after the Republican Party itself. Then, too, they focused on the Affordable Care Act (aka ACA -- ObamaCare and Obama himself. As the Tea Parth gained adherents, they moved on to the election process, finally gaining enough adherents to form their congressional Freedom Caucus. This group is now able to block much proposed legislation with which they do not agree, which confounds their own congressional leaders, as well as the minority Democrats.

DDE and George Will. In his Farewell Address, President Eisenhower warned of the military - industrial complex. In a recent column, George Will warns that government ...

     expands by indirection, using three kinds of “administrative proxies” — state and local government, for-profit businesses, and nonprofit organizations....For example, the EPA has fewer than 20,000 employees, but 90 percent of EPA programs are completely administered by thousands of state government employees, largely funded by Washington. So, today’s government is indeed big (3.5 times bigger than 5½ decades ago), but dispersed to disguise its size.

  Will closes, "The government/for-profit contractor/nonprofit complex consumes about 40 percent of [our] gross domestic product. Just don’t upset anyone by calling it 'big government'.”

Coal. Every nation with  coal deposits has had its long love-hate relationship with its mixed blessings. Mining the hard, black gold has always meant both money and misery. This op-ed piece examines this dilemma.  The author, Maria Zurber, is "the vice president for research at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and Chair of the National Science Board...[who] grew up in a place named for coal: Carbon County, PA." Ms. Zuber's has a family history with coal, the money it brought to the family, as well as black lung and death. As a scientist she presents careful thoughts for consideration.

Simple, right? How long is a year? Not an easily answered question. Pity the poor science writer. Ask a simple question like "How long is a year?" and get very complicated answers.

Thank you for reading. Enjoy President Trump's speech to Congress this evening.