Month: October 2018

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America’s Endangered Defense Industrial Base, Part 2

The New York Analysis of Policy and Government continues its review of America’s endangered defense industrial base, and a major Department of Defense Report reviewing the crisis.

Looming larger than any other factor in the decline of the U.S. industrial base is China.

While multiple countries pursue policies to bolster their economies at the expense of America’s manufacturing sector, none has targeted the U.S. industrial base as successfully as China. China is engaged in economic competition with the U.S. over key sectors of the global economy, and China’s strategies of economic aggression and its complementary military modernization efforts are codified in its doctrine of civil-military fusion. By actively promoting the fusion of its military and civilian industrial and science and technology sectors, Beijing strives to reinforce the People’s Republic of China’s capabilities to build the country into an economic, technological, and military power while ensuring that overall control of these elements of national power remain firmly in the hands of the Communist Party of China. Since joining the World Trade Organization in 2001, China’s real gross domestic product has grown more than 300%, from $2.4 trillion in 2001 to $10.2 trillion 2017.72 During that period, U.S. real gross domestic product grew less than 40%, from $12.8 trillion in 2001 to $17.3 trillion in 2017 ).

China’s economic growth has, in turn, helped finance its rapid military modernization. In 2001, China’s annual military budget was less than $20 billion.73 By 2017, it exceeded $150 billion,74 second only to the U.S.

The Report emphasizes that “China’s non-market distortions to the economic playing field must end or the U.S. will risk losing the technology overmatch and industrial capabilities that have enabled and empowered our military dominance – even as China seeks to raise its military capabilities to U.S. levels.”

One of the Chinese Communist Party’s primary industrial initiatives, Made in China 2025, targets artificial intelligence, quantum computing, robotics, autonomous and new energy vehicles, high performance medical devices, high-tech ship components, and other emerging industries critical to national defense.  In order to obtain the capabilities needed to support these advanced technologies, China relies on both legal and illicit means, including foreign direct and venture investments, open source collection, human collectors, espionage, cyber operations, and the evasion of U.S. export control restrictions to acquire intellectual property and critical technologies.

For example, China imposes conditional access to its domestic market to lure intellectual property, investment, and onshoring of manufacturing, using high tariffs and a complex web of non-tariff barriers, including restrictive customs barriers, burdensome licensing requirements, discriminatory regulatory standards, and local content requirements in government procurement to boost domestic manufacturing and production. China also uses forced technology transfer78 as a condition of access to the Chinese market.

In an attempt to dominate critical global markets and manufacturing industries, China leverages policy tools such as low interest loans; subsidized utility rates; lax environmental, health, and safety standards; and dumping to boost its industry. China also uses counterfeiting and piracy, illegal export subsidies, and overcapacity to depress world prices and push rivals out of the global market. It has implemented these tactics to capture much of the world’s solar and steel industries and intends to extend its dominance to other industries such as automobiles and robotics.

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A key finding of the report is that China represents a significant and growing risk to the supply of materials and technologies deemed strategic and critical to U.S. national security; a challenge shared by key allies such as Germany and Australia. In addition to China dominating many material sectors at the upstream source of supply (e.g., mining), it is increasingly dominating downstream value-added materials processing and associated manufacturing supply chains, both in China and increasingly in other countries. Areas of concern to America’s manufacturing and defense industrial base include a growing number of widely used and specialized metals, alloys and other materials, including rare earths and permanent magnets.

China is also the sole source or a primary supplier for a number of critical energetic materials used in munitions and missiles. In many cases, there is no other source or drop-in replacement material and even in cases where that option exists, the time and cost to test and qualify the new material can be prohibitive – especially for larger systems (hundreds of millions of dollars each). From commodity materials to rare earths, Chinese investment in developing countries in exchange for an encumbrance on their natural resources and access to their markets, particularly in Africa and Latin America, adds an additional level of consideration for the scope of this threat to American economic and national security.

China’s capture of foreign technologies and intellectual property,109 particularly the systematic theft of U.S. weapons systems and the illicit and forced transfer of dual-use technology, has eroded the military balance between the U.S. and China. Such transfers aid China’s efforts to gain a qualitative technological advantage over the U.S. across key domains, including naval, air, space, and cyber.

China’s aggressive industrial policies have already eliminated some capabilities with critical defense functions, including solar cells for military use, flat-panel aircraft displays, and the processing of rare earth elements. China’s actions seriously threaten other capabilities, including machine tools; the production and processing of advanced materials like biomaterials, ceramics, and composites; and the production of printed circuit boards and semiconductors

As part of China’s One Belt, One Road doctrine to project Chinese soft and hard power, China has sought the acquisition of critical U.S. infrastructure, including railroads, ports, and telecommunications.

China’s economic strategies, combined with the adverse impacts of other nations’ industrial policies, pose significant threats to the U.S. industrial base and thereby pose a growing risk to U.S. national security.

The Report concludes Monday

Illustration: China Map (U.S. State Department) 

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America’s Endangered Defense Industrial Base

In the 20th Century, America’s mighty industrial base became  as much a part of the nation’s identity as free speech and baseball.  Historically, it was essential to the development of the middle class, and allowed the military to quickly recover from Pearl Harbor and serve as the “Arsenal of Democracy.” But over the past several decades, that vital asset has eroded, endangering both the economy and the military safety of the U.S.

This month, a key report  on America’s Defense Industrial Base was submitted to the White House. It paints a devastating picture of the clear and immediate dangers presented by the extreme weakening of what was once the world’s greatest manufacturing environment.

America’s manufacturing sector is vital to both the economic and defense health of the nation. The report notes that “Not only is the manufacturing sector the backbone of U.S. military technical advantage, but also a major contributor to the U.S economy, accounting for 9% of employment, 12% of GDP, 60% of exports, 55% of patents, and 70% of U.S. R&D.”

However, between 2000, when President Clinton signed into law a measure granting China permanent normal trade relations, and 2010, over two-thirds of U.S. manufacturing saw production declines in terms of inflation-adjusted output. Between 2000 and 2010 alone, the U.S. lost over 66,000 manufacturing facilities.

Think tanks have long recognized the crisis.  In 2011, James Carafano, writing for the Heritage Foundation,  noted:

“The U.S. defense base is on the verge of a crisis—losing the design engineering and industrial capacity to affordably produce the cutting-edge military systems that once gave the American military an unassailable advantage. The reason for this is simple: The free market works. When there is no competitive market for goods and services, the industries that produce them dry up and blow away. The Pentagon has been under-funding procurement by about $50 billion a year. That, however, is only part of the problem.”

The DoD study notes that the loss in employment has been devastating. 36% of the industry’s workforce, with more than 5 million manufacturing job have been lost since 2000 alone. Job losses have been most pronounced in vital sectors subject to import competition, including primary metals, electronics, chemicals, and machinery. Manufacturing and defense industrial base companies’ inability to hire or retain U.S. workers with the necessary skill sets has led to significant gaps in skilled labor. A lack of skilled manufacturing workers and a decreasing number of jobs is destabilizing workforce readiness and leading to skill atrophy.

From 2000-2018, many defense-relevant sectors have seen increased import penetration with rates more than doubling for the industrial controls and machine tools subsectors. The negative effects of sequestration and the budget caps shocked the market and accelerated the downward trend in vendor counts, resulting in an estimated 20% decline in the number of prime vendors.

The decline in the U.S. manufacturing industry creates a variety of risks for America’s manufacturing and defense industrial base and, by extension, for the Department of Defense’s ’s ability to support national defense. Risks range from greater reliance on single sources, sole sources, and foreign providers to workforce gaps, product insecurity, and loss of innovation.
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On July 21, 2017, President Trump signed Executive Order (EO) 13806 “Assessing and Strengthening the Manufacturing and Defense Industrial Base and Supply Chain Resiliency of the United States.”

According to the DoD study issued as a result of that executive order, “All facets of the manufacturing and defense industrial base are currently under threat, at a time when strategic competitors and revisionist powers appear to be growing in strength and capability.”

The report identifies Five major forces that are primarily responsible for the current situation:

  1. From FY2012 through FY2017, sequestration led to lower defense spending relative to levels projected before sequestration was put in place.
  2. Antiquated and counter-productive procurement practices induced contracting delays, deterred market entry, discouraged innovation, and increased costs to suppliers.
  3. Decreases in key production capabilities and declines in manufacturing employment, relative to the last time the U.S. faced a great power competition, left key weaknesses that threaten the nation’s manufacturing capabilities.
  4. The industrial policies of foreign competitors have diminished American manufacturing’s global competitiveness – sometimes as collateral damage of globalization, but also due to specific targeting by great powers like China.
  5. Finally, emerging gaps in our skilled workforce, both in terms of STEM as well as core trade skills (e.g., welding, computer numeric control operation, etc.) pose increasing risk to industrial base capabilities.

Related to those five overall challenges are ten problems. These include the rise of single and sole source suppliers which create individual points of failure within the industrial base, as well as fragile suppliers near bankruptcy and entire industries near domestic extinction. Due to erosion that has already occurred, some manufacturing capabilities can only be procured from foreign suppliers, many of which are not domiciled in allied and partner nations. The concomitant gaps in U.S.-based human capital and erosion of domestic infrastructure further exacerbates the challenge. Ultimately, these negative impacts have the potential to result in limited capabilities, insecurity of supply, lack of R&D, program delays, and an inability to surge in times of crisis.

The Report Continues Tomorrow

F-35 assembly plant (Lockheed Martin) 

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Hidden Motive Behind Calls to Cut Saudi Relations

There is an extraordinary level of hypocrisy in the coverage of the apparent killing of Jamal Khashoggi, a Saudi national who reported for the Washington Post and was apparently killed after entering the Saudi embassy in Turkey.

If, indeed, Khashoggi was killed in the embassy, his murder should be universally condemned. But that condemnation should not progress to the point where it jeopardizes the entire spectrum of U.S.-Saudi relations, which have dramatically improved since President Trump’s visit to that nation in 2017.

Lawmakers are discussing punitive actions, including suspending arms sales and imposing sanctions.  That would prove to be a significant mistake.

There is a difficult equation that must be understood.  Any deterioration of relations with the Saudis is, in essence, a gift to the far worse, far more dangerous, and openly anti-American Iranians.

Throughout the entire length of the Obama presidency, a still unexplained tilt towards Iran was undertaken by that administration.  Iranian leaders chanted “Death to America.” The Tehran leadership funded terrorist groups throughout the world, targeting not only Israel and other middle eastern nations but the United States itself.  Iran’s favorite client terrorist group, Hezbollah, also sold drugs within the United States. The nation continues to seek nuclear weapons and the means to deliver them throughout the planet.

While America should do its best to spread its ideals of universal human rights and justice throughout the world, the fact is that it also must engage in necessary acts of self-protection, and survival.  That, at times, means allying with regimes that are fundamentally different from us.

That reality is nothing new.  Consider that during the Revolutionary War itself, the Continental Congress had little choice but to accept assistance from France, a nation with a monarchy that was arguably far more absolute than George III. In doing so, America insured its triumph.

Perhaps the most salient example occurred in World War II. The Soviet Union began that conflict as a staunch ally of Adolph Hitler.  Together, they carved up Poland and made future plans. It can be said with considerable accuracy that the Nazi military would not have been able to garner the strength to initiate the war without Moscow’s direct assistance.
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As noted in the Warfare History website, “ the Nazi-Soviet Nonaggression Pact… Included …provisions governing the transfer of raw materials from the Soviet Union in exchange for manufactured goods from Germany. But, more importantly, the pact was a protocol establishing each signatory’s sphere of influence. This included Poland. Hitler and Stalin did not merely intend to partition their neighbor, they meant to wipe the country off the map.”

Feldgrau outlines how from 1922-1933, “ the whole world was almost entirely shielded from Germany’s clandestine military build-up and military development efforts in The Soviet Union.”

Of course, the cozy relationship between Hitler and Stalin ended when Germany invaded Russia.  The allies, despite a profound distaste for Stalin and his nightmare regime, realized that it made sense to ally themselves with Moscow to combat the Nazis.

Saudi Arabia, despite its numerous and serious faults, is certainly better than  the old USSR, and unlike the Communist regime of the 1940’s, is showing clear signs of beginning the long process of reform.

As Dion Nissenbaum wrote in the Wall Street Journal several months ago, “The 32-year-old Saudi royal  [Mohammed bin Salman] has positioned himself as a reformer who has moved to ease widely criticized restrictions on women, clamp down on religious extremism, and promote a more liberal social agenda. The Trump administration has strongly backed those moves as it tries to make U.S.-Saudi relations a cornerstone of its Middle East strategy.”

Part of the reason for the persistent calls to sever relations with the Saudis following the reports of the probable Khashoggi murder is a desire to overturn the Trump Administration’s move to weaken Iran’s terrible influence on the region, an influence greatly buoyed by the failed Obama Mideast policy.

Illustration: Saudi Arabia (U.S. State Department map)

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Media Decries “Right wing” Violence, But Ignores Antifa Violence

This article was written by the distinguished retired judge, John H. Wilson

The violence perpetrated by members of the ironically named Antifa, short for “anti-fascist,” is well known.  This loose-knit group of various anarchist and left wing organizations, was responsible for riots in Berkeley California, where violence has occurred on an almost regular basis since last year. l  This year, the center of protest has become Portland, Oregon where Antifa activists are blocking the streets, and harassing motorists.

Yet, when we read about Antifa, we often find sympathetic portrayals of their activities.  Time Magazine featured a story about Julia, who “helped found a group called Pastel Bloc, whose members wear disarming pinks in the streets as they provide water and support to other ‘antifascist’ activists who might be engaged in more disruptive actions.”  The author goes on to describe Pastel Bloc “as sort of a medic crew with fairy-dust slogans like ‘Resistance is Magic.’”     When the mugshots of Antifa protestors arrested for rioting were published by the Berkeley Police Department, Newsweek called it “a ‘disturbing’ move,” and quoted Veena Dubal, a law professor at the University of California, who likened the exposure to a “public shaming exercise,” that “could be risking the safety of protestors by sharing their identities on social media.”

Most news stories portray the activities of Antifa as simply counter protests to right wing groups, who are almost always described as “Nazis.”  This past August, for instance, a “Say No to Marxism” rally was described as “far-right,” while the counter protesting Antifa were described as a reaction to  Berkeley becoming “a target of the alt-right shortly after Trump’s 2016 election victory.”

In fact, the rise of Antifa can be traced to last year’s violent Black Lives Matter protests in Charlottesville, Virginia, and to the efforts made by the Berkeley College Republicans to bring a series of speakers to the campus.  In February of 2017, Milo Yiannopoulos cancelled his planned speech when riots broke out, however, in September of last year, Ben Shapiro spoke at Berkeley amidst the inevitable violence and protests by Antifa.

At first, the stories printed in the media regarding these speakers involved whether or not these speakers should be allowed to speak in the first place,  and whether or not they should be boycotted.   But soon, the emphasis was placed on Antifa being a justified reaction to violence on the right.  CNN’s Chris Cuomo this past August claimed Antifa activists are “on the side of right” because their actions are done “in the name of stamping out hate.”

Cuomo’s truly oblivious comments came in the wake of this year’s violent anniversary protest in Charlottesville, where protestors assaulted an NBC reporter and police officers.

This media game of “blame the victim” has now reached New York City.  Recently, the headquarters of the Metropolitan Republican Club were vandalized.  Windows were broken, Capital A’s in circles (a symbol for Anarchy) was spray painted on the doors, and a note left behind, promising this attack was “only the beginning.”    The note makes clear that this act of violence was a protest against the Club for daring to host Gavin McInnes, the founder of a group called the “Proud Boys.”

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They have drawn the inevitable designation as a “hate group” from the Southern Poverty Law Center,  who, it should be noted, has 210 listings under their section “Hatewatch” for groups labeled “Alt-right,” but NONE for any group identified as “Antifa” or “anti fascist.”

To date, the NYPD has not been able to identify the perpetrators of this crime.  However, now the focus has shifted from the damage done to the Metropolitan Republican Club, to the arrest of three men who allegedly assaulted a protestor during Mr. McInnes’ appearance at the Club, ignoring the fact that a group had appeared to protest the speaker’s appearance in the first place.

Knowing never to waste a crisis, NYC Public Advocate Tish James immediately decried the “hate fueled mob violence” of the “neo-fascist, white supremacist Proud Boys group” and called upon the Manhattan DA to pursue hate crime charges against the three, even though the NYPD states that it is “unclear” that the men arrested were members of the Proud Boys.

After the Charlottesville riots in 2017, President Trump made a statement regarding the violent clash between Antifa and the alt right that was roundly excoriated by the left, in which he stated “you had a group on one side that was bad. And you had a group on the other side that was also very violent. And nobody wants to say that, but I’ll say it right now.”   The reaction then was immediate and strong, condemning the President’s remarks as making excuses for “Nazis.”

To date, violence between the far left and the far right, continues unabated.  Then it was Charlottesville; now it is Portland and New York City.  Antifa continue to use violence, while the media focus negative attention almost exclusively on those they call fascists and neo-Nazis.

Perhaps the President was correct in his original assessment – there’s bad on both sides.  But to ignore the behavior of the far left and emphasize the actions of the far right is a disservice.  It will only encourage these clashes to continue and grow.

Illustration: Wikipedia

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The Left’s Escalating War on Religion

It has been portrayed that Democrat fury over the nomination of Brett Kavanaugh reached its fevered pitch after receiving the allegation (unsubstantiated and uncorroborated) of the nominees’ alleged teen-years sexual misdeed. That is incorrect.

The decision to use every tactic to oppose Kavanaugh, or someone like him, occurred far earlier than the receipt in July of Professor Ford’s 36-year-old claim.  While the firepower is aimed at this particular nominee, it is actually just one battlefield in the larger war against an entire segment of American society by Progressives.

It is tempting to point to the anti-Catholic inclination of the Left as the prime motive for the extreme reaction to Kavanaugh, and that would be correct, but only partially. Kavanaugh, with his history of religious devotion and parochial school education, may be viewed by Progressives as the “stereotypical Catholic” and therefore associated with anti-abortion sentiments.

It is not merely coincidental that California Senator Diane Feinstein was the center of the Kavanaugh controversy. In September of 2017, she vehemently opposed the nomination of Notre Dame law professor Amy Coney Barrett to the Seventh Circuit Court of Appeals. In a stunning round of questioning, Senator Dick Durbin asked the nominee “Do you consider yourself an Orthodox Catholic,” an inappropriate query which was followed by the even more offensive comment by Senator Feinstein that “The [Catholic] dogma lives loudly within you, and that’s of concern.”

But the Left’s deep distaste of jurists with potential anti-Roe v. Wade sentiments is only part of the story.

A dedication to the end of abusive practices against women cannot be cited as the sole reason for the fury.  The long history of abusive against women by Democrats such as the late Ted Kennedy and the current vice-chair of the Democrat National Committee, Keith Ellison, have gone almost wholly un-noted by Progressives.  And of course, the numerous and deadly serious acts by Bill Clinton continue to be shockingly excused by the Left, including groups that theoretically exist solely to advance women’s rights. Progressive groups such as the “Women’s March on Washington” have accepted at the top of their leadership circle Linda Sarsour, an advocate of Sharia Law which treats females as property.
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As socialism becomes increasingly mainstream within the Democrat party, the inherent anti-religious sentiment of that political philosophy becomes more pronounced. It is reflected equally in the growing anti-Israel and anti-Semitic leadership of the Democrat National Committee, and the numerous progressive groups that stridently advocate for the “BDS“(boycott, disinvestment and sanctions) movement against Israel.

Top-down political systems are traditionally jealous of any source of influence over constituents that do not derive from the ruling center.  That is why regimes that act to restrict religious freedom are also generally allergic to freedom of the press, as well. Socialism is, by its very nature, top-down.  The choices made by the prevailing powers that are backed up by the full force of the state, if opposed on moral or philosophical grounds, call into question the entire rationale for the collectivist governments’ near monopolistic hold on power.

The blatant implications that practicing Roman Catholics can’t be trusted with high judicial posts, or that Jews are to blame for all the problems in the Middle East, have increasingly become staples of the Left. Those foul premises are couched in excuses such as abortion or Palestinian nationhood, but those are mere covers for a far deeper and wider-ranging distaste of main stream Americans, and the individualism that characterizes the American character.

Progressives haven’t been satisfied with their successes in social issues. They believe in the necessity of punishing those who adhere to traditional values.

Photo:  Senator Feinstein (Senate Judiciary Committee)

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Foreign Policy Update

US DISASTER RESPONSE IN INDONESIA

The United States, through USAID, is now providing a total of $3.7 million in assistance through its partners to deliver essential relief items, including shelter kits, blankets, hygiene kits, solar-powered lamps, and other lifesaving aid, according to the State Department Spokesperson.

USAID is also airlifting heavy-duty plastic sheeting to Indonesia to provide for emergency shelter needs of up to 110,500 people and has deployed a team of disaster experts to coordinate our humanitarian response efforts and is supporting a U.S. Forest Service emergency operations expert who’s on the ground providing technical support to the Government of Indonesia’s disaster response, she added. The Department of Defense has provided three C-130s and has already transported nearly 30 – 63 metric tons of disaster relief supplies into the affected areas.

This is not the first time the US has supported humanitarian disaster relief in Indonesia. During the 2004 tsunami in Sumatra, Indonesia which followed the 9.1 earthquake, the United States providing operating rooms aboard an aircraft carrier. It was the first and only nation to offer such assistance.

 

STATE DEPARTMENT NOMINEES HELD UP IN THE SENATE

There are still 65 State Department nominees sitting in the United States Senate, according to the State Department spokeswoman. She said: ”That’s over a quarter of all the senior-level confirmable positions that the United States Department of State is tasked with using to achieve its diplomatic outcomes. There is bipartisan agreement that a fully staffed State Department is critical to American national security. The State Department has been criticized for having gaps in leadership positions, but now we’ve done our part to fix that; now the Senate needs to do its part.”

Secretary Pompeo has repeatedly stated that these candidates are quality candidates and that they’re not sitting on the Senate floor because of objections with respect to their quality, their professionalism, or their excellence and ability to deliver American foreign policy.

Democratic members of the Senate not the Administration are at fault, the Secretary noted. He added that those for whom partisanship has now driven delay and obstruction of getting America’s diplomatic corps into every corner of the world, are to blame.

NORTH KOREA

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According to officials, there is some positive movement as Chairman Kim has invited inspectors to visit the Punggye-ri nuclear test site to confirm that it’s been irreversibly dismantled.  However, it should be noted that this particular site is an older one which already has been destroyed. While there is some progress, there is a long path ahead.

 

CHINA

China is providing the United States and other nations critical components for military weapons and equipment, according to a White House study released Friday.

The report recommends that the US invest in domestic manufacturing to eliminate supply chain vulnerabilities that could potentially cripple the American defense sector, and which pose a significant risk to national security. It also points out that the US already is experiencing delays in receiving Chinese solar cells for military use, flat-panel aircraft displays and rare earths for which China is a sole supplier at this time.

According to the report: “China is the single or sole supplier for a number of specialty chemicals used in munitions and missiles.” It also points out that: “China’s actions seriously threaten other capabilities, including machine tools; the production and processing of advanced materials like biomaterials, ceramics, and composites; and the production of printed circuit boards and semiconductors.”

DARIA NOVAK served in the United States State Department during the Reagan Administration, and currently is on the Board of the American Analysis of News and Media, which publishes usagovpolicy.com and the New York Analysis of Policy and Government.  Each Saturday, she presents key updates on U.S. foreign policy from the State Department.

Illustration: Earth from space, as seen by the Apollo 17 astronauts (NASA)

 

 

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Absence of Paper Ballots Jeopardizes Confidence

The alteration of U.S. voting machines from the familiar paper and mechanical devices to computer-based systems has raised numerous concerns, including the potential of tampering.

A new report from the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering and Medicine states that elections should be conducted using human-readable paper ballots, no later than the 2020 presidential election, and that efforts should be made to do that in the upcoming 2018 midterm ballot. The Report also  emphasizes that “Ballots that have been marked by voters should not be returned over the Internet or any network connected to it, because no current technology can guarantee their secrecy, security, and verifiability.”

It’s not just the actual voting that not be entrusted to solely computerized processes, according to the National Academies. “State and local governments must work together with the federal government to secure and improve election systems…The cybersecurity of electronic systems used in elections, such as voter registration databases and vote tabulation systems, should be continuously monitored and improved. And audits of paper ballots should be used to verify that votes have been tabulated correctly and to detect when electronic systems have been compromised.”

The Reports key recommendations include:

  1. Elections should be conducted with human-readable paper ballots.
  2. States should mandate a specific type of audit known as a “risk-limiting” audit prior to the certification of election results. By examining a statistically appropriate random sample of paper ballots, risk-limiting audits can determine with a high level of confidence whether a reported election outcome reflects a correct tabulation of the votes cast.
  3. Internet voting should not be used at the present time, and it should not be used in the future until and unless very robust guarantees of secrecy, security, and verifiability are developed and in place. 

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  4. Election administrators should routinely assess the integrity of voter registration databases and put in place systems that detect efforts to probe, tamper with, or interfere with voter registration systems.
  5. Jurisdictions that use electronic pollbooks should have backup plans in place to provide access to current voter registration lists in the event of any disruption.
  6. Election systems should continue to be considered as U.S. Department of Homeland Security-designated critical infrastructure.

The analysis by the National Academies is not the first to question the safety of balloting that excludes paper. A 2017 Atlantic  report noted that technologist Barbara Simons warned that the electronic systems that had gained favor in the United States after the 2000 presidential election were shoddy, and eminently hackable.

“Though a liberal who had first examined voting systems under the Clinton administration, she did battle with the League of Women Voters (of which she is a member), the ACLU, and other progressive organizations that had endorsed paperless voting, largely on the grounds that electronic systems offered greater access to voters with disabilities…In late July [2017], at the annual Def Con hacker conference, in Las Vegas, she addressed an event called the Voting Village—a staged attack on voting machines. “I lose sleep over this. I hope you will too,” she told the hackers who had packed into a windowless conference room at Caesars Palace.Four voting machines had been secured for the event, three of them types still in use. One team of hackers used radio signals to eavesdrop on a machine as it recorded votes. Another found a master password online. Within hours of getting their hands on the machines, the hackers had discovered vulnerabilities in all four.”

Reuters  reports that federal election officials are concerned that voting machines that do not provide a paper backup in 14 of the 40 most competitive races “could undermine confidence” in election results, including “… races in Pennsylvania, New Jersey, Texas, Florida, Kansas and Kentucky. Nationwide, of 435 congressional seats up for grabs, 144 are in districts where some or all voters will not have access to machines using paper records…”

Illustration: Pixabay

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Progressive Policies Dramatically Hike Energy Costs

The U.S. Energy Information Administration has released a report revealing that nearly one-third (31%) of American households faced difficulties in affording energy bills during 2015.

“According to the most recent results from EIA’s Residential Energy Consumption Survey (RECS), about one in five households reported reducing or forgoing necessities such as food and medicine to pay an energy bill, and 14% reported receiving a disconnection notice for energy service. Households may also use less energy than they would prefer; 11% of households surveyed reported keeping their home at an unhealthy or unsafe temperature.

The 2015 RECS asked about these and other challenges, including paying energy bills and repairing broken equipment in the home. Households experiencing these circumstances, often considered components of household energy insecurity, may be making difficult financial tradeoffs about which basic needs to fulfill.

“The 2015 RECS questionnaire captured both the occurrence of household energy insecurity and the severity of household energy insecurity in 2015, measured by the frequency of energy insecure events lasting anywhere from a few weeks to most of the year.

“Of the 25 million households that reported forgoing food and medicine to pay energy bills, 7 million faced that decision nearly every month. Of the 17 million households who reported receiving a disconnection notice, 2 million reported that they received a notice nearly every month.

“Occasionally, households may lose the use of heating or air-conditioning equipment entirely. This situation can occur when equipment breaks and a household cannot afford to fix it or when a household cannot afford fuel for their equipment. Seven million households (6% of the national total) reported the inability to use heating equipment because of financial constraints at some point in 2015, and 6 million (5%) households reported the loss of air conditioning. These issues occurred during a year when the overall energy-related expenditure level was at its lowest point in more than a decade.”

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In September, California’s Governor Jerry Brown signed Senate Bill 100, which mandates that by 2045 all energy produced instate must be derived from “carbon-neutral” sources.  The measure also prohibits importing power from sources that don’t meet S100’s standards.  Clearly, the cost factor will be significant.  A Bloomberg review notes “Opponents — including the state’s investor-owned utilities run by PG&E Corp., Edison International and Sempra Energy — raised concerns that the requirement would increase electricity costs. California would need to install more than 200 times as much energy-storage capacity than it has now to make up for the loss of gas plants, according to the Clean Air Task Force, a Boston-based energy-policy nonprofit.”

On the East Coast, New York’s Governor Cuomo continues to block the production of affordable energy in his state. The Wall Street Journal notes that “The U.S. shale boom has lowered energy prices and created hundreds of thousands of jobs across the country. But those living in upstate New York and New England have been left in the cold by New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo, whose shale gas blockade could instigate an energy crisis in the Northeast. … and now he’s blocking natural gas pumped in other states from reaching Northeast markets…Last year the Governor compounded the economic damage by blocking the 120-mile Constitution pipeline transporting natural gas from Pennsylvania to upstate New York and New England…the region desperately needs more natural gas to make up for lost power from the impending shutdown of nuclear and coal plants. New England’s Independent System Operator projects that 14% of the region’s electric generation capacity will be retired within three years and says more pipelines are needed for grid stability. Mr. Cuomo is also forcing the premature retirement of the Indian Point nuclear plant, which provides a quarter of New York City and Westchester County’s electricity. He hasn’t offered a back-up plan…”

American progressives frequently cite their admiration for the European Union’s energy policies.   A study by the Manhattan Institute disclosed that:

“Between 2005, when the E.U. adopted its Emissions Trading Scheme, and 2014, residential electricity rates in the E.U. increased by 63 percent, on average. In Germany, those rates increased by 78 percent; in Spain, by 111 percent; and in the U.K., by 133 percent. Over the same period, residential rates in the U.S. rose by 32 percent.  During 2005–14, residential electricity rates in Germany, which has the most aggressive support for renewables, increased by 13 cents, to 40 cents per kilowatt-hour—an increase larger than the average cost of residential electricity in the U.S. (12.5 cents).  E.U. countries that have intervened the most in their energy markets—Germany, Spain, and the U.K.—have seen their electricity costs increase the fastest. During 2008–12, those countries spent about $52 billion on interventions in their energy markets.  Emissions reductions achieved by the E.U. since 2005 have been greatly exceeded by increases in emissions in the developing world. During 2005–14, the E.U. reduced its carbon-dioxide emissions by 600 million tons per year. Over that same period, the combined emissions of four developing countries—China, India, Indonesia, and Brazil—increased by 4.7 billion tons per year, or nearly eight times the reduction achieved in the European Union. . Bans or restrictions on hydraulic fracturing and, therefore, on natural gas production have made European countries more dependent on imported energy and have contributed to higher electricity prices.”

Photo: Pixabay

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White House Cyber Defense Strategy

President Trump has issued America’s first cybersecurity strategy  in 15 Years.

According to the Director of National Security, Dan Coats,  It’s a measure of the growth of cyber and America’s vulnerability to it that cybers threat are at the top of the list of worldwide threats.

Coats revealed that “From U.S. businesses, to the federal government, to state and local governments, the United States is threatened by cyberattacks every day.” Russia, China, Iran and North Korea pose the greatest cyber threats, he said, but others use cyber operations to achieve strategic and malign objectives…Some of these actors, including Russia, are likely to pursue even more aggressive cyberattacks with the intent of degrading our democratic values and weakening our alliances.”

The Department of Defense notes that nonstate actors, which include terrorists and criminal syndicates, exploit weak state capacity in Africa, the Middle East, Asia and Latin America, to cause instability and violence within states and among states. A part of many of these malign actors is their use of cyber.  Coats reports that the United States is under attack by entities that are using cyber to penetrate virtually every major action that takes place in the United States.

According to Grant Schneider, Chief Information Security Officer and Senior Director for Cybersecurity Policy “Since the beginning of President Trump’s Administration, he has taken action to protect the American people in cyber space. Building on these strong efforts, [On September 20], the President signed the National Cyber Strategy—the first fully articulated cyber strategy for the United States since 2003. The National Cyber Strategy identifies decisive priority actions to protect the American people. This strategy makes clear that the Federal Government will never stop defending our interests, and that we will bring every element of American power to bear to protect our people in the digital domain. This Administration will not treat cyberspace as a separate arena. Instead, we are integrating cyber into all elements of national power. Structuring the National Cyber Strategy around the four pillars of the National Security Strategy reflects and advances and this approach.”

The White House document states that:

“The rise of the Internet and the growing centrality of cyberspace to all facets of the modern world corresponded with the rise of the United States as the world’s lone superpower. For the past quarter century, the ingenuity of the American people drove the evolution of cyberspace, and in turn, cyberspace has become fundamental to American wealth creation and innovation. Cyberspace is an inseparable component of America’s financial, social, government, and political life. Meanwhile, Americans sometimes took for granted that the supremacy of the United States in the cyber domain would remain unchallenged, and that America’s vision for an open, interoperable, reliable, and secure Internet would inevitably become a reality. Americans believed the growth of the Internet would carry the universal aspirations for free expression and individual liberty around the world. Americans assumed the opportunities to expand communication, commerce, and free exchange of ideas would be self-evident. Large parts of the world have embraced America’s vision of a shared and open cyberspace for the mutual benefit of all.

“Our competitors and adversaries, however, have taken an opposite approach. They benefit from the open Internet, while constricting and controlling their own people’s access to it, and actively undermine the principles of an open Internet in international forums. They hide behind notions of sovereignty while recklessly violating the laws of other states by engaging in pernicious economic espionage and malicious cyber activities, causing significant economic disruption and harm to individuals, commercial and non-commercial interests, and governments across the world. They view cyberspace as an arena where the United States’ overwhelming military, economic, and political power could be neutralized and where the United States and its allies and partners are vulnerable.
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“Russia, Iran, and North Korea conducted reckless cyber attacks that harmed American and international businesses and our allies and partners without paying costs likely to deter future cyber aggression. China engaged in cyber-enabled economic espionage and trillions of dollars of intellectual property theft. Non-state actors — including terrorists and criminals — exploited cyberspace to profit, recruit, propagandize, and attack the United States and its allies and partners, with their actions often shielded by hostile states. Public and private entities have struggled to secure their systems as adversaries increase the frequency and sophistication of their malicious cyber activities. Entities across the United States have faced cybersecurity challenges in effectively identifying, protecting, and ensuring resilience of their networks, systems, functions, and data as well as detecting, responding to, and recovering from incidents.”

These are the key tenets provided in the National Cyber Strategy document:

Protect the American People, the Homeland, and the American Way of Life. We will manage cybersecurity risks to increase the security and resilience of the Nation’s information and information systems. We will do this by taking specific steps to secure Federal networks and information, secure critical infrastructure, combat cybercrime, and improve incident reporting.

Promote American Prosperity. We will preserve America’s influence in the technological ecosystem and pursue development of cyberspace as an open engine of economic growth, innovation, and efficiency. To do this, we will support a vibrant and resilient digital economy, foster and protect American ingenuity, and develop a superior cybersecurity workforce.

Preserve Peace through Strength. We will identify, counter, disrupt, degrade, and deter behavior in cyberspace that is destabilizing and contrary to our national interests, while preserving America’s overmatch in and through cyberspace. To achieve this, we will do our part to enhance cyber stability through norms of responsible state behavior, attribution of unacceptable behavior in cyberspace, and the imposition of costs on malicious cyber actors.

Advance American Influence. We will preserve the long-term openness, interoperability, security, and reliability of the Internet, which supports and is reinforced by America’s interests. We will take specific global efforts to promote these objectives, while supporting market growth for infrastructure and emerging technologies and building cyber capacity internationally.

Photo: Army Staff Sgt. Matthew Malesinski, right, 201st Cyber Protection Team network security analyst, talks with his team during a cybersecurity audit of the 1st Combat Communications Squadron’s tactical communications kits at Ramstein Air Base, Germany, March 16, 2017. (Air Force photo by Staff Sgt. Timothy Moore)

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NASA’s Next Big Project

The United States is on the verge of a renaissance in space, with ambitious goals to have astronauts develop a lunar base and explore Mars, as well as accomplishing new science goals using robotic spacecraft. Vice President Pence, who leads the National Space Council recently stated that “… we’re on the cusp of a new golden age of exploration.”

The first step will be developing a presence in “cislunar space” (the area between Earth and the Moon) within the coming decade. The space agency is planning to place a manned station near the moon, and use it to both develop a permanent presence on the lunar surface and use that, in turn, to facilitate a Mars mission.

According to the space agency, it is currently studying the orbital outpost concept in the vicinity of the Moon with U.S. industry and the International Space Station partners. NASA describes the value of the project: “Cislunar space offers affordable near-term opportunities to help pave the way for future global human exploration of deep space, acting as a bridge between present missions and future deep space missions. While missions in cis-lunar space have value unto themselves, they can also play an important role in enabling and reducing risk for future human missions to the Moon, Near-Earth Asteroids, Mars, and other deep space destinations.”

The platform will consist of a power and propulsion element and habitation, logistics and airlock capabilities. NASA plans to launch elements of the gateway on the agency’s Space Launch System or commercial rockets for assembly in space.

According to William Gerstenmaier, associate administrator of the space agency’s Human Exploration division, “The Lunar Orbital Platform-Gateway will give us a strategic presence in cislunar space. It will drive our activity with commercial and international partners and help us explore the Moon and its resources. We will ultimately translate that experience toward human missions to Mars.”
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The power and propulsion element will be the initial component of the gateway, and is targeted to launch in 2022. Using advanced high-power solar electric propulsion, the element will maintain the gateway’s position and can move the gateway between lunar orbits over its lifetime to maximize science and exploration operations. As part of the agency’s public-private partnership work under Next Space Technologies for Exploration Partnerships, or NextSTEP, five companies are completing four-month studies on affordable ways to develop the power and propulsion element. NASA will leverage capabilities and plans of commercial satellite companies to build the next generation of all electric spacecraft.

Habitation capabilities are scheduled for a 2024 launch. Astronauts onboard will participate in a variety of deep space exploration and commercial activities in the vicinity of the Moon, including possible missions to the lunar surface. NASA also wants to leverage the gateway for scientific investigations near and on the Moon.

A Popular Mechanics review of NASA’s plans noted that “This future science station, which will effectively replace the International Space Station when it reaches retirement age in the 2020s, will be a fraction of the size but carry astronauts hundreds of thousands of miles farther into space. In fact, it might travel farther away from our planet than any other human-piloted spacecraft, including the Apollo missions. But the most exciting idea behind this new station, destined to make its home orbiting near the moon (aka a cis-lunar orbit), is it will provide a new foothold for future human missions to Earth’s closest celestial neighbors, like asteroids, the moon itself, and Mars. Because the station is in an egg-shaped orbit, stretching anywhere from 1,500 km to 70,000 km (930 to 44,000 miles) from the Moon, it would need only a little push to be sent flying to a yet-to-be-chosen destination.”

Illustration: NASA