Ten years ago I took a Challenges in Global Affairs specialization on Coursera as part of my intent to work more internationally. This six month program of five classes included a section on the troubles the International Criminal Court was having. There was a lot of attention on Africa, but war crimes in Europe or wealthy Mideast nations were ignored.
This latest move, by three countries that had military coups between 2020 and 2023, Burkina Faso, Mali, and Niger, is just the latest criticism. They do not say “Israel”, but the lack of attention on Netanyahu, despite his ICC warrant, is easily understood as the . It should be noted that Russia had something to do with all three coups.
The entire Sahel had coups during the COVID19 era … and we’ve previously noted the War in Sudan on here.
What does this all mean? Recall that I spent 2013 - 2014 digging into food and water security in the area roughly defined by the maximum extent of the Ottoman empire. That information is available on the Neal Rauhauser Wordpress site.
So what does it mean?
I believe the peak value of human life is in the rear view mirror, climate change is the primary driver of this, and that historians will use the discontinuity caused by COVID19 as a natural dividing line.
And to be clear, I hate that this is the world we live in as I’m just about to qualify as elderly. There are things our species could have done that are now likely forever beyond our reach. The decades we pissed away in holy war as a response to the 911 attack were the time we could have remediated for climate change. Instead we have global rapture hysteria as MAGA begins to awaken from their long nightmare.
At least California had an incredibly mild year in terms of wildfire. Tonight I’ll take a nice long walk after sundown and try to forget all about this stuff.