Author: pelshvalen (Page 27 of 42)

Encryption

18.12.2016 / pelshvalen

To me, the word “encryption” sounded sinister until very recently, when I realised I’d have to take the consequences of what we are seeing these days. And guess what: digital protection – even encryption – isn’t difficult at all. There are programs that do it all for us. I believe that what I am proposing in this and the following post need not even make a dent in anybody’s wallet.

In view of the medieval state of race relations in the US, and bearing in mind Mr Trump’s penchant for decisive action, I think we should not place too much trust in the rule of law in the US, for instance. It’s a good idea to be prepared.

In general, in a world that is increasingly being governed by individuals who label political opponents as “criminals” or even “terrorists”, we should think of the consequences of such labels, not necessarily for ourselves – at least not yet – but for reasons that I will return to a few paragraphs further down.

Many of our rulers are willing to resort to what we in the west recently (i.e. pre-Snowden) considered “the unthinkable”, to stay in power and, in many cases, to improve their financial leverage.

There is also a rising number of people who are learning the tricks of cybercrime. For all you know, your next-door neighbour might be one of them, in which case he or she may be particularly interested in your WIFI network.

Most of us are not terrorists or criminals, although we might be leftist or Moslem or environmentalist or black or even Mexican. We might, however, be deeply dissatisfied with our rulers, and we might even be organised, say in an activist civil rights group. Organised opposition has always been regarded as a threat, or at least a nuisance, by the powers that be, and is now becoming increasingly risky. In many countries, of course, it has always been deadly dangerous. What’s new is that the number and potency of tools to penetrate people’s private (digital) worlds have grown exponentially over the past years.

What’s new, too, is that year by year, in all countries, law enforcement and secret services are being given wider powers to use these tools. This is quite understandable because, after all, there is a real threat of terrorism, and there is a real and growing threat of serious cybercrime.

Meanwhile, political improvement is contingent on our all understanding as much as possible of what goes on. Some journalists, social scientists and whistle blowers are putting their necks out to protect us by uncovering the crooked acts of cynical rulers and magnates. By doing so, they risk their lives in many countries, and in others, including mine, they risk finding themselves without a job.

We need them. We desperately need them! Only by knowing what is actually going on, by being able to dismiss false rumours, libel and “post-truth” propaganda (see Oxford Dictionaries’ Word of the Year), do we have any chance of improving the world we live in. They – the journalists and social scientists – hopefully know how to protect themselves, but by doing so, they will inevitably seem suspicious: “Why is NN encrypting his stuff? Why is that woman using a VPN server? Are they terrorists?”

Since they are trying to protect us, the least we can do is to try to protect them, in essence by protecting ourselves.

If only to protect our bank account information, password lists, copies of passport and driving licence, intimate letters and pictures etc., we should start thinking about digital personal protection. When we started using email, in my case in the late eighties, it seemed very difficult. We had to put a lot of effort into it. These days, it’s all so easy that kids are social media experts before they can add and subtract. Did we think this was the way it would always be? If so, our thinking was flawed: Sic transit gloria mundi.

Sooner or later, the alternative to using only pen-and-paper may well be to encrypt everything; computers, phone calls, email, social networking – the lot!

Meanwhile, there are a few very basic steps we should take, apart from everything we hear every day (e.g. being wary of links in emails and on websites). The measures cost us a few extra seconds, but then again – let us not forget how very, very much more time-consuming everything was, just ten years ago.

Text messaging encryption. Thanks to Edward Snowden, Signal has become quite a hit. It’s so seamless that once you’ve installed it, you won’t notice you are no longer using your phone’s stock SMS app, except that it’s faster and doesn’t hang.
Wifi router protection
Wifi routers must be new enough to yield so-called WPA2 protection (at least).
“Anti-virus” software
You should not rely entirely on Defender, if you are using Windows. There are several excellent and powerful anti-virus protection schemes that are free.
VPN (Virtual Private Network)
If privacy protection is an issue for you — and to my mind it should be, if only for the reasons given above conceal your IP address. This is probably one of the most important steps to take if you are a fact-hunting dissident. Many services provide access to VPN servers in various countries, and competition is fierce. Most of the best services are no entirely free, though, or rather, those that are tend to plague you with adds or restrict your bandwidth. On the bright side, most of them now require no technical know-how, just that you press a button. There are numerous lists of “best VPN” services, free and non-free.
Storage on external drives
Store as little as possible on computers, tablets and smartphones. (Plug in your external drive and move private stuff to it, then remove the external drive at once.) If you don’t use cloud storage, this should do (assuming your computer doesn’t have digital parasites lodged in its entrails, your external hard drive is securely stored and never leaves the house, and the house never burns down).

Cloud storage

Most people use cloud services these days, if only to transfer files. Besides, people are often more or less unwittingly constantly connected to their operating systems’ “Store”, storage spaces, sharing services, etc.and to social services.

TLS/SSL protocol
Respectable cloud storage services use a TLS/SSL protocol for data transfer (HTTPS://). That isn’t much, but better than nothing.
Encryption
Some services encrypt your stuff already before it leaves your computer. They say that you risk nothing and that they have “zero-knowledge” (about you and your stuff). This sort of service is used by companies. But why not do your own encryption before uploading anything to your cloud. with good software, it’s a cinch! So:
- What is good software? Since good encryption depends not on your software, but on the algorithm used by the software, the software you want will depend on whether it is easy to use, can relate to your operating system and serves your needs in other respects. Leading encryption programs all use basically the same algorithms, the best known of which is AES (developed some 20 years ago).
- Veracrypt is one such (free) cross-platform program (i.e. for Mac, Windows, Linux, but not for mobile systems). I am mentioning it not least as it is the program used in the following link which I am including to demonstrate how very easy it is to encrypt whatever files you want to keep out of any private or public eye: encouraging demonstration

Phones and tablets

Being an open system, Android is more vulnerable to malware attacks than are IOS devices. Over the past two years or so Android has been rocked by some pretty serious security issues, e.g. “Stagefright”. So serious were they, in fact, that phones that come with Marshmellow (or newer) installed are supposedly encrypted by default (!) Yes, you read correctly, by default. In other words, Android is not taking any chance, nor should you, so encrypt!

Encryption
Older phones, with Android versions from Gingerbread up, can optionally be encrypted. Details about how to do this may vary depending on your phone and version, but this guide gives an idea.
IOS phones have been encrypted by default for a while. Older phones can also easily be encrypted.

Flash drives

Some people will want to encrypt their entire computer. If so, they will probably have used their operating system’s tools for doing this. (BitLocker on Windows, and FileVault on MACs). Encrypting flash drives is, if anything, all the more important since they tend to get lost or forgotten.

The same tools as for computers
BitLocker (Windows), FleVault (Mac)and, again, Veracrypt, can encrypt flash drives (USB sticks).
Here is one of many guides.

In my next post I shall touch upon sharing (most importantly by email) with PGP.

Scylla and Charybdis

05.11.2016 / pelshvalen

My compatriots seem unable to talk about anything else, so great is their dread of waking up on Wednesday to learn that what they consider … – actually, I’d better not say what they consider him – … anyway, that he will turn out to be the world’s most powerful man.

The media here is unequivocal, to my regret, disregarding a whole set of human foibles, one of them being that a human being inevitably tends to consider the bad guy’s counterpart a good guy.

On the other side of the globe, however, the US side, I suspect that apathy has settled in. I wish to send a greeting to fellow humans “over there”, as we used to say back in the 1890s and in the decades between the two world wars, when hordes of my countrymen fled from poverty to the States:

This is your chance, man! Pull up your socks and turn your country around. Start work now! Today! Look beyond Scylla and Charybdis. What you want is an honourable future for your country. Tell them you no longer accept the shame of your country’s universally known human rights record. A country so rich in natural and financial resources, with such wonderful universities! Yet so many destitute people, lousy schools and ignorant citizens. Such appalling treatment of blacks! So much brazen racism! So much narrow-minded, sanctimonious bigotry!

Your system isn’t working, quite simply. It never will. Something’s got to change, or the whole structure will topple. The United States’ resistance to change is almost as pathetic as that of some religious fanatics’ with whom I am sure you don’t want to be compared.

Look to Canada, for instance. If they can do it, so can you. Right?

Digital perdition

05.11.2016 / pelshvalen

You do have your password ready, don’t you?

Do you have more than one email account? Each requires a password, of course. So do your websites, blogs, Facebook and Twitter accounts… And your bank account – that goes without saying – each of your bank accounts.

Take comfort, it’s just a matter of time before banks will give up providing online services: too risky. Too many accounts are being hacked, and banks can’t endlessly afford to cover their clients’ losses.

And where is your internet service provider? At a café? You’re in luck then, because you won’t have to remember the very intricate password of a private router. Only, you may be out of luck, because there are a lot of accomplished hackers waiting and watching over open networks, ready to send you a key logger with which to capture the password to your bank accounts. You won’t even notice, most probably, but from then on, your PC will be remote controlled.

True, your cloud service looks after you and sends you reassuring messages: Not to worry, everything you write on your screen will be carefully stored. If you throw a temper tantrum and hurl your device at someone, or if a hacker ruins it, don’t worry, be happy, nothing is lost.

You log in with a password at work, I suppose, and if you make purchases on the Internet, each of them has to be confirmed with a password, two in fact – one to the company from which you are making the purchase, and one for your bank. They’d better not be identical, you know, and they’d better be “strong”. Strong passwords are per definition impossible to remember, non-pronounceable, non-readable and defying all mnemonic tricks, the sort of thing only a sadistic teacher would ask a pupil to memorise.

You probably purchase all your airline and train tickets online. Guess what: You will need passwords each time. And you’d better have a printer ready, because if you don’t you wont be able to access your tickets when you need them, i.e. at the airport – unless of course, you remember the password.

I have to log on to my library every once in a while. It demands not only a password but a user name I never remember. Speaking of user names, one of my electricity suppliers insists on using my long- deleted passport number as my user name and will not allow me to change it. Needless to say, it requires a password too. In fact all my electricity accounts do – I have three of them.

I also have Kindle and iTunes accounts, each requiring passwords, and Goodness knows how many tablets and computers on which to read my Kindle books, all password protected, as is my mobile phone. Mind you I have four phone service accounts – depending on where I am in the world. And I look up words in various dictionaries that require passwords. Many people use Spotify, Netlix and or other streaming services. Guess what they demand: PASSWORDS.

My bicycles are locked with passwords – keys get lost. Believe it or not, I can still get into my car with a key, though.

I haven’t tried dying yet, but I am sure I will need a password to do so. What really worries me, though, is that my poor children will need a password to get rid of my earthly remains.

But hope on the way. On Wednesday, the US will have a new president. Regardless of who that president will be, he or she will probably inaugurate a near password-free era. Unless you are terminally ill or get run over by a reckless driver – you are likely to live to see the lifting of the password tyranny that haunts us all.

Fingerprints on touchscreens will replace passwords, and people will be glad – nay, relieved – to submit their fingerprints and be free of the password tyranny.

If your next president has a pronounced dislike of Russians, Mexicans, homosexuals, leftists, Wikikileakists, rightists, Kurds, Iranians, Moslems or Jews, not to mention critics, universal fingerprinting will be very useful, won’t it.

From a cairn

26.10.2016 / pelshvalen

Under a grey sky, I made my way up the steep hill – more like a cliff – to the local Bronze Age cairns. A small sign, planted by a representative of the Directorate of Cultural Heritage, explains that the cairns are about 3000 years old and that most Bronze Age cairns in this country are far from where their builders lived. They are in high, out-of-reach places overlooking the sea.

I clamber up this barely visible track a few times every year, for the view of the river delta below and the mountains beyond followed in the distance by more blue mountains.

What on earth could have induced Bronze Age farmers – for apparently people had turned to farming by then – to lug the dead body of their chieftain up such a steep incline? According to the sign, his body would have been incinerated, placed in a stone cask and covered with stones, most so large that no single man could carry them.

Evolution has not changed us much in 3000 years, I am told. New-born babies today probably look exactly as they did back then, aside from being bigger. Those men – who knows if women followed them up the hill – would have felt awed, as I do every time I get to the top. Maybe they thought that from his sheltered stony bed, the dead man would see what they could not see from down in the valley, and would somehow warn them of impending threats.

At the graveside of somebody who died 3000 years ago, with an entirely different outlook than was his, I gaze at the great river and the tremendous expanses before me, and feel that here and now, I understand everything.

Even under a grey sky, I am bathed in light up here. I realise at last my mistake: It is not so much the ignorance of the Trump-voters that should worry us, as the legitimacy of their anger. True, there is no doubt that Donald Trump is terrifyingly ignorant and reckless. He’s the sort of man who shouldn’t be given a driving licence. But he speaks for a very large number of people, so large a number, that perhaps we should sit back and listen. What are they saying? Why are they so angry?

Moreover, I think he’s right about his opponent’s being an international liability; not more so, albeit, than were previous US presidents.

Trump’s voters claim they have been disinherited. The American dream is no longer theirs. Trump blames immigrants, Obama, women… whatever have you, and the rest of us are appalled. But at the end of the day, the facts are clear: Hillary will not even begin to address the claims of America’s countless dispossessed. She will not redress her country’s past wrongdoings against Latin America, not to mention the Middle East, for which the US of all configurations has so many crimes against humanity to answer for that there will never be forgiveness. She will continue as her predecessors, making havoc of the Middle East and raising the number of dispossessed people in her own country.

Let’s face it: The US is a mess. The country is doing well again, financially, but a large segment of its population is not benefiting from its recovery after the meltdown.

Trump’s voters love him because of his outspoken anger. Finally, somebody dares swear and curse at the establishment. People who have not lost out in the shift from factory to Silicon Valley find him repulsive.

I myself find him repulsive, but I tell myself now: Beware: He is a rebel. Can’t you see his similarity to James Dean?

At this point of my analysis, I am cautiously descending the incline, golden leaves falling slowly around me like great big snow flakes. The birch trees, guarded by stern, unaffected pine sentinels with drooping branches, are preparing for the long winter night, trembling already, discarding their lace underwear.

Pines are like the people who used to inhabit these parts: Unsentimental, unsmiling and unforgiving, like Trump’s voters.

Attempt at making a list

12.10.2016 / pelshvalen

And now for all the good things, the things for which those who believe in a God have reason to offer thanks. Such a list, my friends, is called for, to prevent us from weeping all day and all night over Aleppo and all the little dead children there; an energetic list, to the accompaniment of drum rolls and waving flags, while happy children prance around dressed in their Sunday best.

We hear items from the list every day. In the lift on my way up to work, for instance:

– At least it’s not snowing.
– Better than in Aleppo, for sure.

Or in the lift on my way from work:

– Weekend at last! My wife is away with some friends, and I’m going to get drunk with mine.
– My children are away, so I’m going to read that book, at last.

No, that won’t do. If there is no rain in Aleppo, humanity’s tears will drown the place unless we can do better. So let’s pull our socks up, shall we!

– My begonia is still blossoming, in October, would you believe it? It’s so very beautiful; a hybrid of course. It reminds me that though species in the wild are dying, one by one, due to drought or whatever, we – humans, I mean – will always be able to create new and wonderful hybrids.
– … which will be available to those that can afford to keep a gardener, or something.
– Well, I’m sure there’ll be botanical gardens here and there, at least in big cities.
– Yes, and zoos. You know, in theory we can probably clone any of the popular mammals before they become extinct: lions and whales and tigers and stuff.
– … and we would not have to clone those horrible snails…
– I’m afraid they’ll be among the last to go.
– Oh dear. Well, at least there are still a few birds left in the country, and I’m off to the country for the weekend.
– Leaving your beautiful begonia?
– I’ll have something to look forward to coming back to, won’t I? Have a nice weekend.
– You too.

But I, the furry whale, have a better candidate than begonias to promote as a generator of happiness: Violin quartets. Violin quartets do not need rain or for that matter sun or fertile earth or even concert halls. Violin quartets only need violins and sheet music and a room that can accommodate four people, and me of course, who wants to listen.

But when the forests die and when almost all violins have been burnt in towns like Aleppo (compare Warsaw under WWII – a topic of many films) there will be neither violins nor paper on which to print the notes to be played … Aleppo again!

Why – in heaven’s name! – why Aleppo, again and again? What about Niger? What about all the countries of the Sahel, where death by drought and starvation is the order of the day, where sub-human Bocoharamists put people out of their misery when poverty has finished doing it’s business.

– Your dog had puppies? Why congratulations!!
– Wait, I’ll show you. Hold on, I’m a bit slow with this mobile phone stuff… oh yes, here they are.
– Oh my goodness! How unbelievably adorable!

Innova

21.08.2016 / pelshvalen

– Dere leverer hva slags tjenester, sa du?

– Vi finner den beste!

– Den beste hva?

– Personen til jobben.

– Altså et rekrutteringsbyrå?

– Nei vet du hva! Man rekrutterer til renovasjonsarbeid, ikke til skikkelige jobber, jobber det er verdt å ofre noe for, og…

– Er du arbeidsledig, er du kanskje villig til å…

– …vi har virkelig et flott konsept, og jeg vil forferdelig gjerne ansette min eldste og beste venn som statist.

– Statist? Men…

– Tro meg, du vil ikke klage på lønnen. Jeg regner med at du som skuespiller lever fra hånd til munn.

– Men jeg fikk da…

– Nå skal du høre: For å være Statoil-sjef, for eksempel, hjelper det lite å ha gode karakterer. Det er det uendelig mange som har. Det vi trenger er folk som oppfyller en viss profil. Det er lett å påvirke resultatene av en personlighetstest, særlig hvis du har tatt et par, så vi har designet en ny type test. Vi skal ikke spørre kandidaten hvordan han ville ha reagert i en gitt situasjon, vi skal presentere ham med situasjonen.

– Og hvordan vil dere gjøre det?

– Det er der statisten kommer inn i bildet!

For eksempel: Kandidaten kommer til mitt kontor, men jeg vil invitere ham til lunsj på en restaurant. Der skal vi møte en tredje person. Problemet er bare at jeg av medisinske grunner ikke kan kjøre. Det må han gjøre. Vi har litt dårlig tid, fordi tredjepersonen bare har satt av 20 minutter til oss.

– Og jeg skal være tredjemann?

– Nei, du skal være mopedisten som svinger inn på veien rett foran oss og som holder 40 km i timen.

– Du vil at han skal kjøre meg ned?

– Hehe, nei, jeg vil helst unngå det, men du er inne på noe. Vi forventer at han skal være temmelig kreativ for å få deg av veien for å rekke møtet. Og dersom vi faktisk rekker det, så skal du igjen dukke opp.

– Blodig og forslått for å kreve revansj?

– Nei, som utidig bror av ham vi skal møte.

– Utidig?

– Ja, han vil låne penger av sin eldre bror, og det interesserer ham midt bak at broren sitter i et viktig møte. Pinlig for storebror, selvfølgelig, ikke minst siden brødrenes gjenlevende veldig rike mor er glad i lillebror. Det som er litt spesielt med ham – med deg, altså – er at han – du – har på deg en Behring Breivik T-shirt. Du trykker altså bokstavelig din begeistring for Behring Breivik på ditt bryst.

– Og du vil at «kandidaten» som du kaller søkeren, skal slå meg helseløs! Hva skal man med fiender når man har slike venner?

– Nei, vi er bare opptatt av å velge ut kandidater som respekterer trykkefriheten. Nå? Vil du ha jobben?

– Hva gjør man ikke for å forsvare trykkefriheten?

Good guys?

07.08.2016 / pelshvalen

Once, very many years ago, I had the temerity to argue a point of law with a public prosecutor. I say ‘temerity’, for one thing because he was a prominent public prosecutor whom I held in awe. More importantly, though, I knew nothing of law, and was arguing merely on the basis of what I thought was ‘just’. I thought, back then, that I knew the difference between justice and injustice.

He kindly listened to me for a few minutes and then suddenly flared: “Do you really imagine that any of this is about ‘justice’!”

I shall never forget that, not least since I have since learnt that my interlocutor was a man with an acute sense of justice.

For some years now, the world has been watching the painstaking deletion of what was once a proud and highly civilised nation: Syria. We have witnessed in dismay (or looked away ) as Syrians were starved, executed, tortured, poisoned or exterminated in other ways day after day, month after month, year after year. How many years has this been going on now?

Where are the good guys? Who are the bad guys? Do you see the dividing line between justice and injustice in this particular picture? I don’t.

Let’s say that Assad is a callous dictator. There is certainly no doubt that the Syrian authorities cracked down viciously on peaceful demonstrators back when it all started. The viciousness stunned us all, whereas the demonstrators insisted in going to their death unarmed.

I remember how, reading the paper over a coffee break at work, I felt tears welling to my eyes and, looking up, met the equally tearful eye of my colleague, who said – and I nodded – “surely, the Syrians must be the bravest people on earth!”

Do you remember? Demonstrating was suicidal in Syria, yet thousands and thousands did. Why? Why did they insist on demonstrating knowing that they would be shot at and that no demonstrating could force the authorities to satisfy their demands. What was their strategy?

Of course I don’t know, but maybe in a decade or four, we will learn that indications had been given to opposition leaders that certain governments would be interested in intervening, directly or indirectly, in the event of a Syrian debacle.

Meanwhile, let us look at the opposition. Assad is the press’s pet hate these days. Assad’s forces have engaged in chlorine warfare, we read, and there is every reason to suspect that the past Sarin massacres were perpetrated by ‘him’. I repeat: I have no sympathy with Assad, but what on earth can you say in the defence of the “opposition forces” who are holding the population hostage?! Do you really imagine that they want ‘democracy’? Do you really think, still, after all these years, that these guys are the good guys? Grow up: It’s not as though with Assad gone, the good guys will have their day.

However, that does not mean that there are not millions of honest and, not least, kind, brave and generous Syrians out there, most of them homeless, of course, like the Jews of old, and more recently, the Palestinians.

God help us for the mess we have all made of the Middle East!

The kids

25.07.2016 / pelshvalen

And now they are blowing up Germans!

When western kids are frustrated, they tend to go on drugs or destroy themselves some other way. The past couple of weeks’ young killers in Germany seem to be of a different metal.

Having somehow survived the ordeal of getting to Europe, partly by sea, trekking through woods, crossing fences, evading border guards and paranoid police officers lurking at every turn of the road, with little or no money, being told everywhere, “we don’t want you here!” must have been almost like escaping from a Nazi concentration camp, the difference being that there is no “home” waiting for them if they make it through the barbed wire.

No “welcome!”, no celebration of their heroic survival awaits them. They have made the desperate journey only to find that they will be put on a plane back to their starting point, which for most of them is just another concentration camp, at least in practical terms.

Far from condoning their massacres, for which I blame the ISIS, regardless of whether ISIS actually orchestrated the acts, I cannot help understanding the power of their despair. Look at them! They are hardly more than kids. Until war blocked out the sun over Palestine, Afghanistan, Iraq and Syria, to all appearances for ever, these kids watched western TV series about happy families in pretty towns where “poverty” meant not owning the latest four-wheel-drive sedan. No wonder they were sure that with hard work, they would do well here.

How could they possibly understand what we think is obvious: If you have a passport from a Schengen country, fine, you may try your luck here. If not, tough luck, rules are rules, and we all have to follow the rules, don’t we. Next.

I know how much effort it cost us all, last winter, to dismiss thoughts of the thousands and thousands of refugees from the Middle East who had sold and/or left everything and who were shivering under a bush somewhere in the dark outskirts of the Schengen area.

Most of them do not kill! Those who do, still do not kill a fraction of all the people who get killed in traffic accidents. But the situation is indeed serious and tragic for us all.

I would like to add that the number of European victims of terrorism is only a infinitessimal fraction of Middle Eastern victims of terrorism. So if we feel traumatised, how do they feel?

And so it goes

24.07.2016 / pelshvalen

Much has happened since the Middle Ages, not to mention since the Stone Age. Most of us now have TVs, for instance, and can witness what people are doing in other parts of the world. Many of us enjoy being on-line every moment of the day, except perhaps in the shower. We get healthier food than ever, if we can afford it, better screen resolutions, and faster cars.

Even our species seems to have improved a little, at least according to Steven Pinker: Growing numbers of people are vehemently opposed to torture and death penalties. So-called civilised countries even claim to treat children, prisoners, women and blacks humanely.

Alas, the tide – if there ever was one – seems to be turning. Poverty is eroding large segments of western civilisation, and with poverty comes anger. The Brits decided to leave the EU because they don’t want to share, US Americans are threatening to vote Trump, and xenophobic tendencies are spreading throughout Europe. Meanwhile, the Turks who were excluded from EU on petty formalities (in reality because they are Moslem) in spite of the fact that they met more of the EU’s terms than many of the other new EU nations, are now on a dangerous course. Would the extremely bloody military attempt to overthrow the government have happened if Turkey had been allowed into the EU? Would the Turkish government now be putting thousands of innocent people in prison?

Meanwhile, the French and the Belgians are being decimated by subhuman lunatics. Most of the French are blissfully unaware of the nation’s past crimes in the Levant. The horrors committed there as late as in the third quarter of the twentieth century are not all that well known to me either, nor are the crimes against humanity committed by King Leopold of Belgium and all the other colonial masters of the past, though I know the damage is still crippling. But I doubt that the subhuman minions of ISIS know much about these things either.

It is true that France, and for that matter all of Europe, has a lot to atone for. We are now even negotiating Tkip, the purpose of which is to allow rich people in rich nations to grow richer, regardless of the consequences for the rest of the world.

They say that the mutant who drove over and killed at least 84 people in France was not even religious. He was just angry because he was a failure. He is not likely to have been very well versed in past or even modern history. However, that does not exonerate ISIS.

By advocating the random killing of people, ISIS has instituted a “best practice” that can be applied by anyone, including disgruntled divorcees. They have institutionalised “random killing”. The killing they abet is not idealistic, it is merely foul. What they are doing in Europe brings out, in us – the Europeans – the “them vs us” instincts of the primitive human tribal animal.

I have never heard a level-headed interview of any ISIS leader, so I can only judge them by the deeds they claim are their doing. I therefore have no option but to assume they are all psychopaths of the very worst category, the kind that would not stoop at eating live babies, if there were anything to gain by it. I don’t believe that theirs is an attempt, however mistaken, to create a better world. I don’t even believe they care about their so-called subjects. I believe they are power freaks.

As far as I am concerned, every one of the leaders of ISIS deserves not only life imprisonment, but life in hell, whatever that means (the worse the better).

So what does that make me, if not a blood-thirsty animal? I am not yet willing to embrace the concept of capital punishment, it is true, but my words “the worse the better” would seem to indicate that I am not quite as averse to torture as I claim to be, and I fear I am not alone. If this continues, civilisation will have turned into its anti-thesis within few years.

So what is to be done? Fight back? Alas, they have money, lots of it; any technology can be bought if you have enough money. And they are not bound by any international conventions. But their very greatest strength is that the armies they command far out-number anything we could ever even dream of mustering. They recruit from an absolutely endless reserve of people who are excluded from the good life, people who have nothing but Paradise to live and die for. Their command of innumerable people who long to die, is an unparallelled asset.

So I fear I do not share Stephen Pinker’s optimism about the improvement of the human race. Just as we waited too long to take climate change seriously – we are still waiting, in fact – we will wait too long to take the great North-South divide seriously. It represents as great a threat to civilisation as the climate change. I fear that every month we wait will claim new lives, blown up in random explosions of depair and rage.

In the mean time, maybe we should harness the services of our own discontents: I suggest the following announcement: If you are one of the very few Western nutheads who suffer from a compelling urge to commit a suicidal massacre – in a school, an airplane, or any other public place – please hold your horses: Your government needs you.

…and the winner is:

27.06.2016 / pelshvalen

Speaking ill of the dead is in bad taste. I suspect that speaking ill of the winner of a competition is no better.

So I have a problem. I may not speak ill of the winners of the US presidential primaries, may not speak ill of the Brexicists and may not even speak ill of a man I viscerally abhor, Spain’s President Rajoy.

Of worse taste, even, is the speaking ill of voters of the winners.
What can I do?

Today was a truly sad day for me. I had hoped that Spain would finally turn its back on its shameful past: the very recent corruption, the not so recent dictatorships with “disappearances” of people my age – neither accounted for nor investigated – the extremist catholic stance on a number of issues, the pathetic nationalism, the recent sacking of a prominent judge for political reasons, the abuse of the Constitutional Tribunal, etc., etc.

But no, the voters voted for the party that represents all that, the party whose top brass regularly appears in court, accused of every kind of corruption. I nearly wept!

I will not, repeat not, speak ill of Spanish voters. Here and now I intend to make peace with them, at the risk of making a fool of myself. In a couple of days, analysts will have broken down the figures, examined turnout, age groups, social backgrounds, etc. Just as they defined the average Trump voter, just as they have already (!) defined the average Brexit voter, they will define the Rajoy voter. I am going to put my neck out and define the Rajoy voter myself.

Before I do that, I must explain why I am doing it: Having read who the average Trump voter is, I feel shame on behalf of my Trump-voting friends, if I have any. Having read that the average Brexit voter is an ageing, if not senile, racist loser, I truly feel pained on behalf of my Brexit-voting friends, and I do have them: They are neither losers, nor ignorant. As for my numerous Spanish friends, conspicuously many of them take pains not to reveal their political preferences. I suppose that meanst they are not leftist, because leftists tend to vociferate a lot.

So, to Spain: I suspect that the turnout of people younger than 50 was relatively poor. Why? Because the factions that could have attracted the young were the ones that lost most seats compared to what they won the last time. This applies to both Ciudadanos, on the right, and Podemos Unido on the left.

Podemos Unidos has a very daring, left-wing programme and a leader who plays high stakes and is considered arrogant. After the first burst of enthusiasm that met Podemos, voters are wary. Can the party be trusted? Look at the plight of Greece, for instance. Moreover, Spain definitely does not want to leave the EU, and after the Brexit debacle, voters are afraid of anything that might rock the boat. Podemos makes a habit of rocking boats.

Ciudadanos is a modern party that tries to appeal to the up and coming. It wants progress, not so much social progress, perhaps, as modernity, efficiency, transparency.

The result of the vote is already seen as a triumph of the traditional bi-partite system. I think not. I think it is an expression of the new parties’ failing to convince a “fragmented electorate that oscillates between apathy and indignation” (I have stolen this line from the BBC). I think the oscillation is very much a reality that will haunt Spanish politics for some time. Indeed this new election is again considered a “deadlock”, though there is no doubt that the old-fashioned authoritarian president’s hand has been strengthened.

I suspect voter loyalty came from the people who vote ritually for the values they have held all their lives. PP has always flagged Spain’s glory, the importance of traditional family values and the church, the importance of giving alms to the poor… etc. Many PP voters are bigots, to be sure, but the ones I think I know are good, kind people who are afraid of modernity because they see ominous signs around them, signs the rest of us have grown so used to that we ignore them: drugs, organised crime, violence. They believe that Mr Rajoy will be less permissive than his PSOE counterpart.

Most of all, they want to be told that everything will be all right. Mr Rajoy is good at that. In his stern, patronising way, he chastises critics, and makes us all feel like little boys and girls again. (And you should hear how he talks to Catalunya! No wonder they want out!) No need to make decisions. No need to think. “Mr Rajoy has brought Spain to its knees, but he is taking care of us,” Spanish voters seem to be saying. Indeed they need taking care of. In Andalucia, registered unemployment is somewhere around 35 percent, over 60 per cent among the young.

Why didn’t the ritual voters of the other traditional party, PSOE, turn out? They have lost faith, that’s why. Podemos has undermined voter faith in PSOE. And with good reason.

If, in the UK, Labour is divided, in Spain it has split.

In all of Europe, I suspect, the left is either divided or split. Why? Well, that is the big question, isn’t it? There will be no Pax Romana until a few cardinal issues are resolved.

Speaking of which: How about leaving NATO to Mr Trump and establishing, instead, a European Military Defence Alliance (EMDA)? The UK, I suppose, will prefer to go it on their own again, or stay by the side of their dearest ally, but the rest of us might make a nice go of it? After all, Iceland’s football victory over UK has proved that nothing is impossible.