Doomsday Clock - A serious Concern Reduced to Comical Irrelevance (1 Viewer)

[Steve R.]

Current Time - 2024 - Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists

It is 90 seconds to midnight.

thebulletin.org

Today there was a passing reference to the Doomsday Clock on Fox News. In response to the Russian invasion of the Ukraine and Putin's implications that Russia might further escalate the war. The Fox News pundits pondered why the Doomsday Clock had not been updated to reflect this increasing instability. I took a quick peek at the website. The current assessment is dated: January 20, 2022, which precedes the Russian invasion of the Ukraine. For now, those behind the Doomsday Clock get a "pass" on that issue.

While they may get a "pass" for very recent world events, their last "memo" to the world contains ludicrous viewpoints that are clearly partisan based. Their "memo" does acknowledge: "Ukraine remains a potential flashpoint, and Russian troop deployments to the Ukrainian border heighten day-to-day tensions." Yet they apparently dismiss this factor as well as others (hypersonic missiles, North Korea) in adjusting the countdown clock. Essentially on the unproven belief that Biden could somehow defuse those concerns. That reminds me of the absurdity behind Obama getting the Nobel Peace prize, not for actually doing anything to help peace, but that he may in the future in some unstated manner improve world peace. Seems that those behind the Doomsday Clock are making their doomsday assessment partially on the unproven record of Biden in actually fostering world peace.

Last year’s leadership change in the United States provided hope that what seemed like a global race toward catastrophe might be halted and—with renewed US engagement—even reversed. Indeed, in 2021 the new American administration changed US policies in some ways that made the world safer: agreeing to an extension of the New START arms control agreement and beginning strategic stability talks with Russia; announcing that the United States would seek to return to the Iran nuclear deal; and rejoining the Paris climate accord. Perhaps even more heartening was the return of science and evidence to US policy making in general, especially regarding the COVID-19 pandemic. A more moderate and predictable approach to leadership and the control of one of the two largest nuclear arsenals of the world marked a welcome change from the previous four years.

• Extending the START treaty: Effect on promoting world peace unknown. They do note in their "memo": "This extension creates a window of opportunity to negotiate a future arms control agreement between the two countries that possess 90 percent of the nuclear weapons on the planet." Again, referring to a future product that is unknown in scope. A future undefined product is not a basis for implying "success".
• Iran Nuclear Deal: The US would be allowing Iran to continue developing a nuclear device. That should move the countdown clock further towards zero.
• Paris Climate Accord: An illusionary program to generate virtue signalling optics.
• Return of Science: A massive incomprehensible joke, especially coming from scientists.
• Leadership: The Biden administration has demonstrated incompetent, incoherent and often conflicting policy. Disastrous withdrawal from Afghanistan, refusal to allow domestic hydrocarbon production, failing to enforce immigration laws, inciting racism, inflaming divisiveness, crippling the US school system, cracking down on political opponents, and turning a blind eye to those committing criminal acts.

Essentially, the "memo" concludes that the countdown clock, for now, will remain at 100 seconds as many issues that could continue to push the countdowno clock towards zero still exist. Unfortunately, those behind the countdown clock seemed to have avoided incorporating those negatives as they are experiencing extreme cognitive dissonances that preclude them from comprehneding that the Biden administration is incompetent, selling optics and virtue signalling over actual performance, and is fanatically consumed consumed by political ideology.