By Oona A. Hathaway

Professor Hathaway teaches law and political science at Yale and is a nonresident scholar at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace and the president-elect of the American Society of International Law.

President Trump’s decision to launch a secretive predawn military operation in Venezuela to grab President Nicolás Maduro is a blatant assault on the international legal order. The action threatens to end an era of historic peace and return us to a world in which might makes right. The cost will be paid in human lives.

Last year marked the 80th anniversary of the 1945 United Nations Charter, a document signed by 51 nations at the close of World War II. The signatories pledged to act “to save succeeding generations from the scourge of war.” The great powers have not gone to war with one another since, and no U.N. member state has disappeared as a result of conquest.

But over the past decade, that peace has begun to unravel. Today, it is on the precipice of collapsing altogether. If that happens, the consequences will be catastrophic. We can already see the devastating cost: According to my calculations, from 1989 to 2014, battle-related deaths from cross-border conflicts averaged less than 15,000 a year. Beginning in 2014, the average has risen to over 100,000 a year. As states increasingly disregard limits on the lawful use of force, this may be just the beginning of a deadly new era of conflict.

Retro Trumpian Imperialism

 MAGA is primarily a personality cult, the objectives of which evolve to suit Trump’s capricious moods. Yet his pivot to new wars of conquest is not some shocking reversal. The “Donroe Doctrine,” as he calls his assertion of regional supremacy—a Trumpian extension of the 19th-century Monroe Doctrine, which established the United States’ claim over the Americas in order to keep Europeans out—is in fact consistent with his deepest beliefs. In some ways, it represents the ultimate expression of the world order he hopes to engineer.  

                                                                                                       A desire to dominate—an eagerness to bully his counterparties into submission—is perhaps the essence of Trump’s character. Trump’s unexpected political resurrection and return to the White House have emboldened his ambitions, which have spread outward. His threats against Canada, Panama, and Greenland, and his renaming of the Gulf of Mexico, have little to do with national interest and everything to do with reifying a new order in which he’s the boss and the leaders of neighboring countries are his cowering subordinates.

-Jonathan Chait in The Atlantic

 Jefferson and Emerson wrote from the point of view of the middle and upper classes. Booker T. Washington from the view of those who first needed to make a living before they could be liberally educated.

 Two surprises already this morning. First of all, I woke up, always the best surprise. Secondly, the sun is out where I bivouac, shining brightly, bringing forth happiness and good cheer after a somber post Christmas disappearance. Let us have peace and prosperity. (So happy to see the sun I'm getting carried away)

Before We Bid 2025 a Fond Farewell

 Before we bid 2025 a fond (?) farewell, Santa having come and gone, returned to the North Pole (unless he got sidetracked in Detroit on the way back for some reason) let us pause to look at ourselves in the mirror and take stock.

Are you a better person today than you were a year ago? Probably not, but did you at least try your best to clean up all of your bad habits and forgive those who have trespassed against you?

Have you tried to walk a mile in somebody else's shoes even if they don't fit?

Is your conscious clean from 2025? If not, take some time today and clean it up before you venture into 2026.

Are you brave and courageous heading into 2026? If not, it's okay that you are scared like the rest of us. I just thought someone I know might set an example and be a role model.

Finally, remember that there are meds for acid reflux and panic attacks as you try to forget 2025. And if all else fails, act like you're crazy. At least you'll blend in with your surroundings.

The End of the Dinosaurs

 The most significant day in Earth's history occurred 66 million yrs ago when the planet was struck by a visitor from outer space that wiped out almost all of life on earth including the dinosaurs. Here is a brief except from The New Yorker 3-19-19 which summarizes the damage. Puts perspective into our existence today as you go about your piddling life.

The damage had only begun. Scientists still debate many of the details, which are derived from the computer models, and from field studies of the debris layer, knowledge of extinction rates, fossils and microfossils, and many other clues. But the over-all view is consistently grim. The dust and soot from the impact and the conflagrations prevented all sunlight from reaching the planet’s surface for months. Photosynthesis all but stopped, killing most of the plant life, extinguishing the phytoplankton in the oceans, and causing the amount of oxygen in the atmosphere to plummet. After the fires died down, Earth plunged into a period of cold, perhaps even a deep freeze. Earth’s two essential food chains, in the sea and on land, collapsed. About seventy-five per cent of all species went extinct. More than 99.9999 per cent of all living organisms on Earth died, and the carbon cycle came to a halt.

Last Night

 I was pulled to starting the Larry McMurtry biography,  It really hit home, talking about Larry's penchant for understanding a sense of loss.