Mountain Views News          Saturday, January 16, 2016

15

OPINION

 Mountain Views News Saturday, January 16, 2016 

TOM Purcell

MASTERING THE FOURTH 
INDUSTRIAL REVOLUTION

DICK Polman

TED CRUZ MADE DONALD TRUMP LOOK GOOD

Mountain 
Views

News

PUBLISHER/ EDITOR

Susan Henderson

CITY EDITOR

Dean Lee 

EAST VALLEY EDITOR

Joan Schmidt

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LaQuetta Shamblee

PRODUCTION

Richard Garcia

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John Aveny 

CONTRIBUTORS

Chris Leclerc

Bob Eklund

Howard Hays

Paul Carpenter

Kim Clymer-Kelley

Christopher Nyerges

Peter Dills 

Dr. Tina Paul

Rich Johnson

Merri Jill Finstrom

Lori Koop

Rev. James Snyder

Tina Paul

Mary Carney

Katie Hopkins

Deanne Davis

Despina Arouzman

Greg Welborn

Renee Quenell

Ben Show

Sean Kayden

Marc Garlett

Pat Birdsall (retired)


There’s no point in parsing 
all the verbal volleys 
in the latest Republican 
debate, which one again 
was the equivalent of a 
Michael Bay action flick, 
a blustering bludgeoning 
macho entertainment 
that pummeled the cognitive 
intellect and reduced 
one’s brain to the consistency 
of mixed nuts.

So I’ll simply focus on the Ted Cruz’s hypocrisy-
laced outburst about the alleged evils of “New 
York values.” It was so egregiously mindless, 
and so stereotypically insulting, that it wound 
up making Donald Trump look good. Which 
tells you plenty about Cruz.

Cruz birthed this riff on Tuesday, when he said, 
in radio and later on Fox News, that Trump 
“comes from New York and embodies New 
York values .... The rest of the country knows 
exactly what New York values are, and, I gotta 
say, they’re not Iowa values and they’re not New 
Hampshire values.”

I get that Cruz is trying to supplant Trump at 
the top of the heap, but come on, what he said in 
Thursday night’s debate just reeks. 

“I think most people know exactly what New 
York values are,” Cruz said. “Everyone understands 
that the values in New York City are socially 
liberal or pro-abortion or pro-gay-marriage, 
and focus around money and the media.”

First of all, San Francisco is surely happy to be 
off the hook. A generation ago, the typical GOP 
tactic was to tar-brush the opposition as “San 
Francisco Democrats,” to thus insinuate that all 
Dems were amoral hedonists with no ties to the 
stars n’ stripes. Now we have Cruz taking the 
game eastward. Perhaps he’s irked that Saturday 
Night Live described him as having “a punchable 
face,” but, clearly, he just thinks that his 
blanket smear will resonate, at Trump’s expense, 
with parochial denizens of the Republican base.

However, there’s a big reason why Cruz is hated 
by so many in his own party. It’s his brazen 
hypocrisy.

On the one hand, he condemns what he calls 
New York’s “focus around money.” On the other 
hand, he happily pockets New York money. One 
of his biggest benefactors is New York hedge 
fund mogul Robert Mercer, who has reportedly 
pumped $11 million into Cruzworld. Another 
is the New York-based Sullivan & Cromwell 
law firm. Another is New York-based Goldman 
Sachs, which loaned a million bucks to his 
successful ‘12 Senate bid (this is the money that 
Cruz failed to disclose because of a so-called paperwork 
error).

And the next time he cruises New York to shill 
for money, perhaps he should roll down the 
window of his limo and soak in the obvious info 
that refutes his stereotypical insult. Yeah, there 
are people in New York who support the constitutional 
right to an abortion (as elsewhere in 
the country), as well as those who support gay 
marriage (a stance that’s now American mainstream). 
But New York is also the cops who live 
on Staten Island, the working stiffs in Queens, 
the firefighters who couldn’t care less about politics 
but who would risk their lives to save his.

Cruz’s yammering pejoratives about “New York 
values” prompted Trump to say this:

“When the World Trade Center came down, I 
saw something that no place on Earth could have 
handled more beautifully, more humanely than 
New York .... You had two 110-story buildings 
come crashing down. I saw them come down. 
Thousands of people killed, and the cleanup 
started the next day, and it was the most horrific 
cleanup, probably in the history of doing this, 
and in construction. I was down there, and I’ve 
never seen anything like it.

“And the people in New York fought and fought 
and fought, and we saw more death, and even 
the smell of death — nobody understood it. And 
it was with us for months, the smell, the air. And 
we rebuilt downtown Manhattan, and everybody 
in the world watched, and everybody in 
the world loved New York and loved New Yorkers. 
And I have to tell you, that was a very insulting 
statement that Ted made.”

By that point, even Cruz was compelled to clap. 
This guy is supposedly so bright, yet he couldn’t 
see that he was walking into the 9/11 buzz saw? 
It takes a lot to put Trump on the high road, to 
make him sound like Cicero, but somehow Cruz 
pulled it off. And by the end of the 150-minute 
marathon, Trump stood taller as a candidate. 
Thanks a lot, Ted.

But hey, no worries. Because when Ted Cruz is 
president, he’ll use any international incident — 
like the American sailors’ encounter with Iran, a 
crisis that was snuffed within 10 hours — to unleash 
the dogs of war: “Any nation that captures 
our fighting men will feel the full force and fury 
of the United States of America!” Yeah, baby. 
Carpet-bomb that water, make it glow.

Welcome to “Ted Cruz values.” I’ll take his New 
York stereotype any day.

The smart car is upon us and self-driving 
automobiles soon will be commonplace — 
which will be the buzz at this week’s 2016 
Detroit Auto Show. 

 In the past two or three years, you see, computer 
processing capacity has become powerful 
enough to rapidly manage and analyze massive 
amounts of complex data sets or “big data.” 

What does this mean for automobiles? 

By installing incredibly intricate roadside 
sensor networks and additional sensors in “smart” automobiles — 
both of which feed continuous data, via the Internet, to a powerful 
collection engine — automobiles will be in constant communication 
with road conditions and each other. 

Smart cars can be programmed to avoid crashing into roadside 
obstacles and each other, auto-correct if a driver strays from the 
road or sound an alarm if a driver shows signs he’s falling asleep. 

In the U.S. alone, according to Entrepreneur.com, “self-driving cars 
could eliminate the more than 33,000 motor-vehicle traffic deaths a 
year, 2.3 million injuries and billions in car damage.” 

Traffic jams will be significantly reduced or eliminated. 

Imagine if every car sitting on the Parkway in front of the Squirrel 
Hill Tunnel could be safely guided through at a coordinated speed 
that eliminates stop-and-go driving. 

How about energy savings? 

 “Street lamps could automatically switch off in areas with no 
nighttime traffic, and turn on only when road sensors detect a 
vehicle getting closer,” reports Information Week. 

It’s hard for a car buff like me to imagine — I love to drive — but 
driverless automobiles will soon be everywhere. 

 “A separate study released last month by Britain’s Juniper Research 
anticipates 25 million self-driving cars will be on the road around 
the world a decade from now,” reports The Detroit News. 

 According to a Rand Corp. report, that means people who are 
unable to drive — the blind, disabled or people too young to get 
a license — will enjoy “independence, reduction in social isolation 
and access to essential services.” 

 Self-driving cars have the opportunity to save the average erstwhile 
car owner a bundle. According to The Wall Street Journal, the 
average utilization rate for a typical car owner is only about 5 
percent — that means your car sits idle 95 percent of the time, a 
waste of money. 

 When you include insurance costs, fuel, wear and tear and car 
payments, the average person is spending thousands a year to own 
a car — but would spend significantly less than that if he or she paid 
by the mile utilizing a self-driving car fleet. 

Ravi Shanker, a Morgan Stanley U.S. auto analyst, says self-driving 
cars could “contribute $1.3 trillion in annual savings to the U.S. 
economy alone,” reports The Journal — which will dramatically 
disrupt the auto manufacturing industry. 

 What is happening to the automobile — as our technology is able to 
analyze and manage big data — is happening across every industry. 

 We are at the cusp of another industrial revolution, also referred 
to as Industry 4.0 or the fourth industrial revolution, whereby 
interconnections between machines, systems, assets and people will 
enable massive improvements in efficiency and performance. 

Its scale, scope and complexity will be unlike anything humankind 
has yet experienced, according to Klaus Schwab, founder and 
executive chairman of the World Economic Forum (which will 
meet this month in Switzerland to discuss “Mastering the Fourth 
Industrial Revolution”). 

 Hey, America, we may be sitting on a pile of debt, but if we make 
some smart decisions — if we press our political class to unleash, 
rather than inhibit, the collective genius of our most industrious 
people — great times are still ahead for our country and the world. 


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LEFT TURN/RIGHT TURN 

MICHAEL Reagan

HOWARD Hays As I See It


THE STATE OF THE UNION - 

AS USUAL

If you missed the president’s final State of the 
Union message Tuesday night, don’t worry.

It might have been billed as historic, but you 
didn’t miss much. There were no surprises. 
No shocks. No awe. Nothing historic or 
memorable.

It was the usual Obama setup -- “We have to find a way to come 
together, end the government gridlock and make America better 
and stronger” -- followed by the implication that Washington isn’t 
working the way it should because Republicans in Congress are 
mean, stubborn or stupid.

In seven years Obama hasn’t changed the country, not for the better 
anyway. He hasn’t changed his leadership style, either. Remember 
back in 2009, three days after he was sworn in, when Barack Obama, 
his egocentric advisers and the congressional leaders of both parties 
met to discuss how to frame a gigantic stimulus bill working its way 
through Congress? That’s when Obama famously said to Republican 
Whip Eric Cantor, “Elections have consequences, and at the 
end of the day, I won.” We didn’t know it then, but that snippy quip 
betrayed a lot about the way the hope-and-change president plays 
ball. It’s my football, damn it, and if you’re not going to play the 
way I want, I’m going to take my ball and go home.

Obama has run his administration for seven years with that “I won, 
you lost and I get what I want” game plan. He’s right. There is a 
great divide between the two parties in Washington. He ought to 
know, because he’s as much to blame for it as anyone. It’s hard 
to find an example where he was willing to sit down and come to 
terms with conservatives and Republicans in Congress. And how 
many times did he go home after he didn’t get what he wanted from 
Congress and sign an executive action that got him what he wanted?

My father looked at politics like a football game, too. But he understood 
throwing Hail Marys all the time wasn’t a winning strategy.

He knew you actually had to move down the field slowly and if you 
got 10 yards each play, eventually you’d reach the end zone.

The great liberal-conservative political divide that supposedly 
harms our country is not going to be closed between now and November. 
It’ll have to start with whoever the new leader is in January 
of 2017.

Whoever it is, the next president will have to act a lot more like 
Ronald Reagan and a lot less like Barack Obama. My father disagreed 
greatly with Tip O’Neill and Ted Kennedy, but he always 
looked at the big picture. He was always asking, “How can we work 
together to get this done?” If Ronald Reagan doesn’t sit down with 
Tip, we don’t get the tax break of 1981. If Bill Clinton doesn’t sit 
down with Newt Gingrich and a Republican Congress in 1994, we 
don’t get welfare reform and a balanced budget. Early next year, 
President Trump, President Sanders or President X will be all fired 
up about fixing immigration.

Whoever it is, when he meets with Congress he should not take the 
“all-or-nothing” Obama approach but do what Ronald Reagan or 
even Bill Clinton would do. He should bring everybody in and find 
areas in the immigration bill where there is bipartisan agreement.

Then Congress should write a new bill covering those areas of agreement, 
pass it, have the president sign it and immediately begin the 
process of a writing a better, more comprehensive immigration bill.

Everyone likes to see a long Hail Mary thrown into the end zone. 
But as QB Obama should have learned after seven seasons — but 
didn’t — they almost never win the game.


“Happy to see dialog and 
respect, not threats and 
impetuousness, swiftly 
resolved the sailors episode. 
Let’s learn from this latest 
example.”

- Mohammad Javad Zarif, 
Foreign Minister of Iran

 I was going to write a 
column on a major speech, 
but instead it’s on a minor incident.

 The news on Tuesday was all about President 
Obama’s upcoming State of the Union address, 
but then another story broke in: Two US Navy 
vessels had been captured in the Persian Gulf 
and were being held, along with their ten 
crewmembers, by Iran. 

 There were recollections of the USS Pueblo, 
the spy ship captured off North Korea in 1968, 
whose crew of 82 (an 83rd was killed in the 
attack) was imprisoned for eleven months. More 
recently, there was the Iranian seizure of HMS 
Cornwall in 2007 and detention of its 15 Royal 
Navy crewmembers, which became a multi-
national incident. Thirteen days later, Iranian 
President Ahmadinejad allowed the release of 
the ship and its crew as a “gift”, though not the 
return of all the sensitive equipment that had 
been taken off the ship. 

 There was talk of how President Obama might 
have to toss whatever speech he’d prepared 
for Tuesday, and instead try to meekly offer 
some defense of his policies as the crisis would 
inevitably escalate - amidst a rising chorus of 
gleeful, rightwing “I told you so’s”.

 Rupert Murdoch tweeted a prediction that 
the president’s speech “proclaims great virtue 
of Iran nuclear deal. Tomorrow’s headline: ‘Iran 
grabs ten U.S. sailors’!” Charles Krauthammer 
told Fox News it showed “the United States . . 
. being treated with contempt.” MSNBC’s Joe 
Scarborough had his own message to send: 
“Hey Iran, you have exactly 300 days left to 
push a US president around . . . after that, there 
will be hell to pay.”

 It turned out to be not much of an “incident”. 
A couple U.S. patrol boats were heading up to 
Bahrain from Kuwait, one had mechanical 
failure and they drifted into Iranian waters. 
The Iranians came to check them out (a 
Revolutionary Guards base was nearby) and 
bring them in. Secretary of State John Kerry got 
on the phone to Tehran to make sure everything 
was cool. According to official Iranian media, 
the U.S. sailors explained the incursion 
was unintentional, offered their apologies, 
explanation and apologies were accepted, and 
within 24 hours they and their ship were taken 
back to international waters to be on their way.

 Others had their own views of a connection 
to the nuclear deal. On CNN, retired Lt. Gen. 
Mark Hertling speculated, “I think there 
potentially is a new age coming about with 
Iran. This is going to improve military-military 
relationships . . . It could be part of the Iranian 
deal. It could be because of new engagements, 
the fact that we’ve been talking with the Iranians 
for the last year plus.” NBC News’ Tehran 
Bureau Chief Ali Arousi explained that “Iran 
and America have been talking to each other 
extensively during the course of this deal, and 
because of that Secretary Kerry could talk to 
Foreign Minister Zarif about this issue and try 
and sort things out diplomatically. This would 
have been unheard of before the negotiations 
between the two countries.”

 Iranian journalist Nader Karimi told the 
New York Times, “During Ahmadinejad, our 
whole system sought tension. Now, things have 
changed. Both sides, America and Iran, are in 
direct contact and they seek détente. Currently 
there is no need for anti-Americanism.”

 During the build-up to the Iranian nuclear 
deal, we were reminded that, for the foreseeable 
future, there will be problems between Iran 
and the international community; they will 
no doubt continue engaging in conduct we 
object to. It was emphasized, though, that being 
able to clamp down on their nuclear program 
was justification enough for the talks – with 
or without any side benefits or issues being 
resolved.

 Iran is now ahead of schedule in downsizing 
and dismantling components of its nuclear 
program, with IAEA inspectors due within 
the next few days to verify compliance prior to 
lifting of sanctions. But those side benefits are 
already becoming apparent.

 In one of the earlier Republican debates, it 
was noted that, with candidates trying to outdo 
each other in anxiousness for war, one word 
never uttered during the nearly three-hours 
was the word “diplomacy”. Now with evidence 
of how diplomacy can work, Republicans can’t 
stand it.

 “Obama’s humiliatingly weak Iran policy is 
exposed again”, tweeted candidate Jeb Bush. 
Sen. Tom Cotton (R-AR) insists the explanation 
of mechanical failure on one of the boats was 
a ruse; that in fact it was all an Iranian plot to 
“humiliate the president”. 

 The incident was a fitting backdrop to the 
president’s speech. I’m old enough (barely) to 
remember JFK. The words were magnificent, 
but as kids we’d make fun of the Bostonian 
accent. I never personally experienced the Rev. 
Martin Luther King, but I recall TV news of him 
stepping behind microphones after stepping off 
a plane at the airport before being driven off. It 
would be for a few moments, but a few moments 
of grandeur. President Obama remains the 
most inspiring orator of my own experience – 
with maybe former New York Governor Mario 
Cuomo coming in second.

 In his speech, President Obama reflected 
on major accomplishments and major 
transformations, both here at home and in 
our standing among other nations, and major 
efforts “to form a more perfect Union”. There 
were major promises of what’s to come – both 
in the final year of his presidency and beyond.

 Two of our naval vessels, and their crews, 
were held by forces of a country with which 
we’ve had hostile relations for over thirty years. 
That this turned out to be nothing more than a 
minor incident is in itself a major testament to 
what this president has accomplished.

 As for the USS Pueblo, we still haven’t gotten 
it back. It’s now a major tourist attraction in 
North Korea. 

Mountain Views News

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