The story begins with a man lying on a cot and a voice telling him to eat. The man asks the time and the robot voice responds, there is no time in space. The man asks again, “What time is it on earth?” and the robot tells him earth time. But how did we get here? The cut scene takes us back to when the aliens first landed on the earth. They immediately are taken to the UN, where, as it becomes known, they are a race of beings called the Kanamits. The aliens communicate through telepathy, and in their subsequent interactions with ruling authorities, they announce that they are here to help man end war and famine. In an impassioned speech before the UN, the head alien leaves a book behind and the US army takes it back to their HQ to decipher it. The codebreakers are able to decipher the title of the book — “To Serve Man”. Reassured that the aliens mean no harm, war becomes a thing of the past, budgets are slashed and most people in the Military Industrial complex in governments across the world find themselves out of work. However, one dedicated professional, a woman, continues to work on breaking the code. Months go by, and the aliens have opened embassies all across the world. People begin to flock to the cosmos on board the alien ships, to take vacations on the alien’s home planet. As the hero of our show begins to get onboard an alien ship, the woman runs up to him and says — “The last phrase! I have done it. The title of the book, “To Serve Man” is a cookbook!” Sadly, it is too late for the man as he struggles to get out of line, and the aliens throw him aboard the spacecraft, and that, dear listeners, is where we began our story. The man finds himself aboard a space ship, with all the food that he wants, on his way to being eaten.” The man breaks the fourth wall and asks the audience, “How about you? Are you still on Earth, or on the ship with me? Really doesn’t make very much difference, because sooner or later, all of us will be on the menu….. all of us”. And that, dear listeners, unlike the Twilight Zone where this story took place, is where our show kicks off this week.
The weekend was awash with news, as the Guardian wrote — “Donald Trump has issued China with an ultimatum that if it fails to put pressure on North Korea to disable its nuclear program, then the US is prepared to take action against Pyongyang on its own.” That’s right. Seemingly content to break with 20 some years of US foreign policy regarding North Korea, the new US President is setting a new tone.
In an interview with the Financial Times published on Sunday he said — “Well, if China is not going to solve North Korea, we will”. When “asked how he would tackle North Korea, Trump said: “I’m not going to tell you. You know, I am not the United States of the past where we tell you where we are going to hit in the Middle East.”
On that note, the Military Times recently ran a story that noted that — “An unspecified number of combat soldiers from the US Army's 82nd Airborne Division have been ordered to northern Iraq, marking the Pentagon's latest escalation in what's been a slow-moving campaign to flush Islamic State fighters from their stronghold in the city of Mosul.” That’s right. It seems as if the US is once again going back into Iraq and we will only know the true extent of these measures until after the fact. But is it worth it?
To this point, Motherboard.vice.com recently ran a story noting — “While on the campaign trail in late 2015, Donald Trump pledged to “bomb the crap” out of ISIS if he became president. Now, a couple of months after he took office, reports of civilian deaths from U.S. strikes in Syria and Iraq have hit an all-time high. Why exactly that is, however, remains unclear.”
The article continues — “According to Airwars, a British monitoring group, alleged civilian casualties linked to US strikes in Syria and Iraq have soared to 1,472 so far this month. In March of last year, 196 civilians were reported killed. The previous all-time high was 613 in January.” The article goes on to write that — “The dramatic jump in civilian casualties could be the result of a directive from Trump to change risk/reward calculations when determining airstrikes, or it could be due to the war he inherited being at its deadly peak, when fighting against ISIS is taking place in the terrorist group’s stronghold of Mosul, where hundreds of thousands of civilians are trapped. The author concluded that — “All of this could be happening under Hillary Clinton. It may have nothing to do with politics. It’s very hard to tell.”
And speaking of things that are very hard to tell, we go back to the article in the Guardian, where in the same interview, Trump also praised the European Union’s response to Brexit, claiming the UK’s withdrawal from the bloc could be a “very good thing” for both parties. Compared with previous comments in which he boasted about “predicting Brexit”, he struck a more conciliatory tone about the future of the EU, claiming the 27 other members were “getting their act together” and that it had become less likely that other countries would follow the UK’s example.” Which could be seen as a marked change in tone, right?
However, in response to Trump, a headline at the Spectator noted — “Jean-Claude Juncker threatens to promote the break-up of the USA”. But who is Jean-Claude Juncker? For those that aren’t aware, Wiki notes that — “Since 2014, Juncker has been President of the European Commission, which is the European Union (EU) Executive Branch.” Essentially, the article notes that he “….just said that if Donald Trump carried on supporting Brexit, he would promote the independence of Ohio and Austin, Texas, in the United States of America.”
In fact, the author of the article noted that — “But at some point the joke goes too far.” Specifically, he wrote — “Here’s what Juncker said in full: ‘Brexit isn’t the end. A lot of people would like it that way, even people on another continent where the newly elected US President was happy that the Brexit was taking place and has asked other countries to do the same. If he goes on like that I am going to promote the independence of Ohio and Austin, Texas in the US.” The author noted — ”It’s hard to exaggerate how wrongheaded that statement is. For starters, Donald Trump has not asked other countries to exit from the EU. He has applauded Brexit and, in an admittedly provocative way, warned Brussels that other countries may do the same. Now Juncker has gone one step further in provocation, and suggested that Brussels might support the breakup of the USA. It’s all very funny — but where will it all end?”
And that, dear listeners, is the question for you — “Where will it all end?”
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