We were 10 minutes away from bombing Iran.  We were less than 24 hours from arresting and deporting a million undocumented immigrants.  Then Trump changed his mind.  Is Trump the voice of reason in his administration against the hardliners on immigration and Iran?  I don't think so.  He is the president.  There is no need to announce the policies of the hardliners and then stopped them just before they go into effect.  If he is the voice of reason, he would not have given the go ahead in the first place.  The excuses for pulling back are just unbelievable.  He didn't realize 150 people would be killed in the bombing?  Did he think that our bombs and missiles only hit buildings and weapons?  And he listened to Nancy Pelosi and the Democrats to postpone the ICE raids?   Come On!

The truth is that Trump has no strategy on anything.  He just wings it or announce something that will rally his base.  Once he realizes that what he wants to do will backfire, he changes course.  His dealings with North Korea and China bears this out.  The problem is, his threats may lead to escalations that will be bad for the country and the world.  The trade war with China can still spiral out of control.  Miscalculations between Iran and the U.S. still can lead to war and more chaos in the Middle East.  

The Iran situation is typical example of an unforced error.  The Iran deal was going well.  All other countries involved were pleased with the situation.  Trump blew it up to satisfy his base and Saudi Arabia and some factions of Israel.  There was no backup plan.  Sure it hurt Iran but if you push someone into a corner, he is sure to fight back.  Trump has repeatedly complained about the quagmire that Bush got us into in Iraq.  So I don't think he wants to send troops.  But bombing by itself will not stop Iran or cause regime change.  Iran will cause damage to us and the world if we attack.  Terrorism will increase.  All this because Trump blew up the nuclear deal without any well-thought out strategy. 

Surprise, surprise!   The Hong Kong government actually backed down and suspended an extradition bill.  Chief Executive Carrie Lam actually apologized to the public for her mishandling of the bill.  This was after two massive protests in the past two weeks.  I did not see the government backing down as they did not back down during the Umbrella Movement of 2014.

I am also surprised that the protests this year is much bigger than in 2014.  The protesters estimate 1.9 million showed up on Sunday while the government estimated about 338,000 showed up.  Either one side is using Donald Trump to do the counting or the real number is somewhere in between.  I think the government did lower the true estimate but 1,9 million is also unrealistic.  That would mean a quarter of all the people in Hong Kong showed up.  I don't think the average person in Hong Kong is big on politics.  Making money is the goal, especially for the older people who knew about the time Hong Kong was not that prosperous.  But there maybe a change this time.

As in most democratic protests, this one is led by young people.  So was the Umbrella Movement.  But this one was more successful because more older people are involved.  In 2014 there was a generation divide where the older folks did not want to rock the boat.  Perhaps the older people now realize that the autonomy of the former British colony is being slowly eroded.  Maybe they don't want their children become second class citizens like they were under British rule.  There is more solidarity between the generations this time and the government has taken notice.

But of course the government is backed by China and that means things can go in reverse very quickly.  Beijing could have tell the Hong Kong government to use force to shut down the protest.  They did not seem to have done so.  One reason is that Beijing is in a trade war with the U.S. and it did not want negative publicity that would give Trump the upper hand.  China may want the world to see that Hong Kong has freedom as China had promised.  It wants to tell the world: See we are for freedom and by extension, free trade.

Whatever the reason, it is good for now that the government has backed down.  What will happen next time is anyone's guess.  

If I am a Mexican all I am thinking today is that the U.S.is a bully and our own president is weak to kowtow to the bully.  If the most powerful country in the world cannot keep people from entering its country, why is it that poor Mexico will be able to stop people from Central America to come into Mexico and eventually make their way to the U.S.?  We have limited resources to serve our own interests and now we have to do the job for the rich Americans to bar others from entering their country?   If we don't do it we are slapped with tariffs that will choke our economy?

The American appetite for illegal drugs make it very profitable for Mexicans to form drug cartels to sell to the Americans.  Remember, when there is a demand, there will a supply.  Having form drug cartels, there will be a need for weapons to fight each other for territory.  The U.S. is happy to supply the heavy weapons.  When there is a demand, there will be a supply.  So with all these powerful weapons, our law enforcement agencies are stressed to the limit.  Now we have to take resources from these agencies to help America protect its border?

Our president agreed to Trump's demands because he is weak.  But he also doesn't have a lot of choices.  We are dependent to America.  The U.S. can destroy our economy with some tolerable pain to its own economy.  Of course, our government may not really comply with what Trump wants.  We just pretend to agree.  Nothing much will really change.  I guess Trump likes to create a crisis and bully someone for an agreement that means nothing but then he can claim victory to his base.

So Trump gets what he wanted for now with Mexico.  He may get something similar from China to avoid an all out trade war.  But I am not sure.  He may get some meaningless concession and then claim victory.  China, for sure, will not agree to anything that will even look humiliating to it.  China had its recent history of humiliation.  The reason Xi Jinping has accumulated so much power is because he promises the Chinese that humiliation will never happen again.  And all the Chinese who know about history agree with him.  So Trump will not get anywhere by trying to bully China.  This will not resolve like it did with Mexico.

I am very surprised by the demonstrations in Hong Kong.  I heard of the law that is the cause but it didn't seem like it would be such a big thing for most people in Hong Kong.  There is a second reading of the law on Wednesday.  I will need to look closer at the law and see how the Hong Kong people react after that.

Today is the thirtieth anniversary of the Tiananmen Square protests, known in China as the Six Four Incident.  This date in history reminds us that obtaining freedom takes a long time but losing it can happen quickly.   Thirty years ago I thought with the reforms China was undergoing, that capitalism will lead to democracy soon in China.  Turns out in a few days, China went backwards quickly.

 Economically China recovered and kept marching upward after that.  It is not true capitalism but the system is closer to capitalism than socialism and nothing like old communism.  Freedom continues to be on hold.  Chinese are able to study and travel abroad with less restrictions.  But in their own country, the Chinese cannot see censored sites on the internet.  You can't find an objective view on Six Four on the internet in China for example.  And don't think about protesting against the government too loudly.

So progress for freedom is slow but at least we didn't go back to the Mao era of the Cultural Revolution.  I think eventually the progress for the economy will slow.  In order for China to advance and challenge the U.S., it will need to innovate.   Innovation is much harder to come by if freedom is restricted.  Eventually maybe a Chinese leader will see this and take the country out of dictatorship as Deng had taken the country out of the communist economic system.

Unbelievable, eight way tie for the championship of the Spelling Bee.  They decided before hand that  twenty rounds was the maximum for the final.  Anyone still standing after that would be crown co-champion.  I am happy for the 8 winners, who were obviously great.  I think I might have gotten about 5% of the words correctly.  So hats off to them.

But what are they going to do in the future?  It seems like every year, there are more and more kids who are capable of standing there all night and not miss a word.  So maybe there will be a 12 way tie next year.  I think it is time to introduce the time factor!

They get two minutes to spell the word now.  It is too long!  Many times, the kid knew the answer right away but ask all the questions allowed anyway.  The worst question is "Can you use the word in a sentence?"  Invariably, the sentence is of no use.  It is like the Seinfeld episode where a guy called Seinfeld a hypocrite.  He tried to calm Seinfeld down by telling him hypocrite can be a complement.  When asked to use it in a sentence, the guy said "That Michael Jordan, he is such a hypocrite."  As you can see, using it in a sentence is not helpful at all.

So let's give everyone 30 seconds to write down the answer, like Final Jeopardy.  The most right answers wins after 20 words.  In this case, spelling DOES count!  The game would move along and it would not depend on who got the easier words since everyone will get the same 20 words.

If there is a tie, then do best of 5 by buzzing in.  I know, the speed of of your thumb would matter then.  But I think it would also bring into play quick thinking.  I think the Bee would be much more exciting to watch if we change to this format.