I have written occasionally on links between my scientific work and political thinking, but not much, because the links seem to me abstract and speculative.

In the United States, and to a certain extent in Canada, there's very little interest in what happens outside their borders.

The US and Europe are committing suicide in different ways. In Europe it's austerity in the midst of recession and that's guaranteed to be a disaster. There's some resistance to that now. In the US, it's essentially off-shoring production and financialization and getting rid of superfluous population through incarceration.

Hillary Clinton was the one pressing the hardest for bombing, and look at what happened. They not only destroyed the country, but Libya has become the center for jihad all over Africa and the Middle East. It's a total disaster in every respect, but it does not matter. Look at the so-called global war on terror.

In my experience at least, the large public universities do not fall behind in fostering creativity and independence; often the contrary.

I've been interested in the reports on Rojava. It seems clear that there are positive developments.

Michael Flynn, national security adviser, [his reaction] to the Iranian missile test the other day was very frightening. Now the missile test is ill-advised, they shouldn't have done it. But it's not in violation of international law or international agreements. They shouldn't have done it. His reaction suggested maybe we're going to go to war in retaliation.