The Shapes of things to Come

Politics, , , ,
Death Dealer

With the eminent start of early voting I think it is a good day to think about both the election of 2022 and 2024. Let me give some of the reasons I feel it is quite possible for the GOP not to win control of the Senate.

First and foremost Senate election are statewide so gerrymandering districts has no effect and that means primaries don’t decide who will win in the general election. You have to have a candidate who can attract voters out side of the parties base. This is hard to do with the control of the local party apparatus in the control of Trump/MAGA/Q supporters.

The next thing is to look at how much time and interest is being generated about the very local elections. MAGA/Trump/Q blessed candidates are running for a lot of local offices, especially offices that control/run elections. This has been taken notice of and a remarkable amount of effort is going into these local elections. It should be noted that these early, local elections often have very small turnout, in the low 20% all too often. An while that means they are decided by a very small vote it also means that it doesn’t take very many new voters to change the election. That means a relatively small number of none MAGA/TRUMP/GOP voters can make a big difference.

An this bearings me to the next point. The GOP is shrinking. The number of registered GOP voters is getting small. In many cases in actual numbers and not just a percentage. An don’t think the GOP leadership hasn’t taken notice of this. It just maybe one of the reasons the state GOP parties have been doing so much to limit who can and/or will vote. If they thought that the parties appeal was growing and the party was gaining voters they would be much more likely to make voting easier. Another problem facing the GOP is the number of registered Republicans who are totally disenchanted with the way the party is going. There is no easy way to measure this number, especially because of the retaliations inflicted on those that go public. But they are there and their number just maybe significant.

So the key is going to be the candidates. All the non-Republicans have to do is nominate candidates that accentuate the difference between the MAGA/Trump/Q Republican candidates and themselves.

Now lets look at the House Races. Not nearly as easy to define or categorize. Gerrymandering can and does have a significant effect on house elections. But here is the problem facing the GOP in all most all of the House elections. Just because you are a “registered” republican doesn’t mean you will vote for any Republican. In some districts, even gerrymandered districts, a few people will not vote by party affiliation. Also if the Republican candidate is a devout MAGA Republican they will have a harder time attracting independent voters much less Democratic voters.

The worst thing to happen in ‘sure win’ republican districts is for the non-base republicans to ‘stay home’ and for the independent and democratic voters to come out in force. An the state Republican parties, where they are in control of the state, seem to be bound and determined to do what ever they can to upset the non-MAGA base of the Republican Party.

So that’s all for now. Something to watch in the coming months.

NOTE: This was mostly written before the Russian invasion of the Ukraine.

Boss Tweed and the Modern GOP

Politics, Rants, , ,
Boss Tweed

For sometime now I’ve been intending to put my two cents in on what has been happening in many many “Red” (GOP controlled) states over the past year. I shan’t bother with the “Great Lie” about the 2020 election being stolen as that is a whole nother post. What ‘m gong to talk about is just what the people in the GOP hope for with all their “protect the vote” laws.

The first thing to remember is that, to date, no one, left-right-or center, has show any significant degree of voter fraud in the 2020 election(s). By significant I simply mean the amount of voter fraud is so small it would have not effected the results of even the tightest of races anywhere in the United States. So to say you want to change the laws on how/when/where/who participates in an election is simple a ‘Red Harring’ and I hope to show what they really are after here.

My view is that the MAGA hats that currently control the Republican Party, National, State, and Local, are actually after the control of who actually counts the votes. Partisan control of the vote count has a long and dubious history in this country. One of the most famous, or infamous, was “Boss Tweed” of New York City. Others though history, even dictators, have sought to control the power by controlling the vote count. It is the perfect way to keep the shiny veneer of legitimacy to those in power with the risk of actually loosing an election.

Don’t believe me, just look at the elections held in places like North Korea, Russia, or Iran. The control of the vote count is kept carefully in the hands of those who control the power. Some like “Boss Tweed” did not hold public/elective office, others did. So am I saying all of these laws, both proposed and pasted, have the control of the vote count as there true goal? No, I don’t. What I do say is that they are attempting to control who/where/and how we vote and much of it obfuscates the actual counting of the vote. Many laws also, whether intended of not, have the effect of limiting the vote.

That’s all for now. No proposed solutions. No call to action. Just a warning of what I see on the horizon. An just like a twister of on the horizon I have no idea if it is going to hit me. But I’m sure going to take precautions just in case.

SCOTUS and the coming age of Hypocrisy

Law, Philosophy, ,
The Roberts Court, April 23, 2021 Seated from left to right: Justices Samuel A. Alito, Jr. and Clarence Thomas, Chief Justice John G. Roberts, Jr., and Justices Stephen G. Breyer and Sonia Sotomayor Standing from left to right: Justices Brett M. Kavanaugh, Elena Kagan, Neil M. Gorsuch, and Amy Coney Barrett. Photograph by Fred Schilling, Collection of the Supreme Court of the United States

With the news that the Gov. of California is thinking of using the Texas anti-abortion law as a blue print for an anti-assault gun law I’ve heard from several sources the idea that SCOTUS will be faced with the problem of how to up hold one while striking down the other. While it maybe a little difficult anyone who has studied the history of the court knows this will not be the first time SCOTUS has faced this problem. I, for one, see this as a golden opportunity for the ‘Textulests’ and ‘Originalist’ of constitutional legal theory. Both of these philosophies have a fundamental aversion to the concept of “Implied Rights”.

Before we dive deeper let me give you my understanding of “Implied Rights” as it deals with the Constitution. For me there are basically two kinds of “Implied Rights”. In both cases the right is not enumerated, stated explicitly, in the text of the constitution. The first kind of “Implied Right” is of the kind that if the right didn’t exist, then an stated right would be functional meaningless. A good example of this is the “Implied Right” to have a vote counted. The right to vote assumes that once a vote is cast it will be counted, otherwise the casting of the vote has no reason to be. The next “Implied Right” is much more nebulous. This is the right of liberty in our person. This is the right that is at issue with ‘Roe vs. Wade’. The right to liberty is not expressly stated in the constitution.

The closest the Constitution gets to granting the right to Liberty is in the Preamble where is states the Constitution is established to “Secure the Blessings of Liberty.” The inalienable rights are given in the Declaration of Independence, not the Constitution. An while SCOTUS has stated the Declaration is part of our fundamental national law the Constitution takes no note of it. In my view to exclude the Declaration would make a mockery of the Constitution, it is quite possible for some future court to do that. So where does that leave us with the new Texas legal theory?

Just this: the Texas law deals with an “Implied Right” and the proposed California law deals with an enumerated right (the Second Amendment). All SCOTUS needs to do is find some reasoning that says that “Implied Rights” don’t get the same degree of protection, if any, as “Enumerated Rights”. This would be a very interesting slippery slope to go down an I invite you, my dear reader, to think upon all of your ‘Rights” that an just an “Implied Right” and not explicitly stated in the Constitution.

Lets see what the “Trump” Court decision is.

The American War on Science

General, Philosophy, Rants,
Orange Koolaid

Ever sense the spring of 2020 and the struggle began against the Covid-19 pandemic we have been able to see the American War on Science shown in all it’s ferocity. I say the American War because America has been of two minds about science since the first colonist arrived on these shores. Part of us are children of the Enlightenment and another part are children of hyper religious dissidence. These two groups have never gotten along with each other and for the same reason. They perceive the other as a trying to destroy the other. An in away they are right.

First lets look at the basic philosophical positions of both sides:

Let us first look at the Children of the Enlightenment and their handmaiden, Science. I shall be using “Science” from here on out for brevity’s sake. Science, as seen by many, has as a central principle that there is nothing that can not be questioned. Even the most fundamental concepts and principles can be questioned. An by questioned I mean ‘put to the test’. We teach science both by lecture and actual hand on experimental experience. We have students conduct experiments for many reasons but one of the most important is to check the results of all the experiments that went before. An sometime, very rarely, a student will get a result that will like a spark in their mind that will lead to great and new findings.

Now lets pause right here because I’m sure there is someone reading this who will know, either personally or otherwise, a time when someone was “don’t question” X. It is a ‘fundamental law of nature’. An this happens much to often but it is not the philosophy of science that says this, but individuals who say it. People are human and so will have all of the failings of humans. All we can do is ‘smile sweetly’ and keep on questioning everything.

Now on the other side are people (both the Puritans and Quakers just to name a few) who believe and accept the philosophy of ‘“absolute truth”. There are somethings that are true for all time and therefore can not be questioned. Ever. And these things can not be discovered by asking questions, they can only be ‘revealed’. An there lies both the problem and the strength of Religion. It provides the comfort that a young child gets from asking a parent to deal with an impossible/unsolvable problem. And it provides the security to the one providing the answer of “Because I Say So.” An this is excepted. An the fundamental problem with reviled truth is there is never just one truth revealed.

Looking at the history of this country we have many many examples of intractable problems facing our body politic. From the ‘Devine right of kings’ in the 18th century, to who is ‘sovereign’ (the states or the federal government) and slavery of the 19th century. To segregation and racism of the 20th century. An none of these problems can be resolved from ‘reviled truth’. Why? Mostly because there is more that one reviled truth being referenced. And even when all sides agree on the source of the “truth” (in the USA it is often the Bible) they end up with a battle of scriptures. By a battle of scriptures I mean where all sides can find one or more lines in the reviled truth to support there position. Both are ‘right’ but we have no way of testing for who is right.

But wait you say, that happens in science all the time. Well, yes and no. Yes we get heated debates where all sides point out the “Math”, “Observations” and or experiments that ‘Prove’ there theory is correct/wrong. But unlike in Religion, in Science you have to answer the question “How do we test it?” One of the greatest challenges to “How do we test the theory?” If it can’t be tested it can’t be accepted as fact, no mater who says it is true.

So now we come to the “War on Science”. This is not a unquietly American phenomenon. But it is new in a historically as what we now call ‘science’ is new. Science as we now know it came in to being with the ‘Scientific Method’ in the 17th Century and the ‘Age of Enlightenment’. The ‘Scientific Method’ was and still is by some, seen as a direct challenge to ‘Reviled Faith’. Originally because science was seen to challenge reviled truth that dealt with the observable world. An not just in esoteric fields like chemistry but in very day to day issues like Astrology. After all if moving the sun to the center of the ‘universe’ (or solar system) makes doing ‘accurate’ astrological charts for your king or emperor your going to use it even if the church says the Earth is at the center of all things.

The problem this war has in America is that most of the people who came here to colonize were of the ‘very hard headed’ (some would say pig headed) verity. Both those of the Enlightenment and Regions verity. Next is the problem we have faced ever sense 1792 politicians have seen taking sides in this fight as an excellent way to win and keep voters. More on the ‘Reviled Truth’ side, mostly because they are less likely to respond to hard data and reasoned debate than those of the enlightenment bent.

So there you have it. Don’t get depressed about this “War on Science”. It not new. In fact it is a grand old American tradition we have been practicing since the founding of the country.

Election Day!

General,
Election Day

Be Warned my contrarian nature is in full throated Roar

Yes there is no election where I am now, but we do have off, off year elections in some places in this country. An in many many ways, these elections are more important to our democracy than the BIG Presidential elections. At least to my way of thinking.

It is the ‘small’ elections that mater because they are the ones too many people ignore. They are the bedrock of any democracy because the small elections are the foundation the big election build on. These are the ones where the politicos get there fundamental data on what the electorate are interested in. This is where we identify the true ‘base’ of political moments and parties. It is where we look to see who is an ‘up and comer’, who has new ideas and/or can express ideas clearly and inspire his/her listeners. An this election is more important than most.

Why do I say that? Because the bast decade or so America has not been looking closely at these elections and has not been listening to what has being said. Yes, some Politicos have been listening but not many and the ones that have been are either not saying much about what they hear. Or they are not being paid much attention to. If they had we’d be in a totally different place than we are in now. We would not have one political party looking for, and accepting as, their candidates people with little or no public service.

I think that in 50 to 75 years from now, when Historians write about the politics of the 2020’s they will point back to the election of Geo. W. Bush and the rise of the “Tea Party” republicans as the starting point of our coming time of troubles. And like all of the Historians who have tried to say, “Here, at this point! It all started” they will be both right and wrong. I have, in an early posting said where I think things start along the path we find ourselves so I shan’t bother to repeat myself.

We have a long row to hoe and it is going to take some time to get it done. But the place to start is with the small elections like we are having now. So I call upon you all, get out and vote. Don’t listen to the people telling you your vote won’t count. That the elections are all rigged. That is is a sure thing. Or what ever. Your Vote Maters, it Counts! Not because your vote is one among many or one among few. It maters because you mater and it is your Vote!

A Problem with Numbers.

General,

Recently I’ve been seeing lots of polls showing 50% or 64% or 49% of a group supports or opposes something. In particular i’ve been seeing it applied to voters, that is Democrats, Independents and/or Republicans. What I rarely see is the number behind the number. Like how many of the “voters” are ‘D’ or ‘I’ or ‘R’? This can and is important.

Why do I say this? Let me show you. Lets say that 25% of all voters are ‘D’, 25% are ‘R’ and 50% are ‘I’. Lets also say that the total number of voters is 100. (Not the case as the actual number is in the 10’s of millions but 100 is an easy number to work with.). Given 100 voters we have 25 ‘D’ & ‘R’ and 50% ‘I’. Next lets say the issue I question only needs 50% + 1 voters to pass. If all the voters cast a ballot that means 51 voters need to vote yes. Got it? Good.

Now lets look at a poll that says 45% of the ‘D’s support issue ‘X’. 55% of ‘R’s oppose ‘X’ and 50% of ‘I’s support X’. That means (25*.45)+(25*.45)+(50*.50) will vote “Yes). Given that 25*.45 = 11.25 twice plus 25 giving us giving us just 47.5 votes “yes”. So ‘X’ doesn’t pass. But now lets change the number just a bit with 55% of the ‘D’s voting yes, 55% of the ‘R’s voting no and the ‘I’ splitting again 50/50 now the numbers are (25*.55)+(25 * .45)+50*.5) giving a total vote of 50 yes and 50 no giving us a tie.

Now lets get into the deep grass. Lets change the number of ‘I’ to 30, the ‘D’d to 45 and leave the ‘R’s at 25. How do the numbers change? In the first case ‘X’s still looses with only 46.5 yes votes but in the second case ‘X’ wins with 51 votes. This demonstrates quite clearly why knowing actual number is critical understanding just what the poll numbers mean. Besides the actual numbers we need to know just how the numbers are being counted.

By how they are being counted I mean are we talking registered voters, likely voters, or just asking the person being polled what party affiliation the have. Just a casual use of Google show just how wide a swing in numbers we have being reported. It is no wonder that anyone watching politics has full time teams analyzing the polling data and just what it is based on. So what are you to do?

My recommendation is to remember what I’ve said here and do the following. First and foremost check the predictions against actual election results. Not only did they call the election correctly for who won and lost but did the numbers match up with the prediction. Then, if the results are off, especially off by big numbers (I go by 5 percentage points or more but you are free to go by any numbers you want), do they publish any studies/analysis/etc on why they were off. What conclusions did they draw and do you agree/disagree with the conclusions. Once you find a place that you believe does a good job, stick with them. But remember “Trust but Verify” is still good advice.

An before you ask I do have a site on the Web I trust, it is 538 both it’s website and it’s podcasts. But just take my word for it, do your own work.

A Symptom, not a Cause

General, ,

For quite sometime now I’ve been hearing the people on the Media talking about how Donald Trump has/is destroying the Republican Party, conservative movement, etc. To my way of thanking this is not just wrong, but also bad for the country. Donald Trump and/or Trumpisum is not doing anything to the Conservative Movement, nor to the Republican Party. Donald Trump and Trumpisum is a symptom of what ales them, it is not the cause.

Everything that is happening to the GQP today has its roots back in the late 1960’s. It was then that liberal Republicans started migrating to the Democratic Party and conservative Democrats started migrating to the Republican Party. In the 1968 elections Richard (Tricky Dick) Nixon came up with his famous ‘Southern Strategy’ to woo the former Dixiecrats to vote republican. It is also when the unholy alliance between social conservatives and financial conservatives was truly formalized. Now in the 21st century we are seeing the results of what was started back then.

If you just do a little work you can see the seeds of all the ‘Great’ issues of today in the 70’s, 80’s and 90’s. The thing to remember is Donald Trump is not smart enough, nor Machiavellian enough to have created what we are see. In fact he is just arrogant enough to both claim credit for and to bring it out into the day light for all to see. An just like the high fever lets us know we are truly sick, Donald Trump is letting us know just how much trouble our body politic is in.

Our body politic is no longer facing a quiet infection slowly destroying our democracy. No, the raging fever has broken out and we now know we are in deep trouble. An just like a high fever we must first take action to rid ourselves of the disease. We must not only take action to get rid of the symptoms, just like we take medicines to bring down a fever, we must also take medicines to rid us of the actual disease. An to do this we need to identify the infecting agents but also what is being infected. This is not easy, nor pleasant.

So just how do we identify the agent of infection in our Body Politic? I say lets get more transparency and more truth. I’d start with making the fundamental source of all funds coming to any political campaign be public. Next only natural people may fund any political campaign. (By the way I’m using natural person in the legal since of the words.) An I don’t mean just cash money, I mean anything of value. The next thing is to change are libel and slander laws to take in the new cyber media. An we also need to bring in the use of algorithms that either internally of unintentionally case harm liable for the harm they cause. By this I mean that the person or persons who knowingly or should have known that the algorithm they are using has, or would have, caused harm are liable for the damage caused.

I know the above is very complex and it will take a lot of work to get right but we have done this before (just look at the history of the telephone, radio, and tv) but we can do it. It will be done. The only question is what shape our nation will be in when it is done.

January 6th and the GOP

General,
The 8th Circle of Hell

Both House Minority Leader McCarthy and Senate Minority Leader McConnell Have done the GOP great harm and the President great good this week. McCarthy’s reneging on the deal his personal representative crafted, and where they got everything they asked for, shows to one and all that the GOP does not negotiate in good faith. Like their Great Leader, the Trump, they see negotiations as a ploy to be used to take down their “enemy”. An the “Enemy” is anyone who is not slavishly loyal to the Great Leader Trump.

The GOP has been head down this path for over 30 years, perhaps longer. It started when they took up the idea that “Wining isn’t everything, it’s the only thing.” It got worse when they started seeing the people on the other side not as the opposition, but as the “Enemy”. It has reached it’s current state when it choose to see politics as a “Zero Sum Game” and so it became ripe for a Conman to take over. Unfortunately for the GOP they are now on the road to the 8th Circle of Hell. (Yes I know I don’t believe in Hell, but they do.)

President Biden is now in a very simple negotiation position, you don’t. It does not mater what they will agree to, even when you give them everything they ask for, they won’t take it. It has the “Enemy’s” name on it so it can not be agreed to. The “Enemy” will get something out of it so they will get nothing out of it, so they will, by definition, loose. An if you think this sounds like nonsense, your right, it does and is nonsense. But it is logical. But logic can be nonsense if you start out with “skewed” premises (just Ask Alice in Wonderland). Negotiations with the current GOP is no longer about finding common ground, by definition there is no such thing, it is about achieving useful goals no mater what the opposition does.

When it comes to investigating the events of January 6th this means finding out, publicly, just who knew what, when, who did what, when. Only then can we start to take action to do what needs to be done to correct the system to prevent it from ever happening again. Unfortunately for the GOP this will most likely mean the end of the GOP as a major political party. This will not be an easy time for the country, we are in for a time of whoa

Two Simple Answers to the Fermi Paradox

General, ,

I have what I’m sure are not original answers to the Fermi Paradox as to why we have seen no signs of extraterrestrial life. I may, at a later date go into some of my reasons on why I find fault with the Paradox, but not here.

The first, and simplest, is that it is just not possible to travel between the stars. That there is no ‘Space Drives’. That ‘slow boats’ just can not be made to support life for any extended period of time so it is not possible to travel the decades, or life times, sub-light travel needs. All life is trapped around it’s own star therefor no visits.

I know this is a real downer, but it is a possibility. In the history of science there are many many things that we have wanted to do but we have found out are just not really possible. There is no Philosopher’s Stone that can convert ‘base’ metal into gold. An while we do now how to convert a metal like mercury into gold it takes way to much energy and time to actually do it. An eventually we come to the point of saying ‘why do it?’ In the case of building and meaning a slow boat sub-light craft it may just be that the cost it resources make it totally prohibitive.

On to the second answer. That any contact between life of one planet with another is immediately fatal. That even the slightest contact will kill the visitors. Or even worse kill the live on the planet until the contamination is eliminated (aka destroyed). Once this fact becomes evident to the space fairing Race they will see little reason to visit stars that might have life bearing planets. At best they would be able to exchange ideas, aka information, and at worse create an vengeful enemy thru some tragic accident. Best not run the risk and steer clear of the problem entirely. Wait until they can meet up with someone at a lifeless star where it is safer all round.

So that is it, what do you think?

The Republican Party is No longer the G.O.P. it is the T.O.P.

General, , ,
TOPSHOT – A supporter of US President Donald Trump wears a gas mask and holds a bust of him after he and hundreds of others stormed stormed the Capitol building on January 6, 2021 in Washington, DC. – Donald Trump’s supporters stormed a session of Congress held today, January 6, to certify Joe Biden’s election win, triggering unprecedented chaos and violence at the heart of American democracy and accusations the president was attempting a coup. (Photo by ROBERTO SCHMIDT / AFP) (Photo by ROBERTO SCHMIDT/AFP via Getty Images)

The time has come that we must accept that the nickname of the Republican Party, “Grand Old Party”, is no longer applicable . It should now be known as “Trump’s Own(ed) Party”. I don’t say this lightly. Nor do I contend that this is primarily the results of the growth of the MAGA movement in the party. I say this mostly because of what has happened the last two and a half months. From the insurrectionist attack on the Capitol, to the failure of a majority of both House and Senate Republicans to act responsibly and reject the attempts invalidate the lawful election results. To the failure of all but seven Republican Senators to vote for Trump’s conviction in his 2nd impeachment trial. To the blatant two-faced actions of Senate Minority Leader McConnell in his speech condemning President Trump on the Senate floor and his statement that he would support Donald J. Trump in 2022 if he was the Republican nominee.

The reason why I think we should call the Republican Party the “T.O.P.” is that:

1)The effort of several State Republican Parties to censure those elected party members for their actions in aforementioned impeachment.

2) The public statements of both House and Senate members of the Republican Party finding nothing wrong with the actions of the mob on Jan 6th.

3) The effort to either stop completely, or at least make totally impotent, the proposed independent commission to investigate just what happened on 6 January.

4) And let us not forget the numerous trips down to Florida by elected and non-elected members of the Republican Party for ‘Photo-Ops’ with Donald J. Trump.

5) And finally, and most complex, the fight between the National Republican Party and Donald J. Trump over the use of his, Trump’s, image and name. And then his counter punch stating that his, Trump’s, supporters should stop giving to the National Republican Party and instead send their donations to his, Trump’s, private PAC. The National Republican Party has asked the Trump Organization to host a major fundraiser at Mar-a-Logo.

I fully expect to see the complete and total capitulation of the leadership of the Republican Party to both the Trump Organization and to Donald J. Trump in the next year. Therefor we should be calling the Republicans by what they truly are: Trump’s Own(ed) Party or the TOP.