Sunday, November 17, 2024

Deicing and Enchanting Clouds On Flight South

Our early morning flight was on a plane that had a couple of inches of snow on the wings, not to mention snow on the windows.  









But the deicing machines came and cleared the snow and ice off.  There's a short Smithsonian video about deicing planes at the Anchorage International Airport.  Interesting tidbit in the video is that the Anchorage Airport has never been shut down because of snow.  








And once we were up in the air, we went through a fantasy world of clouds.


















The video does a reasonable job of capturing magic of flying through this cloud forest.  






In Seattle the ground was wet, but the sun was out.  We took the train to the ferry and the ferry to Bainbridge, where we still had a magical cloudscape.















Thursday, November 07, 2024

The Numbers Don't Add Up - The National Gaps vs Alaska Gaps



Kamal Harris lost the popular vote to Donald Trump by almost 10 million votes!


How did the election swing so far to Trump?  How much was voter suppression - mail-in ballots sent too late to get back, Russian bomb threats and who knows what other shenanigans?  Too few polling places in Democratic areas?  Suppression of student votes and other forms?  

How is it that Trump, after losing the popular vote to Clinton by 3 million votes 

"[Clinton] outpaced President-elect Donald Trump by almost 2.9 million votes, with 65,844,954 (48.2%) to his 62,979,879 (46.1%), according to revised and certified final election results from all 50 states and the District of Columbia."

and to Biden by 7 million votes, 

"Biden’s popular vote margin over Trump tops 7 million"

now beats Harris by almost 10 million votes?  There were 155 million votes in 2020 but only 145 million this time.  By all accounts there was a record number of people turning out this time.  It would seem some votes are missing.    

The numbers we have would mean the gap between increased by 13 million and by 17 million against Biden.  

It doesn't add up.  I know, racism and misogyny play a role, but not that much.  Especially after all the terrible things we learned about Trump after the 2020 election.  They've been listed by everyone already from Jan 6 through convictions and indictments.  And I'd argue that Harris ran a much better and exciting campaign than Clinton or Biden did.  And it sure looked like there were lots of people voting early and on election day.  

How is it possible for him to have won the popular vote by a huge margin this time when he lost it significantly the two previous races?  

Alaska Totals Don't Match The US Totals

It seems even more suspicious when you look at the Alaska totals.  Alaska is a red state, so the increased Trump numbers should be more exaggerated in Alaska than the US total which includes blue states and red states.  But it isn't.  The opposite.  

Harris did better than Clinton, and not quite as well as Biden in Alaska.  


Trump beat Clinton by 47,000 votes in Alaska in 2016..  

Alaska Div of Elections



Trump beat Biden by 36,000 votes in Alaska.  

Alaska Div of Elections    xxx



  
But Trump only beat Harris by 39,000 votes this time.  3000 votes more than Biden lost by, but 8,000 votes fewer than Clinton lost by in Alaska.  

Alaska Div of Elections

Alaska's a red state.  If the number were consistent with the Lower 48 numbers, she should have lost by a lot more than Biden and Clinton lost by.  But her numbers were better than Clinton's.  


So my dilemma is how to connect the dots in a way that makes sense.  Not to make up some wild story, but to offer a plausible hypothesis or two that could be tested by people with better math skills and better data analysis skills and maybe some ability to uncover Russian (or others) tampering with out election computer systems. 

One could argue that misogyny and racism gave Trump more votes in the Lower 48, but then why not have a similar change in Alaska?  We have among the highest statistics for murdered and raped women.  
Or you could blame it on the economy or immigration and border issues.  But whatever policy issues you might raise, people in Alaska have as much access as Lower 48 voters to Fox News and odd internet sites that supported Trump with relentless lies. 

What makes sense to me is someone tinkered with the computers.  Or the ballots.  That's not that far fetched.  Trump, before the election repeatedly said if he lost it would be because of election rigging.  

Trump always projects his own behavior onto others. He's a criminal and rapist who said the Haitian refugees were criminals and rapists.  If the Guinness Book of Records had a category on liars, Trump would certainly be in the top five if not the winner.  And he calls anyone who puts him in a bad light a liar.  He accuses others of his own behaviors.  

He told us over and over that the elections were rigged.  Does that mean he was rigging them?  Not conclusively, but it's a clue that fits the pattern.  Just need some serious investigation of this.  Just as Trump would have demanded had he lost.  To be sure.  

Comparing the national gaps between Trump and his three presidential opponents and comparing them to the Alaska gaps raises real questions for me.  

I'm not saying it happened, but I'm saying there are serious inconsistencies that require some explanation.  

I'm sure the Trump mafia are laughing at how easy it was to get Harris to concede.  They knew she would play by the traditional rules that they have flouted since . . . always.  

Joe Biden, you've got three months to try out your Supreme Court granted immunity.  I'm not calling for you to blow up Mar-A-Lago,  but I'd like to see you push some limits to find out more about the Russian Trump election interference and how the numbers got so out of whack.  And it might show us that the Supreme Court has more comfort with Trump transgressions than Biden transgressions.  If it does, it might be forced to put more restrictions on Trump's immunity.  

Oh, and maybe look into the medical records of Trump's ear.  We've essentially heard nothing.  If he'd really been hit in ear, we'd have heard the doctors explaining it in detail and Trump would be showing off the scar.  

 

Monday, November 04, 2024

A Fork In The Road Of US And World History

This is one of those historic moments when the world will pull back from the bring of disaster or go crashing into a new world of callous destruction.  The US AID (Agency for International Development) [poster] from Thailand in the late 1960s isn't too dramatic for the choice we face right now.  On the left side it says "Communism,"  in the middle it says "or" and on the right side it says "Freedom." Our choice now is Authoritarian vs. Democracy.  




Despite its many flaws, the US Democracy has been one of the better examples of how humans can work together to build a society based on law and aspirations of peace, of freedom, and of comfort.  The reality has favored some more than others - in terms of freedom, justice, and economic and social security.  And it has had serious negative impacts on the environment.  

But we're at a critical fork in the road.  To the right, we crash into the despotic world ruled by Trump and those who pull his strings, like Putin and his meddling into our election as he has meddled in the Brexit vote, Hungary, France, Italy, and, of course, Ukraine.  He's a force of evil turning the world toward chaos that he thinks he can better thrive in.  

If we go the Trump route, it's not Trump so much I'm worried about.  But it's his backers - from Putin, to the Christian Nationalist mob, and the wealthy cabal on the far right who have been plotting for decades and have already successfully captured the Supreme Court.  

The left fork would give us the first woman president, who is also part East Indian and part Black.  And she's incredibly capable as her career and short campaign has demonstrated.  

There should not even be any doubt that Kamala Harris should win this election.  That there is reflects serious failures in our system.  Failures in the education system that has produced tens of millions of voters who would choose a candidate with hundreds of flaws and misbehaviors any one of which would have destroyed any other presidential candidate.  
Failures in our system that have allowed foreign propaganda to be broadcast through outlets like Fox News and all sorts of internet sites to sow seeds of distrust in our system and in the idea of Truth itself.
Failures in our justice system that allow a convicted felon, who is ineligible to vote in most states, to be a candidate for the presidency.  Who would be ineligible to join our military to be its Commander in Chief.  
Fairlure in our electoral system that disregards the popular vote for an arcane system that focuses all the attention on seven purple states.  

A Harris administration will face many serious problems (including the disgruntled cult members), but it would work on them rationally and in good faith.   And that a Trump administration would exacerbate.  

Often such turning points aren't realized until after they happen - Pearl Harbor, 9/11, the election of FDR, for example.  

But we know today.  We've known a long time that this election is a choice between two very different futures.  One continues to move us toward greater equality, and one hopes, more equal economic prosperity, and continued fights to minimize CO2 emissions and the worst ravages of climate change.  
The other unleashes nasty brutish anger and hate on our country and the world.  

And even if Harris wins the election decisively, we know the depraved one will fight to overturn the election.  

Fortunately, this time round we know his past behaviors and are better prepared.  The public is more aware because, except for his cult members, we've seen how he operated after the last election.  Our government is better prepared for the same reason.  And more importantly, Joe Biden is still president and in control of the military and the national guard and other resources that might be needed.  

My logical brain tells me that it will be a Harris victory.  Reason says that the world has changed in ways that disfavor Trump.


Since the 2020 election, we've learned so much more about Trump's evil ways.
He was impeached for the second time.
He created a plot to challenge Biden's victory
He instigated the January 6 insurrection of the Capitol
He stole boxes and boxes full of classified documents and stored some of them in a bathroom in Mar-A-Lago. And shared them, well, we don't know for sure with whom.
He's become a convicted felon and rapist.
He has several serious indictments and trials still waiting for him
The Supreme Court overturned Roe v Wade
His public appearances have shown him to be more and more deranged
He's presided over a Nazi rally in New York City
Many of the 'very fine people' he selected to serve in his administration have publicly warned us what a disastrous president he was.  

I can go on and on, but the point is that we know so many more terrible things about him.  Even if his cult stays loyal, there have to be other Republicans and Independents who voted for him last time who either won't vote for Trump, and many who will vote for Harris.  And young people who now are eligible to vote, but weren't four years ago.

We know that the Dobbs decision has galvanized women, especially in light of the Republican states who have passed draconian anti-abortion laws that are killing women who have had miscarriages and other problems with pregnancy.  And we're hearing about many women forced to give birth to their rapists' children.  

Conservative states like Kansas and Ohio have put the right to abortions in their constitutions through ballot measures, by-passing their legislatures.  

The numbers of early voters shows Democrats returning their ballots more than Republicans, shows women outvoting men, shows young voters voting at higher than past levels.  So everything points to a Harris victory.  

But nothing is certain until the votes are counted and whatever gimmicks Trump pulls if he loses are blocked.  

This is one of those huge moments in history where human destiny hangs in the balance.  

[Soon after I arrived in Thailand in 1967 as Peace Corps teacher in rural Thailand, I was taken out one night to a village by an AID employee.  A village not unlike the one on the right of the poster.  He hung a sheet up across the road and showed movies about the danger of communism.  I suspect, in hindsight, I was being tested and I failed dismally - to my credit, I'd like to think.  AID (CIA?) never approached me again, to my knowledge.  But I did end up with this poster.]


Saturday, November 02, 2024

Why LATimes and Washington Post Presidential Non-Endorsements Are So Problematic

The previous post concerned how the billionaire owners of the LA Times and Washington Post blocked their editorial boards from endorsing Kamala Harris for president and why I cancelled my subscription to the LA Times. [I don't have a subscription to the Washington Post.] 

We know that Jeff Bezos has other business deals with the US government [sorry, there's a paywall] - with Amazon and with other ventures - that a Trump presidency would, in Bezos' mind - be quashed.  And he may be right.  Patrick Soon-Shiong also has other businesses that possibly could be jeopardized by a Trump presidency.  Plus Trump has said that he would punish media and others who oppose him.  

I focused on what appears to be their fear that if Trump were elected, they would be punished for such an endorsement.  I compared that behavior to the behavior of the Washington Post and NYTimes when they published the Pentagon Papers in 1971 - a daring display of courage and the power of press.  

I spent more time on the Pentagon Papers than I intended to, because I realized that while I was a young adult at the time, anyone under 53 today, hadn't even been born yet.  If 'Pentagon Papers' means anything to most of them, it probably is pretty superficial.  

Think what people born after next year will know and understand about the 2024 election in 2077!  The historic lessons get lost if we don't keep them alive.  

So I decided to postpone the second part of that post to another post.  

Here's the part I left for a future post - putting their actions into context using Vaclav Havel's "The Power of the Powerless."  You can see the whole essay at the link.  Or a much briefer overview at Wikipedia.

It's a long essay, written by then Czech playwright, and later, president, about how people in an authoritarian regime could still maintain their freedom.  He's specifically talking about the Soviet form of dictatorship that ruled Czechoslovakia at that time.  There are many people with greater expertise on Havel's work than I.  But this is my limited take on this situation.  

When I heard about the two billionaire owners of two major newspapers killing editorials that would have endorsed Kamala Harris for president, the part I thought of was the story of the greengrocer putting up signs in his shop window.   You can read it below.  I've highlighted some of it in red.  

"III 

"The manager of a fruit-and-vegetable shop places in his window, among the onions and carrots, the slogan: "Workers of the world, unite!" Why does he do it? What is he trying to communicate to the world? Is he genuinely enthusiastic about the idea of unity among the workers of the world? Is his enthusiasm so great that he feels an irrepressible impulse to acquaint the public with his ideals? Has he really given more than a moment's thought to how such a unification might occur and what it would mean?


"I think it can safely be assumed that the overwhelming majority of shopkeepers never think about the slogans they put in their windows, nor do they use them to express their real opinions. That poster was delivered to our greengrocer from the enterprise headquarters along with the onions and carrots. He put them all into the window simply because it has been done that way for years, because everyone does it, and because that is the way it has to be. If he were to refuse, there could be trouble. He could be reproached for not having the proper decoration in his window; someone might even accuse him of disloyalty. He does it because these things must be done if one is to get along in life. It is one of the thousands of details that guarantee him a relatively tranquil life "in harmony with society," as they say.


"Obviously the greengrocer is indifferent to the semantic content of the slogan on exhibit; he does not put the slogan in his window from any personal desire to acquaint the public with the ideal it expresses. This, of course, does not mean that his action has no motive or significance at all, or that the slogan communicates nothing to anyone. The slogan is really a sign, and as such it contains a subliminal but very definite message. Verbally, it might be expressed this way: "I, the greengrocer XY, live here and I know what I must do. I behave in the manner expected of me. I can be depended upon and am beyond reproach. I am obedient and therefore I have the right to be left in peace." This message, of course, has an addressee: it is directed above, to the greengrocer's superior, and at the same time it is a shield that protects the greengrocer from potential informers. The slogan's real meaning, therefore, is rooted firmly in the greengrocer's existence. It reflects his vital interests. But what are those vital interests?


"Let us take note: if the greengrocer had been instructed to display the slogan "I am afraid and therefore unquestioningly obedient;' he would not be nearly as indifferent to its semantics, even though the statement would reflect the truth. The greengrocer would be embarrassed and ashamed to put such an unequivocal statement of his own degradation in the shop window, and quite naturally so, for he is a human being and thus has a sense of his own dignity. To overcome this complication, his expression of loyalty must take the form of a sign which, at least on its textual surface, indicates a level of disinterested conviction. It must allow the greengrocer to say, "What's wrong with the workers of the world uniting?" Thus the sign helps the greengrocer to conceal from himself the low foundations of his obedience, at the same time concealing the low foundations of power. It hides them behind the facade of something high. And that something is ideology.


"Ideology is a specious way of relating to the world. It offers human beings the illusion of an identity, of dignity, and of morality while making it easier for them to part with them. As the repository of something suprapersonal and objective, it enables people to deceive their conscience and conceal their true position and their inglorious modus vivendi, both from the world and from themselves. It is a very pragmatic but, at the same time, an apparently dignified way of legitimizing what is above, below, and on either side. It is directed toward people and toward God. It is a veil behind which human beings can hide their own fallen existence, their trivialization, and their adaptation to the status quo. It is an excuse that everyone can use, from the greengrocer, who conceals his fear of losing his job behind an alleged interest in the unification of the workers of the world, to the highest functionary, whose interest in staying in power can be cloaked in phrases about service to the working class. The primary excusatory function of ideology, therefore, is to provide people, both as victims and pillars of the post-totalitarian system, with the illusion that the system is in harmony with the human order and the order of the universe."

The situation of the greengrocer under Soviet authoritarianism and the Bezos and Soon-Shiong is not a perfect analogy, but it shows how the no-holds-barred style of Trump causes even billionaires to modify their behavior rather than draw unwanted attention to themselves.

The slogan is really a sign, and as such it contains a subliminal but very definite message
In the case of both newspaper owners, not publishing an endorsement of Harris was a sign to Trump with a clear message that they didn't want him upset at them if he were elected.  They didn't want their companies punished for supporting Harris.

the sign helps the greengrocer to conceal from himself the low foundations of his obedience, at the same time concealing the low foundations of power. It hides them behind the facade of something high. 

Not endorsing Harris was the equivalent of putting the a sign in the window that says, 'we will not oppose you' to Trump.  The low foundation of their obedience. We do not want you to punish us in some way.  And the low foundation of Trump's power is that the endorsements were perfectly legal and normal, yet they were afraid to publish the endorsements.  

The 'ideology' they were hiding behind was the idea that newspapers should  maintain "political neutrality," should be objective observers that don't take sides, but impartially report the news.  Of course, impartiality is not possible.  A news outlet can try to report objective facts, but the employees and owners all have values that color what events are reported and how they are reported.  Or, in this case, not reported.  

And the idea that newspapers must be objective observers and non-partisan is one that many hold, but it is not historically the only norm.  

Early Colonial newspapers were often "a sideline for printers."  Benjamin Franklin was such a printer with a newspaper on the side.  And they were quite partisan.  During that era John Peter Zenger was found innocent when a governor tried to shut down his partisan attacks.  Do kids still learn about Zenger in school these days?

The fact that Trump has threatened to attack the media as president and more recently to talk about his political enemies being executed - as he let the January 6 mob erect a gallows for his then Vice President - is all the more reason that they should have endorsed his opponent.  

Another issue this raises is the phenomenon of billionaires buying existing newspapers.  On the one hand, this is a way for some newspapers to survive.  And it's probably better than newspapers being owned by corporations that own many newspapers and thus limit the number of different voices available to the public.  I say newspapers here, but this also applies to radio and television.  

And yet, at the same time, the internet has provided access to way more voices than ever.  Perhaps we're just waiting for the dust to settle.  Or the Musks of the world are going to buy up those voices.  It's a time of change and we have to just hold on until it becomes more settled.  

But the problem of billionaires owning papers is that they have large financial interests that can easily come into conflict with the objectivity of the paper they own.  In Bezos' case, Amazon has interest in large government contracts which some have suggested as a reason he vetoed the endorsement.  

The key point in all this for me, the reason I thought it important enough to cancel my LA Times subscription, is the issue Havel raises about having personal freedom, no matter how small, and to use it.  

Authoritarians have control because people voluntarily obey them.  Even when there is no law and no order, people anticipate what the regime wants them to do, and do it.  People cede their autonomy voluntarily.  As did the two owners of the newspapers.  And as the many Republican politicians who trashed Trump during the 2016 primaries - Cruz, Graham, Rubio, etc. - but then fell in line to support him.  Trump is ruthless, but Stormy Daniels and E. Jean Carroll stood up to him and won.  

If Trump wins Tuesday, and we get conflicting reports on how close it is, we will all be facing life in an authoritarian state.  Understanding Havel will be important.