Election 2016: What The Glass Ceiling Looks Like

[This started out fairly focused, but the causes of the glass ceiling for women aren't simple.  Nor do they explain everything in this election.   This isn't intended to be the final treatise on obstacles Hillary Clinton faces in her campaign because she's a woman.  But it is intended to give it some context.  The basic point is this:  Because she is a woman she has more hurdles on her way to the White House than a man would and here are some reasons why and some numbers.]


Rarely are women kept out of higher positions simply because they are women.  No, it's because they aren't aggressive enough, or they're too aggressive.  There are gaps in their resume, or times when they weren't in the office when we needed them (maybe because they took off time to have and care for a child while the fathers stayed at work.)

Deborah Tannen has spent her career as a linguist documenting the differences between men and women's talk and why they handicap women in male dominated institutions.

Norming is one of her topics. [I can't find a good overview.  Try checking out her book Talking 9-5.] The norm has traditionally been a white male in a suit.  That's what leaders are supposed to look like.  And people who don't look (and act) like a white male, have trouble moving up out of subordinate roles.  Not so much because they are women, but because they aren't men. They don't match our image of the Norm.    Individuals who differ from that norm stand out.  They don't fit in.  The more they differ from how we expect them to look and act, the harder it will be for them to succeed.  Maybe they're just not part of the team, like the white males who don't wear a suit or don't go out drinking with the guys.    Blacks stand out, because they're not white.  The whiter they are, the less they stand out.

Women stand out in a lose-lose sort of way.  The more they try to look or sound like men - cut their hair short, wear suits, raise their voices, talk dirty - the less they look like the women men think they should look like.  We've all seen the lists of descriptors for men and women who behave the same way.  When women act like men act, they're punished for it.   Where men are seen as strong, women are seen as pushy.   Women just don't fit our images of what the ideal leader should look like and men (and women) don''t see this as discrimination.  For them it's simply 'the truth.'

Here's a clear example of how 'norms' play a role in Americans choosing people who look like our ideal of a leader from a 2012 article on The American College President Study:

"In 1986, the first year of ACE’s college president study, the demographic profile of the typical campus leader was a white male in his 50s. He was married with children, Protestant, held a doctorate in education, and had served in his current position for six years.
Twenty-five years later, with few exceptions, the profile has not changed."

The study does note that the percentage of women presidents in those 25 years rose from ten to 26.

But underlying this, I would argue, is the fear of change, of losing power that men have in our (and most other) society.

C. Jane Kendrick on Weekend Edition today gave one reason why this happens as she talked about campaigning for Clinton in Utah:

". . . when I think about how people feel about Hillary here in Utah, it's not simply that they disagree with her. It's that they hate her. I think there's a character assassination that happened in the 1990s, long before she ever ran and I think long before Bill was president, that started with questioning women's roles and gender roles. I think she really pushed Utah's buttons.

". . . she poses a huge threat to the system that works in Utah. I think she poses a threat to the patriarchal system. She poses a threat to gender roles. Everything that I was taught to hold dear is the opposite of what Hillary has - who she is, except for, you know, being a grandmother and a mother, which I think a lot of women here, in my past, growing up, would say perhaps she didn't do enough of that."

Sure, people who strongly believe in the free market as the perfect system, who believe abortion is murder, and that guns are as essential an extension of the human anatomy as a cell phone, all have 'rational' reasons to oppose Clinton.  But to hate her?  To make her into a demon?

The Republicans have been smearing their  male opponents with sophisticated propaganda too.  Their crowning achievement was the Swiftboating campaign that took Kerry's heroic war record and made him into a traitor with lies and innuendo.

And that's what they've been doing with Hillary Clinton since Bill Clinton walked onto the national stage.

A PEW study discusses the top qualities people look for in a leader and perceived gender differences in those qualities. Honesty comes out on top among the top four traits.  And women are perceived as far more honest than men.  There's little doubt in my mind that's why the Republicans' most constant sound-bite on Clinton is about her being dishonest.  Just as they worked hard to whittle away John Kerry's war hero advantage over the draft dodging George W. Bush, they are pounding on Clinton's honesty.

But this is against the backdrop of women not looking like our norm for leadership.  After all, Catholics still won't accept women priests, let alone a Pope.  Orthodox Jews still segregate men and women, and Fundamentalists tell us women should obey their husbands.

Of course, Clinton's being a woman is only one of the many obstacles she has faced in her quest for the presidency.  We only pick a president every four years.  That's a possibility of 25 slots per century if no one were ever reelected.  The odds are extremely low for men too.  But even lower for women.

And while I have doubts about some of Clinton's past and how it would play out in a Clinton presidency, I've had those doubts in every election since I first got to vote for president in 1968.  Nobody's ideal candidate is ever on the ballot.  All candidates have warts.

But in my observation of presidential election for the last 50 years or so, no basically well qualified male candidate's election, given an opponent like Trump,  would still be in doubt.  Lyndon Johnson trounced Barry Goldwater, whose policies were not nearly as bizarre as Trump's and whose character was not in question.  Not even marginally qualified male candidates with an opponent like Trump would have anything to worry about.

We have memes that talk about women (or substitute whatever group that doesn't fit Tannen's idea of the American leader norm) having to work twice as hard as men, such as Charlotte Witton's:

 "Whatever women do they must do twice as well as men to be thought half as good. Luckily, this is not difficult."

I'm sure lots of men dismissed this because of what they would have called her smart ass conclusion.

What's particularly telling when this double standard is applied to women, are that facts that women belong to

• the richest and poorest (and all those in-between) economic classes, 
• the best and worst educated, 
• every different religious denomination
• every ethnic group

AND they make up slightly more than 50% the population.  Yet

• 0% of US presidents have been women
• 4% of Fortune 500 company presidents are women in 2016
• 6.9% of generals and admirals in the US military are women in 2016
• 5.2% of commercial airline pilots are women
• "Women occupy just 6.3 percent, or 10 out of 160 head chef positions at 15 prominent U.S. restaurant groups analyzed by Bloomberg."

I can't find numbers on the percent of women heading labor unions, but this article begins:

"Why do unions have so few female leaders? On the face of the facts, that doesn’t make sense. After all, 45.5 percent of unionists are women."

I already mentioned that only 26% of university presidents.  You get the picture.


Where are women doing 'better'?  An Education Week article titled "Women on par with men in principalships" tells us:

"Looking at data for the 2007-08 school year, the report shows that 50 percent of public school principals and 53 percent of private school principals were female that year."

But that doesn't look all that good when you consider that men made up less than a quarter of the public school teachers, the pool from which principals are drawn.*

While women might not get top head chef positions, according to QSR (Quick Service Restaurant) magazine in 2011

"more than 50 percent of restaurants are now owned by women"

And the book Supervision in The Hospitality Industry*  tells us that

"more than two-thirds of the supervisors in the food service industry are women"

Which makes sense, but is a dubious achievement,  because the New Republic lists the food service industry as the lowest paid in the nation.  

When you consider that just over 50% of the population is women, these numbers show that more is going on than "they aren't as good."  There are paths to many jobs that women haven't been able to get on.  Many commercial pilots, for example, got their training in the military when women weren't allowed those jobs.  Trade apprenticeships didn't take women.  And so on.

But think about this.  Until very recently, every married man was married to a woman.  And many, if not most, had daughters.  They all had mothers.  Yet they continued to make decisions and to support a system that made the women in their lives second class citizens.  

This is deeply embedded in our psyches, and we still have a lot of self-reflection to do. This campaign has started some of that.   Just as no one expected Nixon to start the US talking to China, no one expected Trump to start us talking about the prevalence of sexual assaults. (A key difference was that Nixon went to China consciously and purposely.)  

But when anyone says they can't vote for Clinton because she's not honest, or because of emails, or the Clinton Foundation, start asking them about what they know about male candidates of the past and the baggage they had.  Ask them specifically what they know about her dishonesty, or is it just a word they associate with her.  Then ask them about their fathers' treatment of women.  Ask them about their fathers' attitude about family.  Their own ideas about families.  You might prepare by reading what George Lakoff says on that. Go down to where he talks about conservative and liberal conceptions of family.

You can also see Deborah Tannen's take on the election before the Democratic primary was over.
And here she's discusses the interruptions in the first debate.

I'm reasonably confident that Clinton is going to win, but I shouldn't have any doubts about it given the qualifications of these two candidates.  And if you think things got bad when we elected a Black president, just wait until we have a woman president.  All the misogyny that's bottled up will come exploding out.  And only when it's all out in the open for everyone to see, will we be able to process it and move on.  

Again, sorry seems a little disjointed, but the world I'm writing about is also disjointed.  There's no simple cause and effect.  Lots of factors play roles in this first US election with a woman as a candidate from a major party.  

*I'd note that in 1970 I taught 5th grade for a year in Los Angeles.  I was one of very few male teachers, though the principal and the vice principal were both male.  One day, the vice principal invited me to go to an event for male teachers.  He explained that this was the route to become a principal. 

Using Your Fame To Prey On Women Is NOT The Same As Defending Yourself From A Woman Sleeping With Your Husband

Marjorie Dannenfelser is the president of the pro-life organization, the Susan B. Anthony List.  She was interviewed this morning by reporter Steve Innskeep on NPR's Morning Edition.

She strongly objected to Trump’s words about assaulting women on the tape that was released last week.

 “What we just heard . . . is absolutely outrageous and unacceptable.  It is not to be set aside.  The assault and offense of women.  You know for any woman who has ever been assaulted, this is a trigger moment for them.  It brings back a flood of memories that are horrible and that’s no excuse. ”

But then she goes on.  

“For any woman who has been assaulted  and then ignored, or blamed, they should be upset by Hillary Clinton’s behavior and her treatment of the women that in a serial fashion, went through her husband’s life.  She then blamed and destroyed, ridiculed, ignored.  When you think about the women on college campuses today who often are having that happen to them, that’s a trigger moment for them.” 

Steve Innskeep interjects to say that fact checkers only have evidence that Clinton did publicly attack Jennifer Flowers, but they found no evidence that she had attacked other women who’d had relations with her husband. 

Let’s get this straight.  

Clinton, a married woman, ‘attacking’ a woman who had an affair with her husband, IS NOT anywhere near a moral equivalent to Trump’s bragging about using his celebrity and power to get away with sexual assaults on non-consenting women.

These are totally different behaviors, with totally different motivations and consequences. 

In fact Dannenfelser’s wording - in both cases she talks uses almost the exact same phrasing - raises questions for me about who helped her script this interview.  

About Trump:  “for any woman who has ever been assaulted, this is a trigger moment for them.”

About Clinton:  “For any woman who has been assaulted  and then ignored, or blamed . . . When you think about the women on college campuses today who often are having that happen to them, that’s a trigger moment for them.” 

That grammatical symmetry is not accidental.  These comments were scripted to make them sound like the moral equivalent of each other.  

It also helps her rationalize that despite Trump’s behavior - and we have to remember it’s not just this tape but his behavior throughout the campaign and his business career that is being challenged daily - her single issue of ending abortion is important enough to overlook everything else in Trump’s record.

I'd note that our polarized culture - and the media have assisted in exacerbating people's ideological differences - makes it hard for people like Dannenfelser to consider the possibility that working with her 'enemy' might actually help reduce the number of abortions.  Planned Parenthood - the icon the anti-abortionists use as the enemy - counsels women on birth control and does a significant job in preventing unwanted pregnancies.

I'd argue that Trump as a candidate has been a role model for increasing the number of, in Dannenfelser's words, "outrageous and unacceptable" behaviors among his followers that will lead to unwanted pregnancies.  And as president, Trump's model would probably cause the number of unwanted pregnancies and abortions to go up.  

Life is complicated.  The simple cause and effect relationships that people glom onto, tend to be far more complex.  Think about the Three Strikes You're Out legislation that was supposed to cut down on crime, but instead swelled the US prison population, hugely increasing the costs, and ruining the lives of countless people who were no danger to anyone.

The anti-abortion movement has the same perverse consequences.  They throttle the most effective anti-abortion organization because 3% of its work involves abortions.  And they send the most reactionary, bigoted men to Congress, simply because they say they oppose abortions.  

But that is exactly what the larger script writers intended.  To get those who think in simple cause-effect relations into voting Republican.  Talk about trigger words - the conservative movement has been masterful in creating sound bites to get people angry and voting.  

Of course, it plays well with Trump’s hardcore supporters, many of whom, I’m guessing, were not offended by the tape.  Clinton’s supporters dismiss it as soon as they hear who Dannenfelser is, perhaps even without even listening to and parsing it out. 

And I doubt such arguments work any more with independent voters.  

What's Wrong With Judge Guidi's Decision That Ben Nageak Should Be The District 40 Democratic Candidate?

In Friday's ADN a Nathaniel Herz article reports that Judge Guidi overturned the house district 40 election, deciding that Ben Nageak should have won.  Based on that article* I have some problems with the decision.

Map of house district 40 from elections website, I added Shungnak

Let's look at the key points I have issues with.

"But in the small Northwest Alaska village of Shungnak, which went 47-3 for Westlake, Guidi found poll workers acted with 'reckless disregard of the requirements of law. . .'

. . . And Randy Ruedrich, the former chairman of the Alaska Republican Party, testified on Nageak's behalf as an expert witness during the trial. 

Guidi's decision, in fact, hinged on an analysis by Ruedrich of how the double voting in Shungnak affected the outcome of the election. . ."

Note, we have a long-time Republican Party chair working on behalf of one of the Democratic candidates.  That's because while Nageak is a Democrat, he caucuses with the Republicans, which is why the Democratic party supported his opponent, Dean Westlake, in the primary.

"Westlake had his own witness — his campaign manager, John-Henry Heckendorn — but Guidi wrote that Ruedrich's testimony was more "authoritative and reliable." And in his decision, Guidi calculated 12 "contaminated votes" in Shungnak should be thrown out — 11 for Westlake and one for Nageak, based on the existing split in votes between the two candidates."

I would grant that Ruedrich is more knowledgable about voting in Alaska.  He's a very bright man and has spent many years studying districts and precincts around the state.  He was very much involved with the redistricting process in the most recent redistricting and in past ones.  Few people know Alaska elections like Ruedrich.

However, I would argue that Ruedrich isn't acting as a political scientists here, studying the facts and coming up with the most reasonable interpretation and solution.  Rather he was acting as a strong political partisan, finding a scheme that would sound reasonable to the judge, that would result in his favored candidate winning the election.

In fact, were the vote counts switched, and Westlake had challenged Nageak using the same argument Ruedrich used, Ruedrich would have argued against that reasoning, because Ruedrich's goal is to find an argument that will get his candidate elected, not one that is most reasonable.  (And as a party operative, that's what he ought to be doing and it's the judge's job to decide.)

Citing Ruedrich's testimony, Guidi ruled those dozen voters would have picked the Republican ballot — on which Nageak and Westlake didn't appear — based on historical averages."

Here's the part I have the most heartburn with.  Perhaps there were a dozen Republican voters in Shungnak.  But there were no house candidates on the Republican ballot.  The most contested election in the primary, the only one on which the voters of Shungnak might make a difference, was the Democratic** primary. It was the only race where voters in Shungnak could make a difference.

Republicans in Alaska are allowed to vote on the Democratic ballot.  The 'historical' 12 Shungnak Republicans knew they would have no impact on any of the statewide Republican primary contests.  The odds are that they all would have picked Democratic ballots so they could vote in the district 40 house primary.  But, Ruedrich would point out, there was no Republican ballot in 2014 or 2013 and still about a dozen people voted Republican.

I would counter that this was NOT like other 'historical' elections.  In 2012 there were four candidates on the Democratic ballot and Nageak won by four percentage points over the runner up.  In 2014, he beat Westlake by nearly 7% of the vote.  While these aren't landslides, they're comfortable margins.

What was significantly different this year was that the Republicans were backing Nageak and the Democrats were backing Westlake in the primary.  A lot of money was spent on this election.  It had a lot more publicity than in the past.  There was a candidate who was nominally a Democrat, but was had been caucusing with the Republicans and would in the future.  His opponent was going to caucus with the Democrats.  This was NOT by any stretch a typical election where 'historical average' ought to be used.

From what I can gather from the article, Judge Guidi has disenfranchised those 12 Republican voters in Shungnak.  Maybe they would have taken a Republican ballot.  But maybe not.

• They had the right to vote in the Democratic primary
• They chose their preferred candidate
• Any votes on mistakenly given out Republican ballots would have had no effect on any of the state wide primary races

 Since they had the right to vote in the Democratic primary why should their votes be taken away?

Why would Guidi choose to invalidate the Democratic ballots rather than the Republican ballots which Shungnak's Democratic voters had no right to use?

Furthermore, the reasoning Ruedrich used, if I read Herz' article correctly, and he reported correctly, was that we should look at how they voted in the past.  

By that logic, we could skip elections altogether, and just go by what voters did in the last election.  

I understand Judge Guidi's concern about election workers giving everyone both ballots.  That's totally unacceptable.  But so is Guidi's decision.

Essentially, Guidi disenfranchised 12 Shungnak voters.  

If he truly believes the results were tainted by giving out both ballots to all voters, the only fair option is to let both candidates run against each other once more in the general election where more voters are likely to vote.  Since there were no Republican primary candidates, or any other party candidates, this would pit Nageak against Westlake against each other once again.  One could argue that's unfair to the original winner Westlake, but it's a lot fairer than Ruedrich and Guidi second guessing the voters of Shungnak.  

If there had been a Republican candidate, this would have been a messy solution.  But there isn't so this would be the cleanest option if you truly believe that the primary was tainted.  

Now it's up to the Alaska Supreme Court to decide how this election will go.  

[UPDATE October 13:  Yesterday the Supreme Court threw out Judge Guidi's decision and Westlake will go to Juneau representing District 40.]

*Since I'm taking an online class called Journalism Skills For Engaged Citizens, I'm acutely aware that this post would have been stronger had I gotten a copy of the judge's decision and not just relied on the article.  I tried.  I did get to the case online, but couldn't figure out how to get a copy of the decision.  And it's after hours so I can't get help.  Next time I'll do better.

**I use Democratic primary, but technically it's called the ADL primary.

Hope Springs Eternal - Can Steve Lindbeck Beat Rep. Don Young?

Usually there are more post ideas than I have time or energy for.  And I have a lot of draft posts that are either in queue for when I'm ready to finish them.  And there are a lot more that probably are past their use by date.

Here's one I started the day that Steve Lindbeck officially announced his campaign to unseat Representative Don Young.  I gathered the election numbers back to Young's first race for the house in 1972 when he lost to Nick Begich.  Since then, the closest race was 1990 when he won by less than 8,000 votes.

The factors that matter seem to be:

Does the opponent have name recognition and a good reputation?
Lindbeck has never run for political office before, but he's had a number of jobs where his name got out to Alaskans and he had opportunities to get around the state.  He was a journalist with the Anchorage Daily News.  He was head of the Alaska Humanities Forum, and head of the Alaska Public Broadasting.

Presidential year or not?
Opponents seem to have done better during presidential years when more people voted.

Other factors.
More candidates in the race seems to help Young.  This year the turmoil in the Republican Party may or may not have a spillover effect into this House race.  Lindbeck has raised a relatively large amount for Young opponents.  There were a number of incumbents house legislators who lost in the primaries this year.  Young's tainted by some scandals including a road in Florida and his clout in Congress is much weakened.  Will that be enough?  I haven't seen any poll data, so we'll just have to wait and see.

Here's the post I began last April.


The official announcement was today, that Steve Lindbeck will run as a Democrat against Alaska's Republican Congressman for life (as some call him) Don Young.


2014
Republican Don Young Incumbent    51% 142,572
Democratic Forrest Dunbar                41% 114,602
Libertarian Jim McDermott                 7.6% 21,290
Write-in 0.5%                                                  1,277
Total Votes                                                  279,741


2012
Republican Don Young 63.9% 185,296
Democratic Sharon M. Cissna 28.6% 82,927
Libertarian Jim C. McDermott 5.2% 15,028
NA Ted Gianoutsos 1.9% 5,589
NA Write-in 0.3% 964
Total Votes 289,804


2014 and 2012 from Ballotopedia


2008
Berkowitz, Ethan A. DEM 142560 44.97%
Wright, Don R. AI 14274 4.50%
Young, Don E. REP 158939 50.14%
Write-in Votes 1205 0.38%
State Election results -


2006

BENSON, DIANE E. DEM           93879  40.01%
CRAWFORD, ALEXANDER LIB  4029    1.72%
INCE, EVA L. GRN                         1819    0.78%
RATIGAN, WILLIAM IMP             1615   0.69%
YOUNG, DON E. REP                 132743 56.57%
Write-in Votes                                     560    0.24%
Total Votes 234645
State of Alaska


2004
ANDERS, ALVIN A. LIB 7157 2.39%
HIGGINS, THOMAS M. DEM 67074 22.36%
YOUNG, DON E. REP 213216 71.07%
FELLER, TIMOTHY A. GRN 11434 3.81%
Write-in Votes 1115 0.37%
Total Votes 299996
State of Alaska


2002
YOUNG, DON REP 169685 74.51%
deFOREST, RUSSELL GRN 14435 6.34%
CLIFT, ROB LIB 3797 1.67%
GREENE, CLIFFORD DEM 39357 17.28%
Write-in Votes 451 0.20%
Total Votes 227725

State of Alaska

2000

GREENE, CLIFFORD DEM 45372 16.54%
DORE, JIM AI 10085 3.68%
KARPINSKI, LEONARD LIB 4802 1.75%
YOUNG, ANNA C. GRN 22440 8.18%
YOUNG, DON E. REP 190862 69.56%
Write-in Votes 832 0.30%
Total Votes 274393
State of Alaska


1998
YOUNG, DON REP 139676 62.55%
DUNCAN, JIM DEM 77232 34.59%
GRAMES, JOHN GRN 5923 2.65%
Write-in Votes 469 0.21%

Total Votes 223300

State of Alaska



1996
GRAMES, JOHN J. G. G 4513 1.9|
LINCOLN, GEORGIANNA D 85114 36.4|
NEMEC, WILLIAM J., II AI 5017 2.1|
YOUNG, DON R 138834 59.4|
Writein Votes 222 0.1
State of Alaska

1994
CANDIDATE PARTY VOTES PERCENTAGE
Tony Smith (D) 68,172 32.7%
Jonni Whitmore (G) 21,277 10.2%
Don Young (R) 118,537 56.9%
Write-Ins -- 254 0.1%
State of Alaska

1992
Devens, John D 102,378 42.8%
Milligan, Mike G 9,529 3.9
States, Michael A 15,049 6.2
Young, Don R 111,849 46.7
Writein votes 311 0.1
State of Alaska

1990
Devens, John S D 91,677 47.8%
Young, Don R 99,003 51.6%
State of Alaska 1990

1988
Gruenstein, Peter D 71,881 37.2%
Young, Don R 120,595 62.4%
State of Alaska 1988


1986

Begich, Pegge D                       74,053    41%
Breck, Betty  (Belle Blue)L        4,182 2.       3%
Young, Don R                         101,799     56.4%
State of Alaska 1986



1984
Begich, Pegge D 86,052
Breck, Betty N 6,508
Young, Don R 113,582
State of Alaska 1984


1982
Dave Carlson D 52,011
Young Don R 128,274
State of Alaska 1982


1980
Parnell, Kevin D 39,922
Young, Don R 114,089
State of Alaska 1980


1978
Rodey, Patrick D 55,176
Young, Don R 61,811
State of Alaska 1978


1976
Hobson, Eben D 34,194
Young, Don R 83,722
State of Alaska 1976


1974
Hensley Willie 44,280 46.2%
Young 51,641 53.8%
State of Alaska

1972
Begich D 53,651
Young R 41,750
State of Alaska

Understanding Trump Voters: Look At Advice On Why Women Choose Bad Boys

For some Trump supporters (as it was with some Obama supporters) this is more like a romance than an election.  So I thought it might be helpful to go to some advice on relationships for help understanding at least a portion of the Trump supporters.  

Financial Samurai had a post on "Why Do Women Go Out With Deadbeat Losers?"

My theory is that in the beginning, most women don’t know the guy is a deadbeat loser. He probably is reasonably attractive and tells a good story about his current situation and his ambitions. Obviously, he will be on his best behavior during the wooing process. It might take one week, or it might take many months, but until a consummation is made, guys can be very charming! By the time a woman hooks up with the guy, only afterward will she see his true colors. 

Quora had a forum that asked: "Why is it that girls often choose the wrong guy as their boyfriend, although the right person always stood by her?"  I'd note that many assumed the question was from the 'right person' and challenged his perception of who was the right guy.  But there were others who assumed girls do often pick the wrong guy. Here are a few excerpts from some of the responses:

From Luis Garcia on Quora:

• When they are teens, girls aren't mature enough to make good choices, so they get impressed by superficial things, like a car or an expensive date. 
•  Teens are much more affected than mature women by hormones. So they go for the wrong guy just because they're more physically attracted to him. 
•  Teens are rebellious, and girls might go out with the wrong guy precisely because they're parents told them that he is the wrong guy.  [I think this may explain a lot of Trump supporters]
•  Teens are subject to peer pressure, so they might go out with the wrong guy just to be seen as "cool" by their peers.

From Anonymous on Quora:

"Humans tend to be attracted to status, which has to do with hierarchy and not morals.  Although we should base our choice of mates on their ability to do right by us,  most people cannot help but be swayed by public opinion or social status.  Maybe it is ego and maybe it is an instinctual search for a stronger gene pool.
Here are the high-status indicators that will trump good morals almost every time:

• Acting like you are good at doing things.
• Acting like you know what you are doing.
• Acting like you are not afraid.
• Acting like you know important stuff.
• Acting like you have or will have money.
• Good social skills.

None of these indicators in any way relate to being a good romantic partner, but these are the standards which many people use.  The real question may be:  Why would a person imagine they could achieve happiness with someone who chooses status over substance?"

Peter Kemau on Quora:   (He even takes the dynamic to the political realm.)

I'm going to assume that the wrong guy here is the infamous  "bad boy" character. If you really think about it, it has to do with instinct. For women with no experience of a bad relationship, the allure and charm of the bad boy is irresistible. There is something about someone who has confidence, arrogance and an outgoing attitude. Most politicians do, that's why they are able to mass-seduce,  spiritual/religious leaders too. They can make most people believe in them even though their intentions are not particularly honest. 

 Aysha Griffen on Quora offers a different insight:

Often, we are attracted to those who can help us heal a deep childhood wound by letting us play out a similar dynamic, in the hope of redeeming it. This is all unconscious, and usually ends in us rewounding ourself because no one can give us the love or make up for the wounding, except our own conscious self-love. 

Wintery Knight takes what he calls a Christian look at why women choose weak men.  Good Christian men, he posits, will require more from their mates.

"Sometimes a really good man places moral and spiritual obligations on a Christian woman that require her to improve and grow, in order to help him with his life plan. Also, men flourish when a woman encourages him, recognizes him, supports him in his male roles. A good man who has definite ideas on what counts as good behavior may expect more from a woman, and those moral obligations can get in the way of her selfish pursuit of happiness."

So the women fear they won't live up to his expectations, according to Wintery Knight, and they'll be abandoned.  Thus weak men are a safer choice because they are easier to blame and control.

"Let me explain some other reasons why a Christian woman might prefer to have a weaker, non-Christian man: 

1. A woman may prefer to blame a man in order to rationalize her selfish actions, and an immoral man is easier to blame. 
2. A woman may prefer to blame a man in order to punish him for some real or imagined crime, and an immoral man is easier to blame. 
3. A woman may want to avoid moral obligations to a man, and a weaker man is easier for her to control. (e.g. – using pre-marital sex in order to avoid having to love a man self-sacrificially) 
4. A woman may need to avoid being judged or led morally by a man, so she prefers a man who is weak at morality and moral reasoning. 
5. A woman may need to avoid being judged or led spiritually by a man, so she prefers a man who is weak at theology and apologetics. 

So, it’s not that the poor, sweet, innocent women are helpless victims of nasty, evil, brutish man-beasts, at all. Far from it. Some of them DELIBERATELY CHOOSE to pass up the best Biblical Christian men, because they fear rejection or moral judgment or loss of control, and/or they want to avoid moral obligations to men that may interfere with their selfishness."

We've all known people who hooked up with the wrong romantic partner despite all the warnings from their best friends.  It sort of feels like that with Trump supporters.  The more you point out his flaws, the stronger they defend him.

Extrovert Advantage For Presidential Candidates, Introvert Advantages For President

Lots of factors that affect who gets elected president in the United States.  One, that seems to have a disproportionate impact, is the introversion/extroversion factor.  It's no surprise to anyone if I say that Hillary Clinton is much more introverted than Donald Trump.

And it's an issue important enough that a Rasmussen Reports survey actually asks people which candidate they'd rather have a beer with.  And it's not surprising that Trump comes out ahead.  (The large lead with men overcomes the small lead Clinton has with women on this question.)

Reading below, keep in mind that all bifurcations can grossly oversimplify and that people fall somewhere on a continuum from very introverted to very extroverted.  And I've just picked a list of characteristics I found online that seemed consistent with other things I've read on this.  The list was aimed at introversion and extroversion advantages at work.

As you go through the list, you'll probably quibble about the description as it applies to either Trump or Clinton.  For instance, in the Extroverts column, "have excellent communication and verbal skills.' I would say that Trump is very fluid and quick on his feet when talking, though I'm not sure that always translates to 'excellent communication.'

Basically, the extrovert sounds more comfortable speaking to strangers and crowds.  And for many, that translates into more honest, more genuine.  They are more comfortable coming up to strangers and talking because they can talk at that superficial level that one uses until you get a better comfort level with someone.  Introverts tend to hate 'small-talk."  They want to talk about serious stuff.  And, at least theoretically, people think more of people who think deeply.  I get lots of hits still on a 2011 post about the Eleanor Roosevelt quote "Great minds discuss ideas, average minds discuss events, small minds discuss people."


For the extrovert, talking is about connecting with other people more than about the content.

For the introvert, talking is about the content more than connecting with other people.  

So here's the list I got from My Star Job:

Introverts

Extroverts

Care about their job and their organisation  Concentrate well in quiet atmospheres  May know more than they reveal  Have very good attention to details  Love to handle long and complex problems  May seem aloof and quiet  Dislike interruptions and intrusions  Work well with little supervision  Always think and reflect before taking action  Do not like to attract attention to themselves

Always keep abreast of what is happening at work  Formulate good ideas through discussions and interactions  Socialise and network well  Have excellent communication and verbal skills  Love to be a part of everything  Get bored and impatient when work gets slow and repetitive Are fantastic at marketing themselves and their organisation  Thrive on attention · Are good at multi-tasking  Respond quickly to requests and always aim to find quick solutions

I think the best candidate AND the best president is balanced enough to be able to at least act as an extrovert and as an introvert as the occasion warrants.  But I also think most people are more comfortable with extroverts than with introverts.  And that seems to be the consensus.

Susan Cain's book Quiet:The Power of Introverts, reports her research on the topic.  Cain identifies many ways that our society encourages extroversion over introversion.  One example she gives is being pressured to put away her book and join the group activities at summer camp.  Our society is biased to favor extroverts.  From Ted Talks blog:

"That bias, she claims, is everyone’s loss. While the world certainly need extroverts, it also needs introverts doing what they do best. It’s a bias that has no name. To understand it, we need to understand that introversion isn’t about not being social, it’s not being shy, it’s about how someone responds to stimulation. While extroverts crave social interaction, introverts are much more alive while they’re alone. Cain brings in her thesis with the insight that, 'The key to maximizing talents is to put yourself into the zone of stimulation that’s right for you.'”

When we consider our current presidential campaign and the debates, I'd suggest we include in our discussions of the candidates, this factor of introversion and extroversion.

Clearly Trump is a raging extrovert - so much so that it's something of a problem.  But Clinton is definitely an introvert who, as a candidate, is forced to act in an extrovert role.  That's why she doesn't seem genuine, because she can't be her natural self while campaigning.  And all the time in front of crowds of people surely is taking its toll on her energy level.  As an introvert, she needs quiet alone time to recharge.  So our American bias against introverts hurts people's perception of Clinton.  It's even worse than it was for someone like Romney (also an introvert) because women are expected to be extroverts more than men are.

For those struggling to understand how Trump is still statistically in the presidential race, this is clearly a factor, and one we should be talking about.

(Though the years of right wing media attacks and congressional hearings on Benghazi and on emails have also had their effect in making people feel Clinton is more dishonest than past candidates for president. )

"Replumbing Permanent Fund doesn't create more water" or Nerd Nite Alaska Budget AND Facial v Verbal Portrait

I went to the Nerd Nite beer and budget meeting last night.  Before I get into that I'd like to offer you a 'how you know' things test.  Regular readers know I'm fascinated by how people come to 'know' things - like what's true, how the world works, how we draw conclusions about people, etc.  All the kinds of things that underlie everything we know and how we act on things.  If everyone were self-aware of all these things would, society would be radically different.  And as we watch this event known as a presidential election, it's clear that all of these things impact what voters take from media coverage, images, words, etc.

So let's do an experiment

I want you to look at the verbal portrait I've made of someone.  And as you read it, I want you to be aware of the images you have of this person.  I don't want you to work at imagining the person.  Rather I want the image(s) that your unconscious creates.  What do you see?  Is it one image?  Does it change as you read more?  At the end is there an image of this person - a face?  a stature?  a voice?
Again, don't think, just capture the image that your brain generates on its own.

Got your image?  OK.  Stash it away until later in the post.

The 49th State Brewing Company is in the old Snow Goose building, which was the Elks Club built in 1918.  (The chandelier in this room is adorned, still, with elk antlers.)   This was an evening of state budget policy with three speakers who have been intimately involved in the topics they took on.

You can see that the room was packed.  Probably 400 or more people to hear about:

1. the origins of the Permanent Fund Dividend (Cliff Groh)
2. the trade offs between cutting the budget and raising revenue (including dipping into the Permanent Fund, various taxes, and oil taxes and subsidies) (Larry Persily)
3. how the oil subsidies work (Dan Dickinson)

There was beer and snacks for sale as a standing room only crowd hung around for two plus hours of policy.  It was a mix of ages, but I would guess most were under 40 which is a different demographic than I've seen at talks on similar topics in Anchorage in the past.  Having beer instead of coffee probably helped.

Groh went back to the debates between the Hickel view (the owner state) and the Hammond view (the people as individuals having a share in the state's wealth) and other reasons for and against having the dividend.  Groh's position was more as a reporter than an advocate.

Persily didn't pretend to be neutral as he discussed the income options open to the state because cutting the budget alone simply won't balance the budget.  He favored taking a part of Permanent Fund earnings (cutting into the dividend), income taxes, changing the oil subsidies.  When an audience member pointed out that cutting the dividend was the most regressive option, Persily didn't disagree, but said including an income tax would balance this by getting the most from those with the largest earnings.  

After each speaker, there was a five minute beer break, so instead of leaving before the third speaker, the audience was fairly mellow.  

Dickinson discussed how the oil and gas credits worked.  Some are related to production, some are intended as incentives to investment in exploration.  They can give companies a huge return - combining can lead to a maximum of 85% return on investment.  But the graphs he had of revenue show a steady decline since these credits have gone into place.  But he pointed out, in response to a question about why we keep funding companies that go bankrupt instead of producing, that usually a new company takes over what the last company did and they keep production going.  He also pointed out that now when companies submit for their credits, instead of taking the money themselves, they often assign it to the financial institutions that gave them their initial loans.  

A key bit of information I learned was that the law doesn't actually guarantee the state will pay the credits.  There's a clause that says something like "if the legislature appropriates funds."  So, he said, if the state didn't pay the credits because there was no money allocated for them, the state wouldn't be violating any laws.  And, in fact, he said by the end of the year forecasters predicted companies would be submitting for about $1 billion in credits.  The legislature allocated about $460 million (not exactly certain of the number) and the governor vetoed all but $30 million of that.  

All three of the speakers, as I said, worked for the state on the issues they discussed.  They knew their stuff cold and their presentations were lively and interesting.  A good way to get this stuff.

Now, back to the verbal image above.  Which of the images below comes closest to the image your head conjured up?

#1	Image Source #2	#3
#4	Image Source #5	Image Source #6

Be honest with yourself.  Which is closest to your image?

What's the point of all this?  When I got home and looked at the picture I had taken, I realized the visual just didn't convey the depth of work and experience I had learned this person had.  It made me realize how much I still - despite my efforts not to - make assumptions about people based on what they look like.  Despite my admonition to myself to treat people I meet as though they will be the president of the US in 15 or 20 years, but no one knows it yet.  Or as though they have won a Nobel Prize or in some other way are highly distinguished and interesting.

For non-Alaskans and for non-political Alaskans, these are the six certified candidates listed in the US Senate race today at the Alaska Division of Elections.  #1 is Joe Miller who recently replaced the Libertarian candidate who withdrew.  #2 is Breck Craig.  #3 is Margaret Stock.  #4 is Lisa Murkowski.  #5 is Ted Gianoutsos.  #6 is Ray Metcalfe.  The one whose bio is briefly summarized in the top image is #3 Margaret Stock.  The info comes from her campaign website.  I met her for the first time last night at Nerd Nite.

"Look, if African Americans voted overwhelmingly Republican, they would have kept early voting right where it was,” Wrenn said. “It wasn’t about discriminating against African Americans. They just ended up in the middle of it because they vote Democrat.'”

The point of this post relates to comments by a North Carolina Republican consultant about whether the changes in North Carolina voting rules were racist or not.  That's down near the bottom.  First is background to the quote.

Background of the Quote

A long Washington Post article by William Wan documents how the North Carolina Republican majority in the state legislature passed new voting laws that set up significant barriers to voting, mainly by African-Americans.  They changed what voter id could be used, shortened early voting including a Sunday when African-American churches helped their members vote early.  The reduced the hours polls would be open, even specifically saying that polls could not accommodate people who had waited in long lines prior to closing time.  At the same time the reduced the number of polling places in African-American neighborhoods, assuring that there would be long lines of people shut out when it was closing time.

The bill had been much more modest when it was passed by the state house and sat in the senate until a few days before the legislature adjourned.  The magic date was June 23, 2013 when the US Supreme Court in Shelby v. Holder ruled that Chapter 5 of the Voting Rights Act no longer was valid.  This act required that some identified states (including Alaska) were no longer required to have their redistricting plans and changes in the voting laws pre-approved by the Department of Justice.  I remember that well, because I was blogging the Alaska Redistricting Board and it was a big deal for them.

Once the word came out that Justice Department approval was no longer necessary, according to the article,  the North Carolina senate added a bunch of new voting barriers to blacks, held 20 minutes of public hearings, passed the law, and sent it back to the house which also passed it in record time.

And then they were sued.   A Federal District Court judge upheld the law, but the three judge panel of the 4th Circuit US Court of Appeals overturned his decision,

"calling it “the most restrictive voting law North Carolina has seen since the era of Jim Crow.” Drawing from the emails and other evidence, the 83-page ruling charged that Republican lawmakers had targeted “African Americans with almost surgical precision.”  

(The District Court judge was a Republican, the panel were all Democrats.)

The governor asked the Supreme Court to reinstate the voting restrictions in the new law stating it was too close to the election to change things.  But last week the Scalia-less US Supreme Court was deadlocked four to four, thus letting stand the Appeal Court's ruling.

Throughout the article the reporter quotes Republican legislators as saying the changes were made to prevent voter fraud, despite emails that came out in court where legislators and their staff were asking for specific information on black voters - the kinds of id they used; how many voted early; how many were university students, etc.  And despite the fact that there were only two cases of in-person voter fraud referred to a district attorney from 40 million votes cast from 2000 to 2012.


The Quote

"Longtime Republican consultant Carter Wrenn, a fixture in North Carolina politics, said the GOP’s voter fraud argument is nothing more than an excuse. “'Of course it’s political. Why else would you do it?' he said, explaining that Republicans, like any political party, want to protect their majority. While GOP lawmakers might have passed the law to suppress some voters, Wrenn said, that does not mean it was racist. 'Look, if African Americans voted overwhelmingly Republican, they would have kept early voting right where it was,” Wrenn said. “It wasn’t about discriminating against African Americans. They just ended up in the middle of it because they vote Democrat.'”

My Response:

1. Democracy is about the will of the people.  Any voter suppression, whether it be of African-Americans or Democrats is wrong.  Winning elections by preventing people from voting violates the spirit of American democracy.  
1. So Wrenn's admission that it was political (and not about voter fraud) exposes the Republicans' lies.  
2. His admission that what they did was voter suppression of Democrats, not African Americans acknowledges the voter suppression.
3. It's possible that shifting it from suppression of Democrats rather than African-Americans may be a ploy to avoid problems with the Voting Rights Act which, as I understand it, is aimed at preventing suppression of minority voters, not parties.  
2. The majority opinion of the Supreme Court's Shelby v. Holder decision focused on the idea that the list of states required by the Voting Rights Act to submit changes for pre-approval was a relic of history and that conditions had changed.  The Court said, knowing it wouldn't happen given the deadlocks in the legislature, that Congress could pass new standards that better the states with the problems requiring pre-clearance of voting changes.    
1. North Carolina's action, taken days after the Shelby decision demonstrate that, at the very least, nothing really had changed in this area in North Carolina.  
3. The fact that changes were aimed at African-American districts, not white Democratic districts, also undermines Wrenn's comments.
1. According to FactCheck African-Americans were only 38% of the registered Democrats in 2006.  That left the rest, mostly white, with some Latinos.  
2. It may be that because of housing segregation, and economic conditions that make it harder for African-Americans to get off work to get proper ID and to vote during the day, that it was easier to target blacks.  But the result is the suppression of the black voice in North Carolina politics.  

I'd note that the Alaska Dispatch News has been posting a number of important investigative reports from national media.  And I'd guess, important as they are, most people find it easier to read about the latest Trump insults, than to tackle a longer story that requires some thinking.  Not my readers, of course.  

Reports in recent days have included:

How spy tech firms let governments see everything on a smartphone
Tobacco industry works to block federal rules on e-cigarettes   (NYTimes online headline different from ADN print headline)
Flawed missile system produces $2 billion in bonuses
Exxon ignores near-term glut to play liquefied gas long game

Voting Should Be Like Brushing Your Teeth

You just do it every morning and night.  Because it's such an ingrained habit, you don't skip brushing.  It's like putting the key in the ignition, part of the routine that happens automatically.

For Alaskans, primary day is Tuesday.  Many of us have already brushed early, but the polls will close Tuesday night at 8pm.  There wasn't a lot on my ballot - US House and Senate primary choices, but my state rep was unopposed.  But, like brushing teeth, you just do it automatically come election time.

But like every metaphor, parts work and parts don't.  There's more thinking and preparation involved in voting.  If you don't brush, it's your teeth and gums that suffer.  If you don't vote intelligently it's your whole community that suffers.

And like brushing, just voting alone is not enough.  Flossing is important.  So is diet.  And learning about the candidates, supporting good ones with money, labor, yard signs are all important parts of healthy electoral hygiene.


[On other matters, it's been several days since Feedburner last worked for this blog and put my posts on other blogrolls.  For those of you who get here from other blogs here are some of the posts that didn't make it:

Mushrooms And Other Signs of Rain
Walkable Cities Circa 1669
If Women Relate Their Own Gender Battles To Clinton's, She Wins Big 
Man Goes 
Who Invented Inflatable Tube Guys?]

If Women Relate Their Own Gender Battles To Clinton's, She Wins Big

I keep reading polls that say Clinton is only slightly less disliked than her opponent.  When I look at her opponent's records, this makes no sense to me.  When people believe something that makes no sense to me, I search for some explanation.  In this case, my tentative conclusion is sexism and the Right's smear machine that spearheaded campaigns like the Swiftboating campaign against Kerry.
The point of this post is simple:  If women can see the crap that Clinton is taking because she's a woman and relate it to the crap they take in their lives, Clinton can't lose.  The rest explains my thinking here.


Before the industrial revolution, there tended to be two worlds - the public world where men could go when they overcame the biological survival needs.   The women stayed in the private world.  As Europe evolved and with the arrival of the industrial revolution, women began moving out into the men's world.  Some jobs were almost exclusively reserved for women - sewing in factories, nursing, elementary school teaching.  But whenever women ventured into male domains - in the crafts, in factories, in higher education, in the professions - they were second class citizens.  There's so much documentation on this it seems unnecessary to provide links.  One example I recently read was  Barbara Goldsmith's biography of Marie Curie Obsessive Genius.   In it she documents all the ways that Curie had to fight against barriers that kept women out of science.  They weren't allowed in the best schools. (Her father taught her and hired tutors.)  They weren't accepted into the universities.  They didn't get appointments to academic posts.  Their work was belittled.

Deborah Tannen's  Talking 9 to 5  examines the  how the language of men and women use differs, and how this disadvantages women in male dominated settings.  She also talks about norming - how the white male is the norm in the US and in male dominated organizations.  As people differ from that norm (less masculine men, women, people of color) they stand out as lesser.  But as women, say, try to be more like the norm they become less 'feminine' and they get criticized for that as well.  And this seems to be a lot of Clinton's image problem - she's a woman trying to fit a role traditionally limited to men.  She doesn't fit as a man, but as she tries, she doesn't feel right as a woman to many either.  

Sexism is often hard to prove.  Often employees have been forbidden to talk about salaries so women don't know that their male colleagues get significantly more for the same work.  And women usually didn't have more than their own anecdotal experience.  But here is one study cited in Scientific American that does give proof of what I'm talking about:

"research from Yale . . . had scientists presented with application materials from a student applying for a lab manager position and who intended to go on to graduate school. Half the scientists were given the application with a male name attached, and half were given the exact same application with a female name attached. Results found that the “female” applicants were rated significantly lower than the “males” in competence, hireability, and whether the scientist would be willing to mentor the student."

Another example is powerful men taking sexual advantage of less powerful women.   The Roger Ailes case is just the most recent.  Significant here is how long this went on and all the pressure on women not to say anything.  And the pressure of those inside Fox not to challenge the all powerful boss who was accused, not to mention the network of other men who took advantage.

So most women understand what they're up against.  They've all experienced this in some realm of their life.  If they are lucky, they've been able to live in a relative safe bubble where it didn't happen often, but the more they ventured out of the small protected group, or up in an organization, the more likely they were to face obstacles.  And there is no question that men deal with crap from male competitors within organizations as well, but being beaten by a woman is worse than being beaten by a man.  Being reprimanded by a woman is much worse than being reprimanded by a man.

There's no other explanation I can see that explains her negative perception.  OK, she's more a wonk and her work is her life.  But so were Dukakis, Gore, and Romney and their ratings were much higher.  She has issues in her past, but that's been true of every high level candidate.  But men can be wonks in our society, but women should be warm and fuzzy.  That's changing, but given the polling numbers, lots of folks haven't made that move yet.

Reagan got the Iranians to keep the hostages until he was elected* then did the arms for hostages deal with Iran.   That wasn't a problem, but Clinton's emails are a problem?  Give me a break. Benghazi and email are manufactured problems, that in the larger scheme of things are trivial.  They aren't venal, and no serious damage has been proven.  If they want to talk about civilian deaths due to drone strikes, then that's a different issue.  But they don't care about dead foreigners.  Issues about Clinton's close ties to Wall Street are problematic, but few politicians get to her level without having a number of difficult connections.  They should be talked about.  But compared to her opponent, well, there's just no comparison.

Sure, it's more than just a woman thing.  It's also about winning the presidency and all the power that gives to one faction or the other.  But the fact that Clinton's a woman is being exploited by her opponents.  That's the very definition of sexism.

So, if Clinton can figure out how to get most women voters in the US to see that her negative ratings are a result, to a great extent, of our culture's inherent sexism, the same kind of sexism they deal with daily,  then Clinton will win big.   Especially if the women then explain it all to their fathers, brothers, sons, and husbands.  Tell them the stories of the harassment they deal with daily, the stories they don't usually share because, because it doesn't seem worth the trouble.

Loussac Update And Vote

Went by Loussac library while doing errands. It keeps changing.  Here's are some shots at other stages.

If it isn't obvious, I photoshopped the sign into the main picture (which was through the chainlink fence.)  The sign says it's scheduled to be finished by October 24 this year.

I also voted on this ride.  We're headed out of town the day before the primary, so I decided to do my duty today since it was on my roundabout path to get things done.

You can vote early various places.  Voting on Gamble meant I didn't have to fill out all the forms I've had to fill out when I voted at the library.  It was pretty empty and there was no wait at all.  And I joked as I showed my ID about how often I was going to vote.  The lady said a number of folks had mentioned it.  But, she said, in Alaska, if you don't use a picture id or your voter registration card, then your ballot goes into a special envelope and doesn't get counted until after the election when they can check if you voted more than once.  So, there is an easy way to deal with that sort of voter fraud.   Even remote provinces like Alaska can figure it out.

Then I rode the bike trail around Goose Lake to drop off some books at the UAA library and check out the new books shelf.  I'll post some of the new books in the next post or two.

The Trump Shooter Network

[Note:  In a USA Today interview, Doonesbury creator Garry Trudeau, when asked if Trump was easy to satirize, responded:

"Quite the opposite. As has been widely observed, Trump is beyond traditional parody. His demeanor, speech and behavior are so over the top, there's no point in trying to exaggerate it"

This post is a response to that challenge.]

The Trump Shooter Network 

Confidential sources high in the Trump business empire have leaked to us news about a new cable channel that will begin airing in early October called "The Trump Shooter Network."

The network will feature the latest shootings from around the world, but with a focus on the USA.  Aside from "Breaking Shooting News,"  the network will have daily programs on mass shootings, terrorist shootings, robbery shootings, gang shootings, accidental shootings (particularly those involving children),  suicide shootings, and shooting games.
There will also be a program of  best home video of shootings.
Mass shooting anniversaries will be celebrated.
There will also be features on the lives of shooters and their victims.  And detailed reports on the specific types of guns used in shootings.

The network will have a mass shooting calendar so that mass shooters can plan their activities on days that don't have other mass shootings.

Subscribers to the Shooter Network will automatically be enrolled in the NRA and will be eligible for  steep discounts at gun shops and gun shows.

They can also sign up for gun buyers' pre-check so they can always use the fast line when purchasing weapons.

When asked about whether the timing of the debut of this network was aimed at affecting the election, our source said, "Actually, Trump's presidential run was timed to support the rollout of the network."

A spokesperson for the Coalition to Stop Gun Violence said they were hopeful the channel would make it easier to track gun violence data.  An NRA rep told us the channel would help Americans understand the danger all around them and the need to arm themselves.  And a staffer at Negative Population Growth, lamented that this was the natural outgrowth of too many people fighting for finite resources.  

Media reporter Brooke Gladstone didn't think the channel would be a big deal, "After all, the mainstream media are close to doing this already."

Putting The Putin Puzzle Pieces Together

Original image (pre-puzzle) from Esquire

The way I see it, Putin is on a roll.

He's kept Asad in Syria.  He's helped send half the population out of Syria, many as refugees to Europe, where the sheer number of them is straining Europe's capacity to handle them.  And it's straining Europe's ability to work together.  His machinations probably helped the Brexit vote.

And all that means that Europe's attention is on refugees and [not on] their ability to monitor and respond to his interference in former Soviet nations.

I have little doubt that the Russian government is doing what it can to help recruit young men in Europe and the US to commit terrorist acts.  He's probably not directly supporting ISIS, since Russia's had its own issues and terrorists out of Chechnya, but he surely benefits, in the short term anyway, from a European population that is more focused on internal threats than Russian threats.

His fingerprints are reported to be on the hacked emails of the Democratic National Headquarters and we don't know how else he's working to get the Republican nominee for president elected.

And there is always the very real possibility of someone electronically stealing votes.  I've been assured that our Alaska machines aren't internet connected, so it's unlikely the Russian's will mess with our election.  And we do have hard copies of all ballots to compare the results against, but that only happens when there's a challenge, and the challengers have to pay for the hand count.  But any system that's connected to the internet is very vulnerable.  Here's more on these topics.


Back in December, Putin praised Trump:

"He is a bright and talented person without any doubt," Putin said, adding that Trump is "an outstanding and talented personality."

And in an interview Trump seemed to eat it up:

BRZEZINSKI: Do you like Vladimir Putin's comments about you?
TRUMP: Sure. When people call you brilliant it's always good, especially when the person heads up Russia.

[Note:  Putin said 'bright and talented' but Trump heard 'brilliant.']

Remember back what George W. Bush said about Putin? (From ABC News)

"I looked the man in the eye. I found him to be very straight forward and trustworthy and we had a very good dialogue," Bush said according a BBC account. "I was able to get a sense of his soul.

I suspect Bush's ability to assess someone's character is better than Trump's, yet his assessment was totally off.

While I was looking for that quote, I also found this one from Joe Biden in the same article:

Biden recalled visiting Putin at the Kremlin in 2011: "I had an interpreter, and when he was showing me his office I said, 'It's amazing what capitalism will do, won't it? A magnificent office!' And he laughed. As I turned, I was this close to him." Biden held his hand a few inches from his nose. "I said, 'Mr. Prime Minister, I'm looking into your eyes, and I don't think you have a soul.' " 

"You said that?" I asked. It sounded like a movie line. 

"Absolutely, positively," Biden said, and continued, "And he looked back at me, and he smiled, and he said, 'We understand one another.' " Biden sat back, and said, "This is who this guy is!"

I'm guessing this is a joke off of Bush's encounter rather than an serious account of the Biden-Putin exchange.

But there are people who have studied Putin.  Several years ago, a friend lent me  a Putin biography  called "THE MAN WITHOUT A FACE:  The Unlikely Rise of Vladimir Putin" by Masha Gessen, a journalist who holds both US and Russian passports.  From a Washington Post book review:

"Most prominent politicians had abandoned Yeltsin, and the remaining prospects were “all plain men in gray suits.” Boris Berezovsky, the wealthy oligarch and ambitious power broker who was close to Yeltsin’s team, personally recruited the largely unknown Putin, thinking he would be pliable. “Possibly the most bizarre fact about Putin’s ascent to power,” Gessen says, “is that the people who lifted him to the throne knew little more about him than you do. . . . Everyone could invest this gray, ordinary man with what they wanted to see in him.”

What Gessen sees in Putin is a troubled childhood brawler who became a paper-pushing KGB man and, by improbable twists and turns, rose to the top in Russia. He grew up fighting in the courtyards of St. Petersburg apartments. He became “a consistently rash, physically violent man with a barely containable temper.” When studying at a KGB academy, he once got into a fight on a subway when someone picked on him. On the day of his inauguration in 2000, Putin’s stiff gait was “the manner of a person who executes all his public acts mechanically and reluctantly, projecting both extreme guard and extreme aggression with every step.” Putin, she concludes, is a “hoodlum turned iron-handed ruler.”

So far I'm just looking at puzzle pieces.  Some seem to fit together, but many don't yet, and others are missing.  So this is conjecture, but it's starting to feel chillingly probable.  Putin's destabilizing much of the world, including the US.  Trump may see Putin as just another narcissistic entrepreneur, but he's much, much more than that.  Russians play chess and he's half a dozen moves ahead of Trump.

[UPDATE July 26, 2016, 8:19pm:  Minutes after posting this, I opened Twitter and the first was a tweet linking to this article by Masha Gessen, responding to others comparing Trump to Putin or saying Trump was Putin's plant.  She doesn't agree.  And I want to be clear about what I was trying to say.  Not that Trump was, as someone wrote, 'the Siberian Candidate', or that he is a lot like Putin.  I was just saying that Trump would be more in Putin's interest (Gessen says Putin hates Clinton more than liking Trump).  And yes, there are similarities between Trump and Putin, but there are dissimilarities as well.]