Why Wait Till 2020, Let's Ask For An Annulment Of The Election

OK, so you're really drunk when you get married, and you really didn't know what you were doing and you married someone you didn't even know the person you married.   If you're Catholic, you can get an annulment.

So I was thinking the same should hold true for an election.  So I looked up the grounds for an annulment of a marriage in the Catholic church.  We could incorporate some of these as part of a constitutional amendment.

For example, the document I found starts like this:

Grounds for Marriage Annulment in the Catholic Church  There are very well defined canonical grounds for Marriage Annulment. Once these have been established marriage Annulment can proceed. It is important to understand the grounds for Marriage Annulment before making application, and if in doubt you should consult your local priest.

So what are some of the grounds that might apply here?

• Insufficient use of reason (Canon 1095, 10)
• Grave lack of discretionary judgment concerning essential matrimonial [presidential] rights and duties (Canon 1095, 20)
• Psychic-natured incapacity to assume marital [presidential] obligations (Canon 1095, 30)
• Ignorance about the nature of marriage [presidency] (Canon 1096, sec. 1)
• Error about a quality of a person (Canon 1097, sec. 2)
• Fear (1103)

I think most of my readers can figure out the logic one could use to argue most of these.  But there's one more that might need a little clarification because the metaphor is not perfect.  While the Catholics talk about marriage and then "you or your spouse", we're talking about the 'election' in part and the 'presidency' in part.  And the 'you' here is the 'voters' and the 'new president' is the spouse.  But after the election, we have to talk about the nature of the presidency.  

With that in mind, I offer one more ground for an annulment:

• Willful exclusion of marital [presidential] fidelity (Canon 1101, 12)

My thinking here is that the president thought he could take on the presidency and still keep his old partner (the Trump businesses).  I think that qualifies as willful exclusion of presidential fidelity.  He's just put his businesses in his sons' houses where he can sneak a visit any time he goes over for dinner.  

Boys' Life Explains What Makes A Good Leader - UPDATED

I had a chance to glance at the January 2017 Boys' Life magazine while waiting for my granddaughter at the doctor's office.  (Just a routine post birthday checkup.)

I sometimes forget about the huge impact the Boy Scouts had on my life.  The organization gave me lots of opportunities to go camping.  I got leadership training at Philmont in New Mexico and Sequoia National Park.  I learned how to plan, organize, and run a meeting as a teenager.  There are a lot of good skills I learned with them.

And I had a subscription to Boys' Life too.

But in recent times the Boy Scouts have had some issues with their stand against gay scouts that have cast an unfortunate (though not unjustified) cloud over the organizations.  So I paged through the magazine.

One of the first articles was an "Ask Pedro" column.  (I didn't find any old Boys' Life magazines in my mom's garage so I can check my memory, which thinks maybe Pedro was answering questions 60 years ago.)

Here's the way the head of the Boy Scouts describes the quality needed for leadership that's published in the January 2017 Boys' Life magazine.

"You want to be a leader others want to follow, and you always need to put the other person first."

The Boy Scouts is NOT a liberal organization by any stretch of the imagination.  As I thumbed through this issues 52 pages, I saw mostly white boys.  All group pictures were white kids.  There were two girls pictured.







The only faces of color were a kid with an Hispanic name who had helped clean up Louisiana after a flood,

and two dark skinned comic faces - one teaching a white kid how to compost, the other used to show how to make a balance board.      

























Most of the boys pictured looked like this.  I know there have to be black boy scouts, but they didn't have any actual photos of them.











There was also an ambiguous picture (another cartoon who was maybe Asian, maybe white, maybe Hispanic) who was identified as an electrical engineer. You can judge for yourself.  But given that "everyone knows Asians are good at math" . . .

The point here is that even the boy scouts -  known as a pretty conservative organization that seems to have trouble finding actual photos of kids of color, but makes an effort to include a few in Boys Life, even if they are cartoons, has a description of a leader that essential say Trump is not the Boy Scouts' image of a leader.

[UPDATE Jan 31, 2017 - The Boy Scouts announced yesterday that they are changing their policy to accept transgender scouts.

American People Are Starting To Fight Back

When FDR called for Americans of Japanese descent to be rounded up and put into camps, most Americans did nothing in protest.  A number took advantage of the situation to take possession of the property of those rounded up.  Though there were exceptions as the movie The Empty Chair documents.

But when Donald Trump ordered a ban on refugees and Muslims, American people went to the courts to file suit against the president, and they went to the airports to protest the holding of refugees and others held in airports from being sent back.

We've had presidents who have done things people disagreed about.  But we haven't had a president who ignores every tradition, every norm, every law, every norm of decency that interferes with his whims.  We've never had a president who has put into place so many people who have no regard for the basic values of the Constitution and the law.

We've watched this sort of thing happen in other countries, but we're only just learning how to handle someone who comes to power and abuses that power every day in his first week as president.  But we're learning.  I'm proud of the people who are finding their voice and their power to stop the illegitimate actions of this elderly child president.

There will be a backlash.  The real test is when people get hurt, even killed.  We all have to stand up and assume the role fate demands we play.  I hope we learn this quickly and well and that Congress sees where the power of the people lies and stops Trump before he carries out any of the orders he got from Putin*.

World, we want you to know we are planning on taking our country back from this madman.**



*If these aren't orders from Putin, they might as well be - take down NATO, take down the EU, weaken the US Intelligence Agencies, destroy US relations with countries like China, and, it appears more and more, take down the USA.

**I don't use this term lightly.  And the man who has called everyone who has opposed him all sorts of disparaging things, has not standing if he protests when people do the same to him - especially when they are close to or right on the mark.

Meanings of "Pay" - As In "Mexico Will Pay For The Wall"

There are two basic meanings in English of the word "PAY."

One is a free market sort of concept where people sees what they need or want, and voluntarily give someone the money for the product or service.

The other is a more sinister concept, more like retribution from someone who has the power to 'make you pay."  It's what the Mafia are said to do to knee caps.

So when Trump says the Mexicans will pay, one way or the other, it seems like demanding protection money.  Trump said he'd build a wall and get the Mexicans to pay.  Now he's trying to keep his promise to his angrier supporters, by demanding Mexico pay 'voluntarily' or, if not, he'll find some other way to punish them.

I do have to say here, that this is not new behavior by Americans toward foreign countries that didn't do as the US wanted.  The embargo of Cuba is an example.  But there have been many cases of clandestine retribution.   The difference today is that Trump says these things out loud.

AIFF2016: Suggestions for Next Year's Film Festival

Overall, the 2016 Festival went well.  There were lots of good films, lots of visiting film makers, and some nice extra touches - like music before some films.  On the opening night, for instance, the Alaska based band whose music was in the opening night film, played before the film.  That was some thoughtful planning.

But there are always improvements to be made and here is my list for next year.

1.  Scheduling -

This is my biggest issue.  Here are two guidelines I'd like the schedulers to strive to follow.


A.  Maximize number of films someone can see.  From one time slot to another, there should be enough time for viewers to get to any of the next films.   Here's an example of what I mean.  Below is the first Saturday morning schedule. ( I realize it's hard to see the details, but you can get the basics points.)

Top row (A,B,C,D) - films that began between 11:30am and 12.  The blue-green stars indicate how many of the four following films a viewer has enough time to get to.
Someone watching film B could get to four.
Someone watching A or C could get to three.
Someone watching D could only get to two.

The pea-green circles show the number of prior films from which one could get to  the next set of films (E, F, G, and H).

Why not schedule the end times and starting times so someone could get from any of the first four to any of the second four?  This also has to take into consideration walking distance between venues.

All it takes is paying attention to
a.  how long each program is
b.  adjusting the starting times (and thus the ending times) of A, B, C, and D 
c.  adjusting the starting times of E, F, G, and H

They didn't need big adjustments as the following image shows.  A few minutes this way and that.

By starting the longest showings of A, B, C, and D a little earlier and slightly adjusting the starting times of E, F, G, and H, the movie goers' options are greatly improved.  They can see ANY of the following four films from any of the previous four films.  And it can work for the next set of films (I, J, K, and L) as well.

If someone is trying to see two particular films, it's not possible if the two are playing in the same slot.  Festival goers understand they can't see every film.   But one shouldn't have conflicts between slots.  (Slot meaning here - all the films that are showing between, say, 11:30 and 1pm, and then 1:15 and 3pm, etc.)

B.  It should be easy to see the films in competition in each category.

Films in competition are the ones the reviewers thought were the best.  I haven't always agreed, but overall, that's a good guide for picking out better films in a very crowded, generally unknown field.  So it should be easy to find and to watch the films in competition in each category.

For feature length films 

a.  they shouldn't be shown at the same time
b.  they should be marked as films in competition so it's easy to identify them
c.  as much as possible, feature length docs and features, shouldn't play at the same time

Shorts and supershorts
These are more complicated because they are shown in programs with other films.

a.  put as many shorts in competition together in the same program as possible
b.  don't have orphans - just one film in competition in any program
c.  put the films in competition at the beginning or end so someone doesn't have to sit through the whole program to catch them
d.  show more of the short, particularly the short shorts, before feature length films - this year, for example, "Arrival" was shown on GayLa night before "Real Boy."
e.  pay attention to which films are repeated in different showings - there were some shorts I saw three or four times and others I never got to see

2.  Other Issues 

Indicate Films in Competition in the list of selected films on the website
This has been the usual practice, but this year this was only done for the Docs and Short Docs.  There was a place for them to be marked, but they just weren't.  Even though the festival was notified in advance, it didn't get done.  Aside from alerting viewers, it's important information that verifies what a film maker says about her film.

Memberships - I don't know how many people are aware of AIFF memberships, what they mean, and what benefits members get. (I don't.)  Membership is not pushed on the website or at the festival.  I suspect more people would join if it were pushed a little.

Locations
49th Brewery basement room - all seats are at the same level and the screen isn't elevated so it is hard to see films,  particularly those with subtitles.  On weekend nights there was a lot of noise from nearby rooms.  Having food available is good.

Alaska Experience Small Theater - temperature regular goes from cold to hot to cold to hot.  If you sit under a vent it's really bad.  Also latecomers have to walk in at the front and opening the door lights up the screen.  Otherwise, it's a cozy little theater.

When scheduling, remember that it probably takes about ten minutes to get from the Brewery to the Alaska Experience and another ten or so to the museum.

Award titles - get them consistent
  Generally, the awards have been titled:  Winner, First Runner Up, and Honorable Mention.  But at least one of the announcers at the Awards ceremonies used other names, like Winner, Second Place, and Third Place.  I'm not sure the official names are the best.  Would someone not associated with the festival who hears "Honorable Mention" realize this is a third place honor?  It might be useful for the board to consider what names they want to use.  And then get everyone to use them consistently.

World Premiers - Mark any films that are world or North American premiers in the schedule, online, and announce it before the film is shown.

Computer Instructions  -  The audience shouldn't have to see the projectionist's computer screen.  It happened often enough - particularly at the Alaska Experience Theater - to be something worth mentioning here.



All that said, I think this was one of the better run festivals.  The volunteers were great - helpful, cheery, thinking on their feet.   The festival remains low key and, from what I hear from the film makers, one of the most hospitable festivals around.

This Video Overview Succinctly But Thoroughly Explains Redistricting And Gerrymandering In The USA

I watched a video today which spells out very clearly and accurately the electoral problems in the US based on our redistricting process.  (It's below.)

I say this as someone who knows a little bit about redistricting

I blogged the Alaska Redistricting Board that met from 2011 through 2013.  I learned a lot about redistricting both in the Alaska and in the US.

Among the things I learned (and are echoed in the video):

• Whoever controls the state governorships and legislatures generally gets control of redrawing the maps.  That includes the congressional districts (this doesn't matter in states like Alaska where there is only one member of congress) and the state legislative districts
• There are a number of different ways to gerrymander (make the maps so they favor your party):
• "The first method is called the "excess vote." It is an attempt to concentrate the voting power of the opposition into just a few districts, to dilute the power of the opposition party outside of those districts that contain an overwhelming majority of the opposition's voters. [Sometimes called 'packing.']
• The second method is know as the "wasted vote." This method of gerrymandering involves diluting the voting power of the opposition across many districts, preventing the opposition from having a majority vote in as many districts as possible.
• Finally, the "stacked" method involves drawing bizarre boundaries to concentrate the power of the majority party by linking distant areas into specific, party-in-power districts."  (I originally posted this list on a blogpost on Anchorage redistricting.  It comes from Matt Rosenberg.)  
• The Republicans were much more sophisticated and foresightful before 2010 and had captured a large majority of state governorships and legislatures.  Thus they controlled redistricting in most states.   This resulted in the House of Representatives having far more Republicans than the number of Republican voters would likely have produced if all districts were fairly drawn.
• These lopsided districts limit the likelihood Democrats will retake the majority in the House of Representatives.  Some long shot ways Democrats can win in these districts:  
• get out the vote of people who generally don't vote, and do so in huge numbers.
• enough Democrats move into the Republican districts to even the lopsided-ness
• Unless Democrats capture enough state governorships and legislatures, the Republicans will be able to keep control after the 2020 census redistricting.
• The US Senate's two Senators per state is itself a form of gerrymandering which gives the many smaller states a lopsided influence in the Senate.

Here's the video, it gives a great overview of what's wrong.





If all the people who marched last weekend and are organizing to resist the Trump administration want to make a real difference, I'd suggest they take a good look at redistricting in their states and how to either change the system or get more seats on the redistricting board. Here are some starting resources.

• All About Redistricting - Loyola University (LA) Professor Justin Levitt's website on redistricting 
• The Redistricting Game - Here you can do your own redistricting and learn the ways to use and abuse the system.

For Alaskans, here's the list of all the posts I did on the Alaska Redistricting Board.

ACS Revamped Email - Second Attempt Coming Soon, Maybe

Here's an email I got from ACS last November announcing their revamped email system.

If they sent an email saying it didn't happen, I never saw it.  I did eventually call and ask and was told, no, it didn't happen.  Postponed.

So here's an email I got yesterday.

They ACS email is pretty basic, so it would be nice to get a revamped version.  Or maybe not.  The old one is serviceable without a lot of bells and whistles.  We'll see a) if the new one really comes Feb. 1, and b) if it's worth the trouble.

ADN: Fake Quote In Ad

Since the Anchorage Daily News became the Alaska Dispatch News, the local and state coverage has increased significantly.  There are more reporters covering the legislature, the assembly, the university, and other significant organizations and issues.  But in the new world of Fake News, I'd like to see the ADN also take on Fake Quotes in ads.


This anti-income tax ad appeared in the ADN Sunday.

Bob Gillam, Alaska's richest person according to Forbes, and the money behind the anti-Pebble Mine campaign, doesn't want Alaska to reestablish the income tax as this ad in Sunday's ADN suggests.  If I were a billionaire with lots and lots of income, I might feel the same.

But when I read the quote from Johnson - "The 20th Century proved, if you were paying any attention, that taxation is the great enemy of civilization"  - I was skeptical.  Johnson wasn't an anti-tax guy.

So I googled and couldn't find the quote linked to Johnson.  I emailed Jim Gillam's company to see if they could tell me when and where the quote was published or he said it.  Then I emailed the LBJ Library in Austin, Texas.

I haven't heard back from Gillem, but the library was back to me quickly.   Archives Specialist Ian Frederick-Rothwell wrote back:

"I can find no record in the Public Papers of Lyndon B. Johnson that he ever said this. I searched the American Presidency Project website, which holds full, searchable text of all of President Johnson's speeches, statements, messages, and remarks as delivered or published."

He did find an article that included the phrase written by Buffalo, New York attorney Jim Ostrowski.   But I guess Ostrowski's name and picture wouldn't be as meaningful as Johnson's.

And the statement under LBJ's picture about every state that introduced an income tax since 1960 experiencing economic decline seems pretty sketchy as well.  Most states have had periods of 'economic decline' (however one might define that) since 1960.  Is there any cause and effect relationship that can be proven here?  I doubt it since all but a handful of the other states already had income taxes before 1960, so they should be totally depressed by now.  The only 'truth' this add is might prove is that some folks will believe what they want to believe, without any thought.

Billionaires have the resources to check their facts, though as our current president proves, having money doesn't necessarily lead to the truth.

But in this day of FAKE NEWS, I's urge the ADN and other reputable media, to require ads like these to provide sources before they print them.

Another option is simply to put a fact check next to advertisements so that readers don't have to each do this kind of homework.

Inaugural Graphic - Length, Words, Great Interactive Visuals

My last post talked about the MOOC (Massive Open Online Course) I'm taking now on Data Exploration and Storytelling.  Below is an example of a pretty spectacular example of taking data and presenting it in a relatively easy to use graphic.  It's a Google undertaking.   I'm not sure how critical the content is, but I foresee media doing this sort of thing on state or municipal budgets, crime statistics, proposed legislation, etc. that makes it much easier for citizens to get better way to understand important public policy issues.


Alberto Cairo, one of the instructors in the my class, was an advisor to this graphic that compares the eleven most searched presidents' inaugural addresses.

It's highly interactive and you can see each use of a particular key word, including the sentence it is in.

The five categories of words (and five diagrams) include:

• Politics (Words:  Justice, Constitution, Democracy, President of the US, Communism, Republic, US Congress)
• Finance (Tax, Money, Commerce, Economy)
• Emotions & Human Traits (Love, Happiness, Dignity, Courage, Sacrifice, Compassion, Loyalty, Patriotism, Morality)
• Spirit and Mind (Bible, God, Spirit, Soul, Destiny, Prayer, Faith, Truth, Wisdom, Conscience)
• Society (Liberty, Hero, Freedom, Crime, Revolution, Peace, Promise, Wealth, Poverty, Hatred, Common Good)  

Guess who used the word 'wealth' more than anyone else.

Below is a screenshot, which doesn't have the interactivity of the original.  But click on the image to go to the original.

You can see the total length of the speech by how far down it goes. Each bar or rectangle represents a sentence and your cursor can pop up each sentence.

The dots represent each time the president used one of the word listed above. Yellow shows the word that is highlighted - in this screenshot, it's the word democracy. You'll notice that Trump didn't use any of these words - but neither did Lincoln, Kennedy, or Nixon. For the screenshot, I highlighted one of the first Bush's use of the word Democracy.

As I said in yesterday's post, readers have to be vigilant, perhaps even more vigilant, of graphics like this.  There's always the danger that the cool factor will depress people's attention to design or factual issues.  People need to understand the assumptions of the graphic makers.  In this case the creators explain their decisions:

• "we picked the presidents based on the most searched presidents on Google since 2004"
• Our analysis of a selection of historical inauguration speeches allowed us to extract the most common subjects mentioned in speeches. 
• Subjects that were at least mentioned 4 times overall were selected. 
• These subjects are organized by theme, and 
• by comparing them with average search interest from Google search data in 2016, you can explore if these subjects are still searched for today."

There are lots of decisions that have to be made and that could effect the comparisons.  Perhaps picking presidents who came into offie under similar economic or war conditions as Trump would have made more sense.  But determining that would also involve lots of decisions.

And there's an assumption that all this is accurate.  But the website (before the Society chart) says:

"Contrary to other recent Presidents, President Trump does not mention the word Freedom."

Well, that's not exactly true.  Trump said,

". . . we all enjoy the same glorious freedoms, and we all salute the same great American Flag."

I'm not sure how long this took to prepare and how many people were involved.  There's a brief overview at Alberto Cairo's blog, where I learned about it.  

Data Journalism In The Alternative Fact Era

This is the second week of a MOOC class I'm taking called "Data Exploration And Story Telling" taught by Alberto Cairo and Heather Krause.

I'm taking this class because several work sessions at Alaska Press Club conferences (for example this session with Chrys Wu)   have convinced me of the power of being able to extract information from online or otherwise acquired (with permission of course) data bases and then manipulating that data, offers opportunities for really powerful stories.

[For those of you still scratching your head about MOOC, it's Massive Open Online Course.  This class has some 6000 students.   And when I write 'manipulate' I mean it in the sense of reorganizing the data so that the meaning of the numbers is easier to understand.  But I acknowledge that it is easy to misinterpret the data both accidentally and intentionally.]

Data Journalism seems to be a hot topic these days as large data bases are increasingly becoming available.  For me the issue is figuring out how to download them, clean them up, and then play with them to find interesting patterns.   That's what I'm hoping to get out of the class.

Here's a link to a Guardian article on data journalism.  Here's a section of that article that is becoming increasingly clear to me

"5. Data journalism is 80% perspiration, 10% great idea, 10% output
It just is. We spend hours making datasets work, reformatting pdfs, mashing datasets together. You can see from this prezi how much we go through before we get the data to you. Mostly, we act as the bridge between the data (and those who are pretty much hopeless at explaining it) and the people out there in the real world who want to understand what that story is really about."

This is both encouraging (I'm not a dummy because I think this looks like a lot of work) and discouraging (because I'm one blogger without a team of folks to help figure this out and do the work.)

Numbers, graphically displayed, can powerful tell stories that are otherwise invisible.  I've known this for many years.  It can often be relatively simple to prove or disprove someone's idea by getting the numbers.  I remember back in the 1980s at the Municipality of Anchorage, a couple of fairly easy projects where data ended or changed the conversation.

One was about the use of pool cars.  The Muni had some cars that employees could use to go out on Muni business.  We were getting complaints that there weren't enough cars and people were getting turned down.  We just asked the person who assigned the cars to log the requests for a month.  It turned out that anyone who asked for a car 24 hours in advance, got one.  But people who wanted a car in ten minutes sometimes got turned down.  That report ended the discussion.

Another study of the people making over $10,000 a year in overtime was sent to all the department heads, just to let them know.  This highlighted some departments with high rates and led to more careful monitoring and in some cases to adding positions.

Hospitals have used data on treatment and length of stay and recidivism rates for each doctor's patients in certain units.  The data led to doctors making changes in their treatment of patients.

So I know this can be very powerful.  We'll see whether I can learn to do this with the tools I have - I've been an Excel holdout, trying to by with Apple's version, Numbers.  And there seem to be a number of folks in class who are doing this already as part of their work.  And this class seems a little harder to negotiate online than the Coursera class I took in the fall.  There are so many forums and comments - which there should be with 6000 students - that it feels a bit like being in jammed train station at rush hour.

And then there's the issue of storytelling.  I believe in the power of stories and their importance.  But I'm starting to get concerned about how loosely it is being used, and how it can lend to people dismissing the stories as, just that, stories.  Something made up.

We're in the era when photos can be easily manipulated by anyone and now video can be manipulated to change the narrative.  The use of story lines by media is nothing new.  The broader skepticism on the part of the public is also a good thing.  But skepticism without the critical skills to assess a story's accuracy is problematic.  We're in an era where people shop around until they find the spin that fits their world view, wether it's accurate or not.

And some take full advantage of this.  Trump tells whatever story makes him look good and challenges those that don't.  From the LA Times:

Challenged on NBC's "Meet the Press" about Spicer making incorrect claims, Trump advisor Kellyanne Conway made a startling characterization , that Spicer gave "alternative facts."
“You're saying it's a falsehood, and Sean Spicer, our press secretary, gave alternative facts to that,” Conway told host Chuck Todd, who immediately interjected his disbelief over her description.
Conway eventually backed off Spicer's adamant claims and inflated crowd estimates. “I don’t think you can prove those numbers one way or the another,” she said. “There's no way to really quantify crowds."

Alternative facts?  No way to really quantify crowds?   Really?

If you live in Trump's competitive world where everything is about winning, then facts only matter if they help you win.  You challenge the umpire every time he calls you out and every time he calls your opponent safe.  Whether you got to the base before the ball did is irrelevant.  Instant replay is only your friend if it confirms your claim.

Can data journalism become a form of instant replay?  I suspect not.  It plays a different role.  Instant replay shows us, in slow motion and from a better angle, what we all just saw from different angles at high speed.  Data journalism goes through lists of numbers and converts them into visuals that make sense of the numbers.  It makes the incomprehensible, comprehensible.

And people will have to become more sophisticated about data collection, about categories used in collecting data, about survey questions, and a whole lot of other things if they're going to be able to evaluate the accuracy of data journalism.

Journalist have to learn those things.  In the first week of the class, Heather Krasue offered students a checklist for data:

• Who collected the data?
• How they collected the data?
• Who was included? 
• When it was collected?  
• Why did they collected the data?  

So, between watching the class videos, reading the articles, participating in the forums, and doing the assignments, not to mention playing with my granddaughter and other duties as assigned, keeping up here is getting sketchy.

Here's another look at this topic that my friend Jeremy posted on FB the other day.