Bainbridge Island Japanese American Exclusion Memorial

Bainbridge Island Japanese American Exclusion Memorial is a short drive from here.  A friend from Anchorage who is also in Seattle visiting grandkids brought two and two dogs to visit us on Bainbridge today.  So I haven't had much time to even think about posting.  But here's a bit.

There's a path here with a series of panels with wooden pictures of the removal of Japanese-Americans, many, not most,  American citizens, from Bainbridge Island after the US declared war on Japan after Pearl Harbor.  Japanese had settled here and many raised strawberries.  The book Snow Falling On Cedars is a novel about this period here on the island.  This path is also the path the internees were walked down to get to ships to remove them on their way to internment camps further from the coast.

There are also quotes here and there from people who experienced this, like this one:

This echoes the sentiment of Holocaust survivors in Europe during World War II.  And give the imprisonment of asylum seekers and the separation of children from their parents there, it seems that we are letting this happen again.

The LA Times today reports that California is going to officially apologize for internment of Japanese in World War II.


Then we walked along the nearby beach, where the dogs had a great time off leash.

Here, the ferry from downtown Seattle is coming into downtown Winslow.

Fictional Accuracy Of Elections And The Iowa Caucus

As the Nevada caucuses begin, I'm still pondering how pundits, the media in general, and people in general reacted to the Iowa caucuses.  My sense is that caucuses are a kind of community gathering where people share with others to get a sense of how the collective feels about the candidates.  But we are in a world that demands precision, demand instant results.  People get impatient if it takes a website to open in more than 2 seconds, so election results need to be available 20 minutes after the polls close.  But what do the numbers mean anyway?

Caucus Thoughts

I’ve been to two caucuses in Anchorage - 2008 and 2016.  People come together.  Lots of people.  There’s camaraderie,  laughter, crowds, confusion, donuts, and a chance to see lots of folks you haven’t seen for a while.  

Once into your precinct rooms, talk gets more serious, but there’s still a friendly banter about candidates.  It’s time to hear from proponents of different candidates, to ask questions, and be asked questions.  Some people have done their homework, others are seeking answers.  

People eventually get asked to stand in different parts of the room depending on which candidate they support.  Then those candidates with too few supporters are eliminated and their supporters get to join their second choice.  

If the group is small, it’s easy to get an accurate count.  If there are 100 or more, it starts getting trickier.  People have to stand still.  Did you count him already? What about her?

But if the tally is 111 or 113 it doesn’t really matter that much.  You’ve got a good sense that a lot more people want candidate A over candidate B.  Besides, the people in the room represent only those people who had the time, transportation, or interest to go.  There are plenty more people who couldn’t or just didn’t come.  

There’s lots good about a caucus.  The chance to see and talk and debate with lots of people - some good friends, some acquaintances you haven’t seen a while, and some strangers you want to see again or not.  It’s a way to get more information about candidates, to learn why others support or don’t support different candidates.  And it’s a way to get a sense of how many people prefer this candidate over that one.  It's a lot different from making the decision alone in the voting booth.

Nowadays, science and efficiency and legal (but not scientific) precision are demanded.  The people of the media have made elections into a sport with stats that tell us precisely what the electorate wants down to two or three decimal points.  

All this comes to mind as I watch the coverage of the Iowa caucuses.  Here we have an old fashioned process that allows neighbors and friends to work out who they want to support, even with the benefits of being able to pick a second choice when it’s clear their first choice isn’t going to make it.  In the past, I’m sure, these things never had to be lunar landing precise, just good enough.  And they served a lot of social functions that individually marking a ballot in a curtained off booth doesn’t serve.  People get a better sense of what those voting for other candidates are thinking.  And they even learn that people are voting for their own preference for different reasons.

This process has been coming into conflict with the increasing demands from the politicians and the media for precision.  Iowa’s attempts to ‘bring the caucus into the 21st Century’ by using an app, just didn’t work out.  And the candidates and the media, who need the certainty of precise numbers, were left to run off to New Hampshire without the resolution they needed as quickly as they needed it.  

It makes sense for elections to be precise, and if people choose not to vote, well, that’s their choice.  (Unless it’s manufactured by removing people from the voting rolls, limiting access to the polls by having fewer polling places, or not enough workers or ballots, and other such schemes.)  But this form of caucus has served a lot of other purposes beyond getting a final precise voting count.  

And the numerical precision that the media demand, really isn’t as precise or reflective of what people want any way.  And even when nearly 3 million more people voted for Hillary Clinton than for Donald Trump, the technicalities of the electoral college voided all those votes.   

And the purging of voters in states like Florida and Michigan, not to mention irregularities with the unbacked up voting machines, probably were enough to fix the electoral college vote.  (Greg Palast tells us that while Trump won by 13,107 in Michigan, 449,922 voters (mostly black) had been purged from the voting list.)

I’d note that Alaska has a petition gathering signatures now that would allow for ranked-choice voting.  That is, like in a caucus, they would be able to indicate their second and third choices, so two candidates they like wouldn’t split the vote and allow one they don’t like to win.  Which is part of what’s in the caucus process.  

I think we're being way too controlled by technological demands for an artificial accuracy and for instant turnaround in the elections.  The harder to measure social and civic benefits of voting itself are ignored and sacrificed in exchange.  And the bigger issues of voter suppression and hacking voting machines are not getting the attention they should get.  Trump will win this election only with the help of foreign propaganda, voter purging, and tampering with the count of votes, both electronic and otherwise.  

Better Husband, Architecture, New Monopoly, Trump and Hitler

There are so many things to post that I get overwhelmed.  A few drafts are backed up as I write and rewrite and gather more information and then try to shorten them to focus on the key points.  I try anyway.  But in the mean time here are a few things.


1.  I Quit Being a Therapist so I Could Be a Better Husband

 "I hated the idea of being someone who spends the day helping other families overcome difficult emotions but can’t do the same with himself at home for his family. I felt like a fraud."

"Early on, the skills I refined as a therapist made me a better husband. I got good at understanding the variety of reasons people do what they do. I became more compassionate in our marriage and I was better equipped to help Nhu-An navigate challenges in her family, with her friends, and at work. I think it’s also made me a better father to our daughter — more patient, present, and involved.
Three things changed."

 It's a good piece, I recommend you read it all.  It's positive, but also critical of the medical system.





3.  If Trump's Loves Classical Architecture, He Needs To Congratulate Nancy Pelosi On Her Home Town City Hall.

Trump had just issued an order about court houses needing to only be built in classical style.  No modern buildings (like his towers).  I thought about this as we walked past the San Francisco City Hall on our way to BART and the airport Wednesday.










2. San Francisco as we flew back to Seattle.  

3.  New Monopoly Uses Credit Cards Instead Of Money

My granddaughter insisted we play monopoly.  It was never one of my favorite activities, but she's my granddaughter, so what could I do?  It turns out that each player now gets credit cards and there's this little gadget you put the cards in.  Then you type how much money, and it either a) transfers it in or out of one card (if you pass go or have to pay Luxury Taxes, etc.) or b) transfers money from one card to the other (if you have to pay rent.)

As I recall, it was relatively easy to cheat when you used paper money.  This gadget takes that ease to a whole new level.  The banker just types it in and you get your card back.  Unless you insist the banker shows what your card is now, you have no idea how much money you have.

And the amounts are in the tens of thousands to millions.  One dollar bills?  Hah!



4.  Sound Transit (Seattle) Hate Free Zone

If you want to keep out of the darker side of politics, stop here.

4.  Leading Civil Rights Lawyer Shows 20 Ways Trump Is Copying Hitler’s Early Rhetoric and Policies  -  I've been talking about this since at least the election in 2016. (For example this post.)  No one can say we weren't warned.

"A younger Trump, according to his first wife’s divorce filings, kept and studied a book translating and annotating Adolf Hitler’s pre-World War II speeches in a locked bedside cabinet, Neuborne noted. The English edition of My New Order, published in 1941, also had analyses of the speeches’ impact on his era’s press and politics. “Ugly and appalling as they are, those speeches are masterpieces of demagogic manipulation,” Neuborne says.
“Watching Trump work his crowds, though, I see a dangerously manipulative narcissist unleashing the demagogic spells that he learned from studying Hitler’s speeches—spells that he cannot control and that are capable of eroding the fabric of American democracy,” Neuborne says. 'You see, we’ve seen what these rhetorical techniques can do. Much of Trump’s rhetoric—as a candidate and in office—mirrors the strategies, even the language, used by Adolf Hitler in the early 1930s to erode German democracy.'”

Climate Change Giant Paul Hawken In Anchorage Thursday Free At UAA

Feeling overwhelmed by Climate Change and other issues.  Learn how the top ways the world can slow down climate change.  Some are surprising - like educating girls.

The author of Drawdown - an incredible book that looks at 50 ways to slow down climate change is speaking at Wendy Williamson Auditorium at UAA tonight (Thursday) at 7pm - FREE!!!

I've posted about Hawken's book before.

Port Of Oakland and Chappell Roland Hayes

After dropping the kids off yesterday morning we took BART out to Oakland to visit long time friends.  And they took us to Middle Harbor Shoreline Park.

From The Port Of Oakland website:

"Middle Harbor Shoreline Park is built on the site of the former Oakland Naval Supply Depot, an important supply center for the Navy's Pacific Fleet from World War II until 1998, when the depot was closed and transferred to the Port of Oakland. This 541-acre facility was equipped with dozens of warehouses with a combined floor area of over 7 million square feet. The Naval Supply Depot that stood on this land played an important role in the World War II war effort--civilian and military workers processed and shipped a wide variety of cargo, including aviation material, electronics, weapons, clothing, food, fuel, lumber, and medicine and medical equipment."

The park looks out over San Francisco Bay and the Bay Bridge into downtown San Francisco.

This is a naked eye view from a tower in the park.

This is with a little zooming with the camera.

And this is with help from the telescope on the tower.

The cranes are part of the Oakland docks.  A dockworker was eating lunch on the tower.  He said he eats there every day and it's always as deserted as it was yesterday.  Except when there's a concert.  As an Alaskan I forget that deserted isn't normal.

He also said that ll shipping to and from China has been halted.  Shipowners here, he said, are afraid their ships will be quarantined.



I also learned about Chappell Roland Hayes.

I found more about him here (where you can read it all)

"Visionary Hayes Honored by PortSunday, January 25, 2004
by Paul T. Rosynsky, Staff Writer
Oakland ~ During his brief 45 years of life, Chappell Hayes inspired hundreds and changed the lives of thousands with his stoic leadership of West Oakland's never-ending fight for environmental justice.
As an outspoken critic of governmental policies that favored industrial development over community cohesiveness, Hayes stood as a beacon of hope for thousands of disenfranchised residents who neither had the means nor the knowledge to fight against the destruction of their neighborhood.
So it was fitting Saturday, exactly 10 years after Hayes' death, that his nemesis, the Port of Oakland, dedicated its prized environmental achievement to the man who made it happen.
In an emotionally stirring ceremony, more than 100 family members and friends, including his wife, City Council member Nancy Nadel, and daughter, Sele Nadel-Hayes, helped the port turn a new observation tower at Middle Harbor Shoreline Park into a monument celebrating Hayes' life and achievements.
"The naming of the observation tower is very fitting for Chappell," Nadel said, wrapping up a two-hour dedication ceremony. "With his feet on earth and head in the clouds, he served as an inspiration to me and Sele. Now, he has the ability to inspire us all to infinity."
Hayes, who died of cancer in 1994, is credited for helping West Oakland begin its long and continuing battle against polluting industries and the governments that support them. . ."

It was, as you can see, a beautiful day.  Got into the low 70s in Oakland.

Learning Numbers

 






While waiting for the pre-school to open we walked around the corner and I saw this tile address on a house.  My three year old looked and I pointed out the first number - Three - and she repeated Three.  I pointed out the second number and she repeated four.  I pointed out the third number and she said five.  We talked about it, but she insisted it had to be a five.

So I looked across the street and found 345.  And she agreed with all my numbers.  But when we went back to 346, she continued to insist on 345.  Of course, she knows "1-2-3-4-5" and my changing that five to six had no chance.


















So after dinner I wrote out the numbers one through eleven (with her editing below).  And we went through them.

Then I made white ones and had her find the matching number.  Most she did without hesitation.  Three and five were confusing.  Eight was a B to her.  All good too the point that she played games with me, saying she didn't know while taking the right white paper and turning it over.  Even gluing some to another piece of paper.

But the 346 picture is still 345 to her.



[Background of the pictures.  We first saw the 346 yesterday morning.  I decided to take pictures in the afternoon when we picked her up.  The 345 was made of beautiful metal numbers on the wall across the street.  But in the afternoon, there was a portapotty covering the 345.  It was still there this morning, so I had to make do with the little numbers on the mailbox.]

Scarcity On A Windy Day

wind strewn eucalyptus bark

The wind was howling during the night and flags were straining at their harnesses, today.  We went to an event in Golden Gate Park.  The almost three year old was allowed to take her scooter.  This irked the five year old no end.  Things that others have seem to become an overwhelming obsession and it lasted pretty much the whole day.  Well, there was a period when the scooter wasn't at the top of his mind.  When the little one was on the swing.  There were two swings and the second one was occupied too.  Suddenly he needed to swing.  She needed to give up her swing for him.

But grandpa was there to remind him how angry he got when she took the toys he was playing with.  His response:  "Grandpa, you're annoying."

The wind had toppled this dead tree in the park and there were lots and lots of branches all over the ground.  (I'm making an assumption here about how this tree landed on its side.  But it looked fairly newly down.)

The five year old appropriated one - about seven feet long - that was a hazard to anyone walking near him.  We pointed this out and sometimes he would drag it off the path on the ground.  When a young lady walked by and got scratched by the branch, I asked him what he had to say.  Nothing.  You need to apologize.  Glare.  "It was her fault.  She walked into it."  Glare.  When you chose to carry the stick where other people were, you took on a responsibility.  Luckily she wasn't hurt much. But you still have a responsibility to apologize.  Glare.

Fortunately at age five, grudges don't last long and he was giggling soon.

redwood bark in Golden Gate Park

We got back home for the three year old's nap and the older brother went with his dad to a friend's birthday party while the scooter owner napped.  

Later I enjoyed this San Francisco sunset.  

Leaving Seattle Arriving SF Photos

We had a cramping call for a few days in SF.  So here are some pictures of our departure from Seattle and of San Francisco.  First step was taking the ferry through the fog.

Eventually, we were above the Seattle clouds and flying past Mt. St. Helens.  It's been a forty years since she erupted.

And soon we were flying past San Francisco and looping back into the airport.  This view is from the west with the Golden Gate bridge barely visible at the bottom left.

We BARTED into town and had a great Mediterranean lunch

Today we bused with the kids to the Children's Creativity Museum, a great place for kids.  On the way we passed the cable car turning around.  

"One of the finest street clocks in America"














And here's the clock.  It didn't seem to be working.

The park near the museum is in a canyon surrounded by buildings, and has a waterfall

The kids had a great time at the museum and I couldn't get them from the first floor activities.  The little one had a crying meltdown on the way home.  But she held my hand and kept walking.  Getting really tired.  On the bus she continued until I started telling her the story about the little girl who cried so loud on the bus that it hurt other people's ears.  And that her tears flooded the bus.

LA Times Headlines Help Promote Partisan Divide

The media have been painting a picture of partisan divide.  There's no question there is one.  Fox News, Donald Trump, and others have been fanning the flames of racial, social, and political divide for years.

But millions of Republicans and Democrats meet regularly at family celebrations, at work, in the military, at garden clubs, and tens of thousands of other venues daily.

The metaphors of war have infected (a metaphor of disease) our discourse.  And the media play a large role by perpetuating this idea.  Here are two examples from the front page of the LA Times paper edition today.

I expect more of the Los Angeles Times, but here's a headline today:

Reeling Biden goes on attack

But in the actual article, here is what they said he did:

“I have great respect for Mayor Pete and his service to this nation, but I do believe it’s a risk — to be just straight up with you for this part — to nominate somebody who’s never held an office higher than mayor of a town of 100,000 people in Indiana,” he said of Buttigieg.

As for Sanders, Biden said that if the Vermont senator were to win the nomination, Democrats “up and down the ballot … will have to carry the label that Sen. Sanders has chosen for himself. I don’t criticize him, he calls himself a democratic socialist.”

For the Democrats, going on attack means, I guess, making factual statements about one's opponents and raising your concerns in the most deferential way that his opponents have some issues that may cause problems in the election.  

Just think back to the kind of statements Trump made about his primary opponents.  

I would note that I read the headline above on the hard copy version online.

Really, LA Times, if Biden's statements are  an 'attack' what do you call how Trump engages his  rivals.  There were reports the Trump team told Republican Senators their heads would be up on a pike if they defected.  And Trump Jr. tweeted immediately after Romney defected, that Romney should be purged from the Republican Party.  That was followed by a nasty video from the Trump camp on Romney.  Now that's more like an attack.  

If Trump Jr. had 'attacked' like Biden, he would have said, "I respectfully disagree with Romney's vote on Article I."

Another headline - also on the front page of the LA Times - says: 

The big winner:  Partisanship

 A poll before the vote on witnesses said that 70% of voters wanted witnesses and more documents reviewed by the Senate.  That's just one sign that things are not as partisan as the media pundits suggest.   We all see what we are looking for and miss what we aren't looking for.  That's a common human trait.  The media are just lots of people, so it's natural for them too.  But professional members of the media, like professional attorneys and doctors and scientists, are supposed to be trained to overcome those natural biases.  To look beyond the obvious and to question their own biases.

I'd note that as I sought links to these articles I found that the web versions of the articles had very different, more accurate headlines:

Reeling Biden Goes On Attack 

became 

As some backers panic, Biden scrambles to save his campaign in New Hampshire

And

The big winner:  Partisanship

became

News Analysis: Trump’s impeachment and acquittal please partisans on both sides

US Senate: Guilty of Cowardice and Derelict of Duty

Article I

They wouldn't even let the camera show the faces of the Senators as they voted.

Article II

Romney voted for impeachment in Article I, but not in Article II.  So, for article I the vote was bi-partisan for impeachment and partisan for acquittal.