A post-Civil War map of the newly purchased Alaska sets the mood for this decade's Redistricting Board website. This is NOT your typical government agency look. Especially compared to the site of the last Board. This is a very user friendly site and offers Alaskans an easy portal to the redistricting process. And now that the Census data isn't due until late summer, this is a good time to start exploring the site.
I'm going to make this as brief as I can and encourage others to find their way to other forums so they can judge for themselves. April elections tend not to have that many people voting, and with so many candidates, there's a good chance that there will be a runoff in May. Those have even fewer people voting. So your vote counts a lot. On the other hand, the Municipality has a vote by mail election, which tends get more participation.
I watched the mayoral forum hosted by about 20 non-profits that one would have to say lean toward protecting the environment, diversity, and those in need. The zoomed through a lot of questions and it quickly separated the candidates into, what seemed to me, the well qualified and the less qualified.
Just as any large private or non-profit business would focus on people's experience and knowledge of the organization and or similar ones, when we elect a mayor we should be hiring someone who isn't going to be learning on the job. So the first thing that struck me about the candidates was:
Knowledge and Experience With the Municipality
Basically, there were four candidates that stood out as reasonably well versed in what's happening in Anchorage and would be reasonably well prepared to start from day one. These are folks who, unsurprisingly, have been very involved with the operations of the Municipality:
Bill Falsey - is a former Municipal Attorney and the he was the City Manager. The first position gives you a ring-side seat and the second actually puts you in the ring.
Forrest Dunbar - is a current Assembly member.
Bill Evans - is a former Assembly member.
George Martinez - has a lot of government experience in New York and has been involved with community organization in Anchorage since at least 2008. He worked as a special assistant to Mayor Berkowitz so he has a handle on a number of municipal issues. He's currently head of Leadership Anchorage at the Alaska Humanities Forum
All four were familiar with the various programs and issues that were raised in the forum and were able to speak to the questions with obvious detailed knowledge of the issues.
In my mind, these are the people qualified to step into the job and be able to do the do real work from Day One. The others are going to have to learn on the job. That's not really what we need.
Articulate and Able to Represent the Municipality Well
The four above were all good spokespersons. I found George Martinez to be the best speaker - very fluent, clearly had his thoughts well organized and articulated, and conveyed a sense of caring. Dunbar and Evans were next. I found Falsey about wonky. He knew the technical details and was able to say a lot, quickly, but I didn't feel a lot warmth. High on rationality, not so high on charisma.
I took a lot of notes, but what I've written above is probably more important than the details of the answers which were focused a lot on parks, diversity, outdoors, indigenous issues, and a little on downtown.
The other candidates really were far behind in both factors above. They were not people who had any real experience with Municipal government that was greater than any one off the street. Mike Robbins said he was in the raise in response to how the Municipality handled the pandemic response. Businesses were badly hurt. I don't disagree with that, but I lean more to the side that believes they would have been hurt a lot more if the Muni hadn't take the strong action it took.
Heather Herndon spoke about being fourth generation Alaskan, she said growing up in Alaska she was never aware of people being treated differently because of the race or ethnicity. She made some cryptic references to indigenous people saying there were some in her family.
Several candidates seemed to cast themselves as 'normal people': Anna Anthony is a mother and a little one made noise in the background a couple of times. Jeff Brown said he represented the 80% of Anchorage residents that agreed on most things.
Another factor might be generational - who best represents the future and will be best able to take us there? Of the four most qualified, Dunbar and Falsey are the youngest. At this point in the pandemic, those who kept forgetting to unmute are automatically disqualified. It's ok for ordinary folks, but not for someone about to lead one of the biggest organizations in Alaska. They just don't have what it takes to learn quickly to adapt to change. T
Gender and ethnic diversity will be a consideration for others.
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| Click to enlarge |
Jeff Brown and Joe Westfall came in late, after I took the screen shot. Julie was the moderator. Wikipedia lists five additional candidates who did not show up:
Dave Bronson
Darin Colbry
Reza Momin[10]
Albert Swank Jr.
Jacob Seth Kern
Yes, we vote on Anchorage's next mayor April 6, 2021. That's about six weeks away. Wednesday (tomorrow as I write this, but today probably for most of you reading this) is a good chance to start getting a sense of the candidates. Nine have accepted invitations for the Forum. Start figuring out who you can clearly eliminate and who you want to support. Too bad Prop. 2 which will give us ranked choice voting in 2022 on the State level, isn't in effect for this election. We wouldn't need a runoff election if no one gets 45% on April 6.
[UPDATE Feb 17, 2021 - I should have said the quoted info comes from an email I received, as does the image.]
"The Alaska Center Education Fund, Anchorage Park Foundation, NAACP Anchorage, and other local partners are co hosting a virtual Mayoral Candidate Forum, tomorrow. We are looking forward to engaging candidates about the issues that affect our community. Anchorage's parks, trails, climate and economy are critical for a healthy and sustainable future. We look forward to hearing the candidates’ visions for our city.
Tune in via Facebook Live from 5 - 6:30 pm Wednesday, February 17 or register TODAY on zoom to be a part of the conversation. Check out the Facebook event >>
Anna Anthony
Jeffrey Brown
Forrest Dunbar
Bill Evans
Bill Falsey
Heather Herndon
George Martinez
Mike Robbins
Joe Westfall"
Click on the image below to see it bigger.
How did we get to this point, where NPR asks a "capitalism expert" this question? The intro was that corporations were cutting off campaign contributions to legislators who supported Trump's big lie about the election and the insurrection.
"SACHA PFEIFFER, BYLINE: I want to reel off some of the ways that the corporate hammer has been coming down recently. We saw Dominion and Smartmatic sue former President Trump's allies for lying about their voting machines. We saw companies, including American Express and Morgan Stanley, suspending their donations to key Republican lawmakers. The PGA pulled its tournament from a Trump golf resort. I see this happen, and it makes me think that the corporate response to political controversy has been more nimble and possibly more effective than the government one - effective if you disagree with what these politicians were doing. Am I fair to view it that way?"
Here's a link to the whole piece.
Let's start with the most obvious thing that Sacha Pfeiffer missed here. The very fact that she points to corporations withdrawing campaign funding from politicians who supported the lies, should have tipped her off to the answer: politicians aren't independent of their corporate funders.
Maybe a better question would have been, "Why didn't the corporations let the politicians know they disapproved of the ex-president's lies and fomenting an insurrection before the impeachment votes?"
Sacha Pfeiffer also conflated elected federal officials with government. They are just one, small, if powerful, part of the vast federal government. But these are elected officials, not the people who actually carry out government functions. These corporations got most of the Republican House and Senate members AND the president elected in the first place. But the career employees of the government - whether in the CDC or other health agencies, or in the State Department, or in the military, or the post office have been doing their best to keep serving the people of the United States, despite the corporate funded politicians.
And, as I've pointed out here before, there are many, many governments in the US. From Wikipedia:
| Governments in the United States[1] (not including insular areas) | |
|---|---|
| Type | Number |
| Federal | 1 |
| State | 50 |
| County | 3,034 |
| Municipal (city, town, village...) * | 19,429 |
| Township (in some states called Town) ** | 16,504 |
| School district | 13,506 |
| Special purpose (utility, fire, police, library, etc.) | 35,052 |
| Total | 87,576 |
David Pogue (@Pogue) tweeted a link too Radio.garden. You get to a page. Click open and
you then get the world, literally. Each green dot is a radio station. And when you zoom in you get
told the location and many more local green dots. Put the circle on the dot you want and start
listening. I'm listening to music from Kerala on the southern tip of India right now.
The following notice comes from a US Census Bureau redistricting blog via an email from the Alaska Redistricting Board Executive Director Peter Torkelson. (He offered to email a notice of the next Board meeting when I asked if there were an easier way to find out meeting times than the State Public Notice site. Thanks, Peter.)
FEB. 12, 2021 — The U.S. Census Bureau announced today that it will deliver the Public Law 94-171 redistricting data to all states by Sept. 30, 2021. COVID-19-related delays and prioritizing the delivery of the apportionment results delayed the Census Bureau’s original plan to deliver the redistricting data to the states by March 31, 2021.
Different from previous censuses, the Census Bureau will deliver the data for all states at once, instead of on a flow basis. This change has been made because of COVID-19-related shifts in data collection and in the data processing schedule and it enables the Census Bureau to deliver complete and accurate redistricting data in a more timely fashion overall for the states.
The redistricting data includes counts of population by race, ethnicity (Hispanic or Latino origin), voting age, housing occupancy status, and group quarters population, all at the census block level. This is the information that states need to redraw or “redistrict” their legislative boundaries.
In preparation for the delivery of redistricting data products, the Census Bureau has been in close coordination with each states’ official nonpartisan liaisons to understand the impacts of the delayed delivery on individual states. Since 2019, states have had access to prototype geographic support products and data tabulations from the 2018 Census Test to help them begin to design their redistricting systems. This is one tool states can use to help minimize the impact of schedule delays. In addition, the Census Bureau today completed the release of all states’ 2020 Census geographic products needed for redistricting. This will enable states to redistrict promptly upon receipt of their 2020 Census tabulation data.
I'd note that this is a significant delay (potentially six months if it takes until September 30) from ten years ago when the Alaska Redistricting Board got its data from the US Census Bureau on March 15. That post explains some of the rules at the time - like having to have the first plan done within 30 days of receiving the data. (I apologize for the missing photos on that page. They weren't mine and some are apparently no longer on the original sites.) I don't know whether any laws have been changed since then. Back then I learned about the rules because they were explained at the Board Meetings. There have only been a few meetings this time round and they've all been COVID kosher.
Dear Senator Sullivan,
It appears that you have already made up your mind to vote to acquit ex-President Trump. I don't understand that decision, which most of the Republican Senators seem determined to make. But this is critically important so I will give you the view of one of your constituents on why you should vote too convict.
As a young man, I listened to most of the Watergate Hearings on the radio. Let me begin with this quote from Howard Baker, Republican Vice Chair of the Watergate Investigation:
“There's only one way that my party, the Republican Party could be mortally wounded with certainty and that would be for the public to think that we Republicans don’t have the courage, the stamina, the determination to clean our own house."
I've watched four days of impeachment hearings now. It's clear that the House team made a tight, detailed, well organized, factual case against the ex-president. They clearly showed how his actions, since well before the election even, set up the mob that ransacked the Capitol. They showed how he created the big lie - "if I lose, the election was a fraud." After the election he kept up that refrain - and presented no credible evidence in 61 courts. All the judges rejected his cases out of hand. Not just Republican judges, but judges Trump himself appointed!
Then he tried to intimidate Republican election officials in Michigan, Pennsylvania, and Georgia into decertifying the elections. He told the Georgia head of elections to just find enough votes to let him win!
Then he started telling his supporters to "Stop The Steal." He encouraged them many times to prevent Biden from becoming president.
Not only was the evidence they presented overwhelming, but for anyone paying attention to legitimate news the last six months, it was all stuff we knew already. You yourself related how you and Sen. Murkowski sprinted out of the Chamber because the insurgents were knocking out the windows and banging on the doors where the House and Senate were certifying the election.
Trump's defense attorneys made feeble attempts to reiterate their claim that "impeaching a private citizen was unconstitutional." But we know he was impeached while he was a sitting president. We also know that judges and other officers have been convicted after they resigned.
They argued that his First Amendment rights were violated. They dismissed the letter from over 100 top Constitutional lawyers, including key people from the Federalist Society, as "partisan." It wasn't. I'm guessing by your question today, that you will choose "You can't impeach a private citizen" as your fig leaf to cover your vote. It's transparent. It won't cover what you're trying to hide.
They played five minutes of video tape of every time any Democrat had ever said "Fight" arguing that the ex-president saying it numerous times in his pre-rampage speech was equivalent. The House team put the ex-president's words into context. Trump's team did not. Instead they tried to make it seem that telling people to fight for equal justice for African-Americans who are regularly being harassed and killed by police is the same as telling an armed mob to take the Capitol and stop the certification of the election by violence.
Some have argued that the Senate Republicans are suffering from the political version of Battered Woman Syndrome. I assume that you know about this syndrome since you have championed the ending of abuse against women. But let me remind you of some of the symptoms:
Here's what some key Republicans said of Trump in 2016:
"On the campaign trail, Rand called Trump a “delusional narcissist” and a “fake conservative,” and Trump mocked his height. Rubio mocked Trump’s small hand size and called Trump a “con artist,” and Trump eviscerated “Lil Marco.” Graham said Trump was a “kook,” “crazy,” and “unfit for office,” and Trump gave out Graham’s personal cellphone number on national television. Cruz said Trump was a “pathological liar,” a “narcissist,” and a “serial philanderer,” and Trump and basically called Cruz’s wife ugly—while accusing Cruz’s dad of being involved in the Kennedy assassination." (from The Daily Beast.)
You yourself said you were ready to support Pence as the candidate and you publicly said you didn't vote for Trump in 2016.
Yet all these Republican Senators, including yourself, have lined up to staunchly back Trump for four years, and the now the ex-president.
The battered woman syndrome does seem to fit well in two particular ways.
That sounds pretty close to the situation of Senate Republicans. You're afraid of retaliation by Trump and by his supporters and you are afraid of losing the economic support of Republicans in your next election.
You've taken an oath to support the Constitution both as a Marine and as a US Senator. You're allowing your personal interests and the peer pressure of your Republican colleagues to close your eyes to what that oath requires of you now. The case against the ex-president is more than clear. Trump's defense team was all smoke and mirrors.
There is more to life than being a US Senator if that is the price for honoring your oath to office. But you aren't up for reelection until 2026. By then, voting to convict Trump will be respected by conservatives as well as progressives. Or Trump will be using his acquittal to continue to claim he was robbed of the election and will still be stoking the fires of white supremacy and creating more havoc than you can imagine now. Just as you didn't imagine the storming of the Capitol when you voted to acquit last time.
The American people know Trump should be publicly sanctioned and banned from office. The world knows that. And even if Republicans prevent conviction, the House's case is well preserved on video tape for future generations of Americans to see it for themselves in history classes. And they will. Your children and grandchildren will see it. And they will know you didn't have the courage to honor your oaths to protect the Constitution. They will realize that you grabbed some of the irrelevant sound bytes that Trump's lawyers offered Republicans to use to excuse their votes.
I urge you to stop hiding and stand up front and proudly and deliberately cast your vote (mine too since you represent me in the Senate) to convict Donald Trump.
Thank you
On May 14, 2018 I began a blog post like this:
Congressional Republicans Show Signs of Battered Wife Syndrome
Medical News Today says battered women suffer from PTSD but then adds they suffer their own special symptoms as well.In addition to PTSD, people with battered woman syndrome show symptoms that may be confusing to outsiders.
Those include:
- learned helplessness
- refusing to leave the relationship
- believing that the abuser is powerful or knows everything
- idealizing the abuser following a cycle of abuse
- believing they deserve the abuse
I then went on to look at each of these symptoms and relate them to Congressional GOP. (You can see the whole post at the link above.)
Today, Anonymous left this comment:
"Reporting back from the future: GOP's battered wife syndrome is in full force even after Trump has left office. So SAD!"
So sad, indeed. But the Democrats have laid out such a powerful, logical, and easy to understand case for Trump's treachery. And it's all there in video - the presentations of the House team and the embedded video they used as evidence.
Even if the Republicans can't see it, or are too paralyzed to break rank, everyone else can see it. Historians have never had it so easy. And their students have never had it so compelling.
Smartmatic, a maker of election technology is suing For News for knowingly broadcasting lies about their company for financial gain.
Fake news is not new. In a post about Misleading Headlines I wrote about serious problems rife in the US from 1898 when there was a circulation feud between the Hearst's and the Pulitzers.
But Fox News goes well beyond headlines. The whole story is often totally made up. The First Amendment has been interpreted to give a lot of leeway for legitimate news media to make honest, even sloppy mistakes.
However, as you read the allegations in this case (and based on everyone's personal experience either with Fox News directly or on the ever-present clips on different social media) it's clear that Fox has often pushed the protections of the First Amendment to the point that they are actually causing harm to people and companies and endangering democracy, by labeling fiction as non-fiction.
Distinguishing Free Speech from Slander and Libel
So how do we balance free speech and slander and libel? There have always been laws against slander and libel. Smartmatic is claiming that Fox and its on air spokespersons not only made patently false claims, but they knew that they were doing it, and in doing it they did Smartmatic irreparable harm, for Fox's financial gain and to help reelect Trump.
Findlaw outlines the key elements of libel (written) and slander (spoken).
To prove either type of a defamation lawsuit, plaintiffs must prove the following elements:
- The defendant made a false and defamatory statement concerning the plaintiff;
- The defendant made the defamatory statement to a third party knowing it was false (or they should have known it was false); and
- The publisher acted at least negligently in publishing the communication.
Here's a link to the suit Smarmatic filed. And excerpts below are taken from the documents filed today.
SUPREME COURT OF THE STATE OF NEW YORK COUNTY OF NEW YORK
--------------------------------------
SMARTMATIC USA CORP., SMARTMATIC INTERNATIONAL HOLDING B.V., and SGO CORPORATION LIMITED,
Plaintiffs, -against-
FOX CORPORATION, FOX NEWS NETWORK LLC, LOU DOBBS, MARIA BARTIROMO, JEANINE PIRRO, RUDOLPH GIULIANI, and SIDNEY POWELL,
Defendants.
The basic narrative of the case is that Fox knowingly made up facts defaming their company for Fox to gain a bigger audience and it did great damage to the company.
INTRODUCTION1
1. The Earth is round. Two plus two equals four. Joe Biden and Kamala Harris won the 2020 election for President and Vice President of the United States. The election was not stolen, rigged, or fixed. These are facts. They are demonstrable and irrefutable. [emphasis added]
2. Defendants have always known these facts. They knew Joe Biden and Kamala Harris won the 2020 U.S. election. They knew the election was not stolen. They knew the election was not rigged or fixed. They knew these truths just as they knew the Earth is round and two plus two equals four.
3. Defendants did not want Joe Biden and Kamala Harris to win the election. They wanted President Donald Trump and Vice President Michael Pence to win re-election. Defendants were disappointed. But they also saw an opportunity to capitalize on President Trump’s popularity by inventing a story. Defendants decided to tell people that the election was stolen from President Trump and Vice President Pence.
The Table of Contents gives you the general narrative of their case. I'll give you just a taste of what's there. Again, the link his here.
FACTUAL ALLEGATIONS ....................................................................................................... 12
Smartmatic’s Role as an Election Technology Company ..................................................... 13
Smartmatic grew from a small start-up into a successful multi-billion-dollar
enterprise. ....................................................................................................................... 14Smartmatic’s success was built on its reputation for secure, reliable, and auditable election technology and software. .................................................................................. 18
Smartmatic had a relatively small, non-controversial role in the 2020 U.S. election. ... 19
Los Angeles County introduced a new Voting Solutions for All People initiative for the 2020 U.S. election................................................................................................ 19
Los Angeles County selected Smartmatic to contribute election technology and software to the Voting Solutions for All People initiative. ....................................... 22
Smartmatic’s involvement with Los Angeles County was a success. ....................... 23
Smartmatic quietly celebrated its success in Los Angeles without knowing what was coming from Defendants. ............................................................................................... 25
Defendants’ Disinformation Campaign Against Smartmatic ................................................ 27
Mr. Giuliani and Ms. Powell created a story about Smartmatic. ................................... 30
Fox Defendants joined the conspiracy to defame and disparage Smartmatic and its election technology and software. .................................................................................. 32
Defendants engaged in a widespread disinformation campaign against Smartmatic and its election technology and software. ............................................................................. 34
Defendants used multiple platforms to spread disinformation....................................... 57
Defendants presented their statements about Smartmatic as facts, not opinions ........... 67
Defendants’FalseStatementsandImplicationsAboutSmartmatic......................................78
A. Defendants falsely stated and implied that Smartmatic’s election technology and software were widely used in the 2020 U.S. election..................................................... 79
B. Defendants falsely stated and implied that Dominion used Smartmatic’s election technology and software during the 2020 U.S. election................................................. 84
C. Defendants falsely stated and implied that Smartmatic fixed, rigged, and stole the 2020 U.S. election for Joe Biden and Kamala Harris.............................................................. 92
D. Defendants falsely stated and implied that Smartmatic sent votes to foreign countries for tabulation during the 2020 U.S. election. ............................................................... 102
E. Defendants falsely stated and implied that Smartmatic’s election technology and software were compromised or hacked during the 2020 U.S. election. ....................... 106
F. Defendants falsely stated and implied that Smartmatic was previously banned from providing election technology and software in the United States. ............................... 112
G. Defendants falsely stated and implied that Smartmatic is a Venezuelan company founded and funded by corrupt dictators from socialist and communist countries...... 115
H. Defendants falsely stated and implied that Smartmatic’s election technology and software were designed to fix, rig, and steal elections. ................................................ 122
IV. Defendants Acted with Actual Malice and Ill Will Towards Smartmatic........................... 132
A. Defendants had no support for their statements and implications regarding
Smartmatic. ................................................................................................................... 133
Defendants did not have sources to prove something that did not happen.............. 134
Fox Defendants eventually admitted they had no basis for their statements and implications about Smartmatic. ............................................................................... 135
Fox News knew its anchors and guests lacked a basis for their statements and implications about Smartmatic. ............................................................................... 143
Defendants purposefully avoided learning the truth about Smartmatic and its election technology and software. ......................................................................................... 147
B. Defendants had access to information showing their statements and implications about Smartmatic and its technology and software were factually inaccurate....................... 148
Defendants knew Smartmatic’s election technology and software were not widely used in the 2020 U.S. election (and were not used in contested states). ................. 149
Defendants knew Smartmatic’s election technology and software were not used to fix, rig, or steal the 2020 U.S. election. ................................................................... 160
That's enough to get you started. The Roberts court has given a lot of deference to the First Amendment, but it seems this case is going to help the draw some lines. And if the Plaintiffs are successful, there will be a new weapon against fake news. This could be an important step in the fight against fake news.
The Watergate Hearings in 1973 were conducted by the with three Republicans and four Democrats. Below in the MacNeil/Lehrer coverage of the first day of the hearings. It starts with an introduction to the key players and some context. There never was an impeachment decision because Republicans told Nixon that it was clear he would be impeached and convicted. Nixon resigned first.
There's a striking difference from what we're seeing in the Senate these days. I think it's very instructive to watch these hearing now as we prepare for the Senate trial of former president Trump.
Republican Sen. Howard Baker, Vice Chairman of the Hearings, talking to Robert MacNeil:
“There's only one way that my party, the Republican Party could be mortally wounded with certainty and that would be for the public to think that we Republicans don’t have the courage, the stamina, the determination to clean our own house. So, it is not only not embarrassing, it’s an absolute requirement that we pursue every fact, wherever it leads us and that every phase that may emerge from that mosaic of fact emerge. That we do it with enthusiasm but that we do it even handedly and that we have a fair and impartial exposition of the facts but that we establish absolute credibility as Republicans that we are going to take care of it ourselves.”
The introduction is useful, but if you want to skip it, Sen. Sam Ervin (the senior Democratic Senator from Georgia) calls the meeting to order about 9:27 on the tape.