I had a dream

My apologies to Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. for using a variation of the title of one of his major speeches.

My dream early this morning was about a similar nemesis: those whose only interest is ruling with a false idea of conservatism and a misuse of religion.

The false idea of conservatism is holding on to power, irregardless of how it affects the vast majority of the citizens.  This conservatism puts the interests of some large corporations over the interests of large segments of the population.  The misuse of religion is to claim to have the truth even as it acts contrary to the teachings of its greatest prophet.

My dream was that teams of journalists met all over the country to unite against the attacks by false conservatives on the journalists integrity and professionalism.  Interestingly, many of these journalists being attacked are real conservatives, like George Will and Jennifer Rubin.

What is a real conservative?  We can start by naming a few: Adam Smith, Edmund Burke, George Washington, Abraham Lincoln, and Dwight Eisenhower.  All of these have given warning about the order of men that is not to be trusted.

Adam Smith warned about those who live by profit.  Edmund Burke warned about the folly of not allowing the colonies to govern themselves.  George Washington warned about factions and about foreign entanglements (letting both friends and enemies control our judgment).  Abraham Lincoln stated that we had to think anew with new circumstances.  Dwight Eisenhower warned about the military-industrial complex.

The best way to counter these false conservatives is to vote in each and every election.  These false conservatives do all they can to dissuade people from voting from gerrymandering to false statements about their opponents.

Until such time as real conservatives appear on the scene, I’ll just have to keep voting for Democrats.  I don’t support many of the issues of the Democrats, but these issues are not so destructive of our country as the issues proclaimed by false conservatives.

Shame on Wisconsin stay-aways

In the election for a Wisconsin Supreme Court Judge, Rebecca Dallet, a Democrat, beat Michael Screnock, a Republican, 56 to 44 percent.

No matter what your party affiliation is, this is very  bad news.  The turnout was 22 percent!!  This means that just over 12 percent of the voters supported Dallet with their time.

Don’t throw your vote away. Vote on 11/6

Odd year elections are decided by turnout more than the even year elections.  If you stay away, you are even more likely to get your least liked candidate.

If you live in Virginia, this applies very much to you.  It is a election that will be decided more by who stays away than by who shows up.  If you don’t live in Virginia but have friends or relatives in Virginia, please remind them to vote.

My wife, an election judge, thinks I am too negative with this sentiment.  But if I don’t shout it from the rooftops…

Staying home changes nothing, you must vote for change

“The real change will come when those who felt compelled to stand on principle and not participate in an election in which they felt they were being forced to choose between “the lesser of two evils” realize the staggering magnitude of the gap between those ‘two evils.’”
“Soul Survival in Trump’s Hell”, Charles Blow, New York Times, 2017-09-11.

Democracy: quote of the day

"Democracy is about majority rule, not majoritarian tyranny."

"Gandhi won't leave India", Gopalkrishna Gandhi, New York Times, 2017-08-14

We do have to be careful even about the phrase “majority rule”.  Does the majority rule about climate change?  If the majority is purple people do they get to rule that all orange people should leave the country?

“Majority rules” should be limited to the majority elects those who govern, not to each and every rule that a government makes.  And in our last election, a minority of those who voted determine who would become president.

Consider also that many corporations want to eliminate many rules that “the majority” made: rules about safety, rules about pollution, rules about…

Quote of the day: Why vote?

"Hillary Clinton didn’t inspire anyone. Why the hell stand in line if it’s just to vote for more of the same?"
- Unnamed union official
"Can the Democratic Party Find New Voters?", Timothy B. Edsall, New York Times, 2017-06-15

The only reason I voted for Clinton was that she was not Trump.  I can name several female politicians I would rather have seen on the ballot.  Maybe we'll see one of them on the presidential ballot in 2020.

“How to Stand Up to Trump and Win”

Nicholas Kristof gives several ideas about standing up to Trump in a New York Times article, 2017-04-13.  See https://www.nytimes.com/2017/04/13/opinion/how-to-stand-up-to-trump-and-win.html.

When I forwarded the link to my wife, I added the comment "Don’t just hold a sign. Experts share how to resist and get results.”

It can happen here!

Many of us think that the Constitution protects us from a dictatorship.  Unfortunately we are seeing signs of the possibility with Congress almost being in lockstep with the President and the Supreme Court becoming more subservient to the same ideology as the President and Congress.

Kurt Gödel, a mathematician and refugee from Hitler, studied the Constitution thoroughly in preparation for his citizenship.  He saw a flaw that his friends cautioned him not to mention it in his hearing.

The examiner sympathetically mentioned that what was happening under Hitler couldn’t happen here.  Gödel mentioned that he knew how it could.  His friends managed to quiet him down and he became a citizen.  See My Brain is Open by Paul Erdös.

How could it happen here?  The Constitution can be amended.  Could it be amended to give the President a life term, extend to the terms of Congress, abolish free speech,…?

Think of how much of the Constitution has already been corrupted by Supreme Court decisions:  Corporations as people, people becoming persons,…

Think of how Republicans are working hard to suppress voting or dilute the effect of any opposition.

All that is needed is for a hard-nosed party to take absolute control of Congress and three-quarters of the states.  Boom!  There goes our Constitution.

Only you can prevent it.  Vote thoughtfully in each and every election, from city council to state house to Congress to President.  You are our only bulwark against our loss of freedom.

Is Donald Trump a Threat to Democracy?

Steven Levitsky and Daniel Ziblatt wrote an article with the above title that was published in the New York Times, 2106-12-16 at
http://www.nytimes.com/2016/12/16/opinion/sunday/is-donald-trump-a-threat-to-democracy.html

I was surprised that a day later it was still open for comments with 1667.  I just had to put in my two cents with my the following comment.

"Let's stop blaming the system for the embarrassing low turnout, among the worst in the world, especially for a nation that regards itself as the greatest democracy in the world.

"Sure, many blocks to voting have been put up by corrupt, self-serving politicians. Sure, the "media" has spread many distorted stories that have discouraged many potential voters. But too many people willingly choose not to vote.

"What would the result have been if half the no- shows had actually voted? We really don't know. Maybe Clinton would have won. Maybe Trump might have done better than third to a defacto none of the above.

"Whatever elections come up next where you live, remind your friends and neighbors 'The only way You throw your vote away Is to stay away!'”

After I posted the above, I searched for “The only way You throw your vote away.  One of the top hits was https://justinegraykin.wordpress.com/2016/02/09/be-subversive-vote.  Justine posted a lot of right-on comments:

“If you fail to vote, you have only yourself to blame."
“Bad politicians are elected by Good People who don’t vote”
"If 99% of America showed up to vote, it wouldn’t matter what the 1% wanted.”
“Vote as if the future depends on it.  It does.”

She had a link to “HP Lovecraft Historical Society — Why settle for the lesser evil?”  As I had recently listened to a “To the best of our knowledge” podcast on HP Lovecraft http://www.ttbook.org/book/hp-lovecraft.  I thought I would check the link out.  Unfortunately, it was broken.  But I did find https://cthulhuforamerica.com/.  Among the pictures is hooded figures holding signs for “Cthulhu for President 2016, Vote best evil”.  Cthulhu was a deep sea monster in one or more of Lovecraft’s stories.

What would have happened if there had been a massive vote for Cthulhu?  If Cthulhu won, the election would have to go to the runner-up because Cthulhu doesn’t exist?  But what if somebody had adopted that name?

I think this kind of tomfoolery indicates that we should have far better candidates running: people who truly want to make the U.S. a country for all of us rather than stoke their own egos or be in the pockets of the 1%.

Day-o! Day-o! Daylight comes and me want to go vote!

See http://www.nytimes.com/2016/11/07/opinion/campaign-stops/harry-belafonte-what-do-we-have-to-lose-everything.html.

I’m sorry I didn’t post this earlier, but Harry Belafonte was spot on that if we don’t vote, we lose.

2016 turnout seems to be super…

… now if we can only continue that each and every election day.

My wife is a precinct judge, and based on her text reports on turnout, that precinct may have over 90% turnout.  I think her figures are for those who voted today.  Considering the number of early voters in Duluth and elsewhere, many areas of the country may have over 90% turnout.

Now if we could only get all eligible voters to turn out for each and every election, not just presidential elections.

If you are eligible to vote in the U.S. I hope you show up or showed up to vote today.  If you are reading this before the polls close and have not voted, I hope you make a point of voting before they close.

Quotes of the Day, misdirected politics

 “It’s just more about getting the other people than worrying about the American people.” Christine Etima, quoted in "Immersed in the election, but unable to vote", Duluth News Tribune, 2016-11-05

"But not making a choice — sitting out the election — is to turn our fate over to others."  Ann McFeatters, Duluth News Tribune, 2016-11-06

If you don’t vote, you have only yourself to blame

Originally published in
Reader Weekly
October 28, 2004

The U.S. is still considered a democracy.  The word comes from the Greek demos for people and kratein for rule.  It means the people rule.  If you don’t vote, how can you rule?

Democracy has been interpreted as majority rule.  But no president has ever been elected by a majority of the adult population.  Before the 1860’s few blacks could vote.  Before 1920 few women could vote (Wyoming territory being the exception in 1869).  Since 1932 the voter turnouts have never been greater than sixty-three percent (1).

That high was in 1960 when John F. Kennedy won with 34,227,096 votes to Richard M. Nixon’s 34,108,546, a difference of 118,550.  However, over 40 million people did not vote!  More people stayed away than voted for either candidate. (2)

Ronald Reagan supposedly had a landslide victory in 1980 over Jimmy Carter.  The voter turnout was less than 53 percent.  If you consider that less than 28 percent of the eligible voters voted for Ronald Reagan, he did not have a mandate.  Almost twice as many people stayed away as voted for Jimmy Carter.

Bill Clinton had five million votes more than Bob Dole in 1992 but the turnout was 55 percent.  Fewer voters might have shown up if Ross Perot hadn’t run and won almost 20 million votes, more than half of those that went to Bob Dole.  Even then 84 million people stayed away, giving Bill Clinton a plurality of 27 percent, a lower plurality than Ronald Reagan who also had a three-way race.

Even if you don’t like any of the presidential candidates, vote.  You don’t have to mark a vote for every office.  A lot of people skip voting for judges or conservation district commissioners, why not skip voting for president?  Leaving a blank presidential ballot shows you care enough to show up, and you get counted in the vote totals.

Many people blame Ralph Nader for Bush winning in Florida in 2000.  Nader got 97,588 votes and the difference between Bush’s and Gore’s totals was 537 votes (3).  However, over three million of Florida’s eligible voters did not even show up at the polls (4).  That is, more people stayed away than voted for either Bush or Gore.

In no midterm election since 1974 have more than forty percent of the adult population voted (2).  Midterm congresses aren’t the best money can buy; they are the result of extreme voter apathy.

You can vote strategically, you can vote tactically, but vote.  You can vote because of an overall result you want; say you want one party to dominate in Congress.  Therefore you wouldn’t vote for a third party candidate you respect.  Or, you can vote because you want a specific person in Congress.  Therefore you would vote for a third party candidate or a “major” party candidate in a party different than the party you want to dominate in Congress.  Either way, vote

You think Bush should be punished for the mess he made and that Kerry shouldn’t get the blame when he tries to fix it.  So vote for Bush, but vote.

You think that Bush has done a marvelous job, then especially in Minnesota you should vote.

You think Bush should not be rewarded for the mess he made and that Kerry can clean it up.  So vote for Kerry, but vote.

You think Hilary Rodham Clinton should be president in 2008.  If so, Kerry should not be president.  But don’t stay away, vote.

You think Hilary Rodham Clinton should not be president in 2008.  So vote for Kerry, but vote.

Do you think the make up of the Supreme Court is important?

Do you consider yourself patriotic?

Do you think the country is on the right track?

Do you think the country is on the wrong track?

For any of these reasons, vote.

You can’t get time off from work to vote?  Wrong, by law (in Minnesota) your employer must allow you paid time off to vote.  It’s your future, vote.

You can’t get a ride to the polls to vote?  Call for a ride.  (Sorry, I have no current phone numbers for these, but you can probably find some party info on facebook.  Look for your party of choice at the municipal or Congressional district level.)

OK Northlanders!  Let’s show we care about our country.  Let’s have over 90% turnout of the voting age population on November 2, 2004 (as of this re-posting, November 8, 2016).

VOTE!

(1) World Almanac 1998
(2) "National Voter Turnout in Federal Elections: 1960-1996", Federal Election Commission (http://www.fec.gov/pages/htmlto5.htm)
(3) “Nader Has Impact on Presidency”, Associated Press, posted at http://quest.cjonline.com/stories/123100/nad_nader.shtml (The connection to the server was reset while the page was loading.)
(4) “Who took votes from whom?” http://magree.blogspot.com/2010/12/who-took-votes-from-whom.html

©2004, 2006, 2007, 2008, 2016 Melvyn D. Magree

Is Donald Trump the ISIS candidate?

No, I don't mean that Donald Trump is a supporter of ISIS.  But he is certainly doing just what ISIS wants.  His attacks on Muslims bolsters ISIS's claim that the West is at war with Islam.  The more Trump rails against Muslims in general, he helps recruit disillusioned or disaffected Muslims to join ISIS or to carry out attacks in the West.  The more attacks, the more people like Donald Trump will over-react.  The more over-reaction, the more recruits and the more attacks.

The only counter to a vicious cycle is a virtuous cycle.  Probably the best tactic is to out-Qur'an ISIS, especially considering some of their camps don't even have copies of the Qur-an.  Consider that few in ISIS even know "...and you should forgive and overlook: Do you not like God to forgive you?” (Qur’an: Surah 24, v. 22)

The few don’t represent ‘the people’

Despite a claim to the contrary in the May 11 letter, “Flood of letters makes the answer clear on Central’s fate,” the “people” have not spoken about the fate of Duluth’s Central High property. A large number of letter writers have made their opinions known, but they are only a small minority of all the people of Duluth.

This is like saying the people have spoken because of a large turnout at a hearing on an ATV trail or on clean water.

This is worse than saying a politician won in a landslide with a turnout of less than 60 percent. Even if the vote for the politician was 60 percent, that means 64 percent of the voters either voted for someone else or didn’t make the effort to show up

At least in an election, all the people have the opportunity to show up. In a hearing or in letters to the editor, only a few [can] participate. The few, no matter the view, do not represent “the people.”

Letter to the Editor, published in the Duluth News Tribune, 2016-05-17

P. S.  I didn't think to include "the people have spoken" is about as bad as the "People's Republic of ..."

Raucous Caucus and Other Ruckuses

The Party of One held its caucus in front of my fireplace.  Mysteriously, it issued the following results:  None of the above, Bernie Sanders, and Hillary Clinton.  The Party of One caucus called on all of its members to not vote for any Republican except Arne Carlson or Bill Frenzel.  Unfortunately, Bill Frenzel died two years ago, but Arne Carlson is alive and writing.  See governorcarlson.blogspot.com for what he thinks of Trump, Fox, and MSNBC.

Trump's plurality is not the lock on the nomination that so many news stories imply.  Cruz and Rubio could unite as President/VP and have the majority of delegates.  Either of the two could run as President but Rubio running as President may have a benefit.  This choice defuses the issue of Cruz's birthplace.  But if such a duo is finalized, Cruz will more than likely be the Presidential candidate because as of this writing he has more delegates than Rubio.  Do you think the same “birthers” that tried to make an issue of Obama’s birth will make an issue of Cruz’s birth?

There is a campaign by Credo Action to get CBS to stop giving so much coverage to Donald Trump.  An email from Credo Action quotes CBS CEO Les Moonves: Trump’s campaign “may not be good for America, but it’s damn good for CBS.”  The email also quotes CBS’s diversity and tolerance policy: “CBS Corporation, and its divisions are committed to building an environment that values diversity throughout the corporation and in its business practices.”

Personally, I think watching televised debates or even TV news is a waste of time.

I last watched Presidential debates in 2004.  I got so sick of John Kerry repeating “in my plan” that I almost didn’t vote for him.  I only voted for him because he was better than the alternative.  Bush was an angel compared to the angry clowns trying to outdo each other in shouting matches.  And Bush as a former governor and a sitting president had far more credibility and experience than an erratic businessman who has made a career of putting people down.  Remember “You’re fired!”

Watching TV news is unproductive time.  I can read more news items in a half-hour in a newspaper than I can get in a half-hour TV news broadcast.  Plus, I can skip ads in the newspaper but it’s hard to skip the twelve minutes of ads in a TV newscast.

My Party of One caucus was a lot less crowded than my wife’s DFL caucus.  She spent a lot of time driving around looking for a parking place, then she had to stand in line to even enter the building, and then she couldn’t get into the room for her precinct.  The best she could do was write her choice for president on a little slip of paper.  She had wanted to submit a couple of resolutions.  This is democracy?

I keep wondering why so many states have partisan primaries or caucuses that are open to the public.  I think it was Robert La Follette of Wisconsin over a century ago who thought that primaries would make elections more democratic.  I think it has had two downsides.  People who don’t give time or a dime to a party get to decide its candidates.  Second, it makes for much longer campaigns.

Many point to Canada and Britain as examples of “six-week campaigns”, but both of these are parliamentary systems.  My deadline precludes doing further research on this, but I think two factors are at work here.

First, elections are not held on a regular cycle.  Often, a prime minister may decide to call elections to try to get more support for his positions.  These irregular elections have to take place in a relatively short time.  If a government does sit for its whole term, people are just in the habit of holding elections in a short period of time.

Second, even though voting for a member of parliament may be a proxy for the prime minister, the members are possibly only willing to campaign for a short period of time.  Few are the times that we have two-year-long all-out campaigns for local and state governments.

I do wish our so-called “debates” were debates in the classical sense: rather than moderators posing questions to each of the “debaters”, one of the candidates would speak for a certain amount of time on whatever topic he or she chose.  The other candidate (or candidates) could either rebut the first candidate’s remarks or go on to another subject.  Assuming only two candidates, the first would have a shorter period of time to rebut the second.  This is more or less how the Lincoln-Douglas debates were held.  Unfortunately, few people today would be willing to stand the hour-plus time of a single debate, or even sit that long.

It is ironic that the party that thought the federal government should work to abolish slavery is now the party that promotes segregation.  “Because we think it a wrong, we propose a course of policy that shall deal with it as a wrong.”  - Abraham Lincoln, Quincy, Illinois, 13 October 1858.

Whatever your choices are in November, be sure to vote.  Your vote always counts.  You only throw your vote away if you stay away.

Also posted in the Reader Weekly of 2016-03-10 at http://duluthreader.com/articles/2016/03/10/6854_raucous_caucus_and_other_ruckuses.

Iconoclastic ideas (or mysteries)

 “I would love to talk to people, and say ‘Why do you need so much money?’ And why do people say it’s so admirable? I think the world has gone quite mad.” - John Cleese as reported by Lee Schafer, Star Tribune, 2016-02-17.

I haven’t yet gone back to “Dark Money”, the book I mentioned last week, but I keep wondering why so many exorbitantly rich have so much money to slosh around that they spend exorbitant sums to ensure that they get even more.  When one has hundreds of billions of dollars, what’s a hundred billion or two less?

What is galling is that many claim they earned it, every penny.  But how many people worked for a pittance or even a decent salary to create and implement the ideas to earn this money?  Often several thousand people showed up every day to bring in that money while the billionaire was jetting here and there on vacation or attending a conference to rail against taxes and government, the same taxes and the same government that subsidizes many of their enterprises.  For example, I’ve seen estimates that every Walmart store costs government entities one million dollars a year.

Many who want strict adherence to the Constitution seem to forget "Regulate commerce among states" and "establish a post office”.

The Republicans and their giant-corp backers are doing their best to nullify the EPA rule about emissions.  Are these polluters keeping their emissions in the state where they are produced?  If any of these emissions go to another state, then the President is right to regulate this commerce in emissions.

The Republicans seem to be bending over backwards to dis-establish the Post Office.  The latest gimmick was to impose far greater requirements on pension funding than many corporations get by with.  The last I looked my Unisys pension was funded at 77 percent.  I exaggerate, but it seems like the Republicans want the Postal Service to be fully-funded on pensions for employees who have not even been hired yet.

I really don’t know what a “fair share” of taxes is, but it is a mystery how many people want perfect infra-structure, immediate arrest of all criminals, and bombing of countries far, far away but do not want to pay any taxes for any of these.  Is there a correlation between complaints about government and complaints about burdensome taxes?

A good case in point is the following headline: “Wisconsin crackdown on repeat drunken drivers will cost taxpayers”, Mark Sommerhauser, Wisconsin State Journal, published in the Duluth News Tribune, 2016-02-19.  Duh!?  What is the cost to taxpayers of the death and destruction caused by drunken drivers?  I submit that it is quite a bit higher than the cost of the crackdown.  In other words, spend what seems too much to prevent something that costs even more.  Even that crackdown on fourth offenders may be too soft. Sweden had or maybe still has tough drunk driving laws: first offense was two years in jail, even for members of Parliament.

Why does Clinton have to be president so we finally have a woman president?  Amy Klobuchar or Elizabeth Warren are much better choices, but neither seems to be interested.

Why do we have reach out across (fill-in the blank) lines?  Can’t we just be nice to everybody.  I hold doors for others, they hold doors for me.  Rodney King said, “Can’t we all just get along.”

We do have to reform or at least neutralize people who judge people by factors which have nothing to do with a given situation.

Right now many established and respected media are giving misleading information.  Clinton “won” in Nevada and Trump “won” in South Carolina.  I posted a comment on a New York Times article; the article made no reference to the actual delegates gained. Sorry, I didn’t note the article.  Interestingly, my comment was not posted for all to see.  At least, as I write this hours later, I have not been emailed that my comment was posted.

Well, Trump did win in South Carolina because the South Carolina Republican primary is winner take-all.  He “won” with less than a third of the vote.  However, in Nevada, Clinton received 22 delegates and Sanders received 16 delegates.  Oops, another source gives 19-15, and yet another shows a spread of about 600 votes.  Sorry, I’m visiting so many sites to get to the truth that I have forgotten where I found which figures.  Clinton does have an advantage because of super-delegates, elected and party officials who are automatically delegates to the convention.  The super-delegates are overwhelmingly pro-Clinton.

One of these sources was “How many delegates do Trump, Clinton need to win? What's the delegate count for each candidate?” by Jonathan D. Salant at http://www.nj.com/politics/index.ssf/2016/02/how_many_delegates_do_hillary_clinton_and_donald_t.html.

Let's skip caucuses and primaries and even do away with political parties.  Even though the writers of the Constitution warned about factions, they soon split into them.  The most famous being the long feud between Thomas Jefferson and John Adams.

Let’s start at the local level.  Let each registered voter send in a nomination for each position by email or mail.  Rank the nominations by number of votes; those who are in the top half of the list go on to the next ballot.  Repeat as necessary until one is chosen. Named candidates can drop out at any time.

Some may say that this is too expensive and subject to fraud.  Isn’t the low turnout expensive to our society?  Supposedly we already have too much fraud if you believe those who demand onerous restrictions on voting.

The only vote that doesn’t count is the vote not cast.

Also in the Reader Weekly of Duluth on 2015-02-25 at http://duluthreader.com/articles/2016/02/25/6797_iconoclastic_ideas_or_mysteries.

Voting choices

As I was balancing my checkbook, I noticed that a payment that I had sent last week had not been debited to my account.  I wondered if it was corporate slowness on the part of the recipient or a less efficient postal service.  That led me to think how too many Republicans are trying to make the postal service inefficient.

From that I thought about the voter mantra of “choosing the lesser of two evils”.   Isn’t that a bit harsh?  Shouldn’t it be “choosing the lesser of two incompetents”?

Who decides? The many or the money?

Keith Ellison, U.S. Representative for Minnesota’s 5th Congressional District, wrote a good “Counterpoint” in today’s Star Tribune - “Minnesota Values Deserve Our Support”.

My favorite line is “…the voices of the many, not the money, should govern our democracy.”

If you are a U. S. citizen, I hope you have Tuesday, November 4, 2014 on your calendar to remind you to vote.  In fact, be sure that the first Tuesday after the first Monday in November is on your calendar for every year.  Local and state officials need your electoral support, too.

Proof of poor education system

From my note pile:

We must have a poor education system.  Just look at the quality of the politicians and at the judgment of the voters who keep electing them again and again.