Observations Along The Road... at Dreamwidth

I haven’t done a “news chum” post in ages, but this seems strangely appropriate to do here, on my blog, as opposed to Facebook. In recent years, I’ve moved much of my comments on news and stuff over to Facebook. Today’s chum is about Facebook, and it seemed just to, well, meta, to comment about it directly on Facebook. The universe might implode, or something like that.

The news today is that Meta is getting rid of fact checking. According to the CNN article, they are “replacing them with user-generated “community notes,” similar to Elon Musk’s X”. They are doing this to supposedly address the perception of censorship (never mind that as a private organization, that term really doesn’t apply), and the feeling from the right that fact checking is used more to suppress posts from the right than from the left. [Of course, the flaw in that argument is that non-factually posts are equally distributed across the political spectrum, and that tends not to be the case: in other words, the far right has posts fact-checked more because they are posting more posts that are loose with the facts.]

I’m sure that, in response to this, folks are going to be kermit-hand-waving (think of that GIF) and stating they are going to flee FB. But are the other services better in this? I searched to see what Bluesky is doing, and they are doing the community notes as well. In general, Bluesky’s moderation seems to be community based and report based, and you choose the moderation that you want as opposed to a blanket enforcement of a policy. Is that better? Hard to say. It just looks like the appeal of services like Bluesky and Mastodon is that they aren’t owned by folks that are sucking up to Trump, as opposed to something specific in the service. But the same “better ownership” model would also apply to the post-Livejournal services such as Dreamwidth — and Dreamwidth has the advantage of being able to limit audiences and writing longer-form pieces.

I’ve never quite gotten the hang of X, Threads, or Mastodon. I’m not into the short-form posts that Twitter encouraged, and it also seems like everything is publicly shouted into the wind, hoping to find an audience (which hash-tags help with, but those aren’t working as well these days thanks to idiotic overuse). More folks I know moved over to Bluesky, but what I see there is mostly political articles and other article sharing. There’s much less sharing of what is happing with the person. The things that you might talk about between friends — what we used to have on the blogging services — is still primarily on Facebook. That’s also where the mass of people still are.

So this is a long form way of saying: Despite its flaws, the personal stuff is likely staying on Facebook, unless there is a mass exodus of my friends moving that stuff elsewhere. I’m not seeing it on Bluesky. I might return to more news chum posts, and then sharing blog posts across multiple services, as a way of finding out where those communities have moved to.

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Words, words, words!
I’m so sick of words
I get words all day through
First from him, now from you
Is that all you blighters can do?
(“Show Me” from My Fair Lady, M/L: Lerner and Loewe)

Words, words, words (and their underlying concepts): we use them everyday, but as they say in The Princess Bride: “You keep using that word. I do not think it means what you think it means.” Here are some articles that have passed through my various RSS feeds and sources of late that relate to words/concepts, and their use/misuse:

1. Words You May Be Using Wrong. This is an interesting summary of a scientific paper that explores 50 terms that people regularly confuse and use wrong. For example, there is a significant difference between asocial and antisocial, and most people use the latter when they mean the former. Envy and jealousy are similarly confused. Race and ethnicity. Serial killers vs mass murderers. Quite an interesting read.
2. Lost Words That Deserve a Comeback. Here’s another interesting word list: 30 Lost English Words that Deserve a Comeback. We had a good example of such a word in the last few days: dotard (meaning “an old person, especially one who has become weak or senile”). I’m not sure that’s the word I would have used.  Sillytonian seems better to me (A silly or gullible person, esp. one considered as belonging to a notional sect of such people). In any case, it is worth reading the list.
3. Open and Closed Minded. Speaking of Sillytonian people, one of the major complaints about that group is that they are so closed minded (but they would say the same about us). But what does it mean to be open or closed mined. Here’s an exploration of 7 significant ways you can tell open from closed minded. For example, closed-minded people don’t want their ideas challenged. They are typically frustrated that they can’t get the other person to agree with them instead of curious as to why the other person disagrees. Where are you on that spectrum?
4. Infinities of Infinities. Infinity is a concept that has fascinated me since high school. The math surrounding the concept is so weird: ∞ + ∞, for example, equals ∞. The infinity of all even numbers is the same as the infinity of all numbers. However, for the longest time, we have believed that the infinity of all rational numbers (that is, those that can be represented by a fraction of two integers) was actually smaller than the infinity of all numbers including transcendental numbers (i.e., the real numbers like π that can’t be represented by a fraction). It now appears that we were wrong, and all infinities are equal. I expect this is something we’ll keep seeing come back, because it is in someways counter-intuitive, like the ever-present Monty Hall Problem.

Words, words, words!
I’m so sick of words
I get words all day through
First from him, now from you
Is that all you blighters can do?

P.S.: If you like words, here’s a newly discovered Kurt Vonnegut short story.

This entry was originally posted on Observations Along The Road (on cahighways.org) as this entry by cahwyguy. Although you can comment on DW, please make comments on original post at the Wordpress blog using the link below; you can sign in with your LJ, FB, or a myriad of other accounts. There are currently comments on the Wordpress blog. PS: If you see share buttons above, note that they do not work outside of the Wordpress blog.

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We’ve had the rock and roll, so how about some sex and drugs before the next writeup. Here’s is some news chum I found particularly interesting in these areas:

Sex

Three interesting articles related to the subject of sex:

• Bespoke Porn. Technology changes the porn industry. As free porn has become increasingly available on the Internet through sites like Pornhub, the primary industry in the San Fernando Valley — porn — has been hurt. When people don’t pay, how are actors to earn a living? The answer is a bit of a surprise: Bespoke Porn. What this means is porn specifically made for one individual for their particular tastes. This isn’t always the sex you think. The article notes cases of women fully clothed swatting flies or destroying stamp collections. To each their own; I find this interesting less for the sex aspect and more for the statement it makes about the larger industry.
• Cosplay Capers. The second article I found explores the trend for cosplayers (usually buxom young women) to create patreon pages where followers can pay to see even more risque photos (usually at the edge of R towards the S T U, but not getting as far as X or multiples thereof). I see this on FB: I have one friend that has befriended a bunch of cosplay models and comments on their pages; thus I see them promoting their patreons. It bothers me what such comments telegraph to others, but that’s neither here nor there. As for the evolution of cosplay, as long as this is the player’s choice I guess it is OK, but I can also see how such images play to the troublesome double standards we see in society.
• Sex on Stage. Here’s a fascinating article on intimacy directors: that is, those individuals whose job it is to choreography intimacy onstage to make it believable, and yet not cross actors’ personal boundaries.

Drugs

Here are two articles related to … well, not quite drugs, but something that acts like a drug for the current generation: smartphones.

• Smartphones and the iGen. As I wrote in my last post, we’re dealing with a teen who constantly has her face in her phone: snapchat, youtube, constant selfies. We don’t think it is healthy, and this article gives some facts and statistics to confirm it. It leads to significant sleep deprevation and depression, and serves to isolate the generation from personal contact and interactions with friends (not in all cases, but as a general statistical sample). It really is an interesting read.  Here’s an example of such a statistic: “All screen activities are linked to less happiness, and all nonscreen activities are linked to more happiness. Eighth-graders who spend 10 or more hours a week on social media are 56 percent more likely to say they’re unhappy than those who devote less time to social media. Admittedly, 10 hours a week is a lot. But those who spend six to nine hours a week on social media are still 47 percent more likely to say they are unhappy than those who use social media even less. The opposite is true of in-person interactions. Those who spend an above-average amount of time with their friends in person are 20 percent less likely to say they’re unhappy than those who hang out for a below-average amount of time.”
• Sinister Screens. Here’s a shorter article that addresses the same subject, and again an interesting quote: Brain-imaging studies have shown that the dopamine released when users are getting their technology fix is akin to what is seen in other forms of addiction — one of the reasons Peter Whybrow, director of UCLA’s Semel Institute for Neuroscience and Human Behavior, has referred to digital technology as “electronic cocaine.”

Bringing It All Together

Now, think about these articles in the large. Are we creating a generation that finds intimacy online through individualized porn and patreon girls? Is this an unanticipated side effect of the growth of the Internet? What does that say about society as a whole?

This entry was originally posted on Observations Along The Road (on cahighways.org) as this entry by cahwyguy. Although you can comment on DW, please make comments on original post at the Wordpress blog using the link below; you can sign in with your LJ, FB, or a myriad of other accounts. There are currently comments on the Wordpress blog. PS: If you see share buttons above, note that they do not work outside of the Wordpress blog.

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We all have fears. Some find strength in them. Some let them shape their lives.

Fear, thy name is Apple.

This post, of course, is brought to you by the letters “i”, “t”, “u”, “n”, “e”, and “s”. Put them together, and they spell “iTunes” — the reason for this musing, especially after reading an article titled “How iTunes built, and then broke, my meticulous music-listening system“. I’m one of those folks: curing my iTunes library, making sure the meta-data is right, the album art reflects the version of the album I have — for all of my 40,000+ songs (yes, I’ve crossed the 40K song mark). Although the article discusses the problem of iTunes with newer devices, I’m dependent on the software to sync with my modded iPod Classic (512GB storage). I’ve even stayed on iTunes 11, because I know that will work with the device. I will never get an iPhone, because that would mean upgrading iTunes — and we all know that will spell doom.

So what are my fears?

Well, my iPods could die. I’d still have the music of course: tracks lovingly downloaded, ripped from CDs, recorded by hand from LPs, extracted from videos. Most of the music not available elsewhere digitally. But that’s why I have a backup iPod Classic. Primero and Segundo. Prime.

But what if iTunes 11 no longer works when I move eventually to Windows 10. How will I sync my music? How will I move everything to another library system. I really do not want my music in the cloud. There are so many places where streaming just does not work. Not to mention, of course, that it is MY music. I paid for it, I should be the only one to control it.

That, by the way, is why I tend to buy digital music from Amazon, but not use Amazon Music.

This brings us to the problem with MP3 download collections. Unlike CDs or LPs, there’s nothing tangible. Nothing to pass on. It is in a fixed format that might not be supported in the future. Then what? Pay for your music again, if you can find it. I can still listen to LPs from almost 80 years ago (alas, I can’t deal with 78s). We can still listen to CDs from 30 years ago. 30 years ago, the MP3 format didn’t exist.

30 years from now, how will we listen to our expensive MP3 downloads? We will probably still be able to find CD players (although forget those CD-ROMs you recorded — they’re likely toast now). We’ll find the cassette players, and LP players. But will our computers still be able to play MP3s? Ask yourself this: Could you open a Wordstar file?

So a big fear of my: My music won’t age well with me. Of course, in 30 years I’ll be 87. I probably will have forgotten how to use a computer. Hopefully, my iPod Classics will still be working 🙂

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Inspired by some podcasts I’ve been listening to and some articles I’ve been reading, here are some deep questions:

• Is cereal a soup? After all, soup is food in a nutritious liquid.  [Corollary: Is oatmeal stew?] (inspired by this)
• Is a taco a sandwich? After all, when you take a single slice of bread, put PB&J on one side, and fold it over, it is still a sandwich. (inspired by this)
• Is a Snuggie a blanket or clothing? (inspired by this)
• Is a cheesecake or a tart a pie? [Corollary #1: Is pizza a pie?] [Corollary #2: Is yellowcake a cake?] (inspired by this)

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There’s an old joke that goes: There are 10 types of people in this world, those that see the world in binary, and those who…

I’m here all week folks. Try the Haddock sandwich. It’s delicious. Early in the week.

But seriously, there are significant dichotomies in thinking in this country — so much so that purple America has all but disappeared. We divide ourselves into conservatives vs. liberals, Democrats vs. Republicans, Trump-lovers and Trump-haters, Red States and Blue States, and we no longer meet in the middle.

This was driven home by a post by Mark Evanier that I read over lunch, which talked about two types of healthcare providers: Those who are in it primarily for the money and those who are in it primarily to help people. He said it’s very important that when two or more doctors open an office together, they all be from the same mindset. He drew a similar dichotomy regarding the health care political debate:

There’s a bit of an analogy between the two kinds of doctors and the two kinds of politicians now debating health care. It’s not exact but certainly, the problem faced by anyone trying to craft an Obamacare replacement is that they’re trying to negotiate a compromise between two parties working at cross-purposes. One side doesn’t care if 10-20 million people lose their insurance and tens of millions more see whopping price increases. They don’t care as long as it doesn’t rebound on them politically…which it will. I don’t see how you arrive at a workable plan if you need to simultaneously please those who want a good government-monitored health care system and those who don’t.

I’ve noted a somewhat similar divide between conservatives and liberals — and note these are generalizations. Conservatives appear to be focused on what is in it for them: what will make their business stronger, what will increase their self-wealth, what will increase their self wealth even more if they become wealthy (the musical 1776 captured it well: they would rather plan for the possibility of being rich, than face the reality of being poor). Thus, they want to reduce corporate taxes, they want to reduce personal taxes, they want everything to be back on the individual and be the product of hard work and hard work alone. Work is its reward; a corollary  of that is no work, no reward. Liberals, on the other hand, think about the other first. They don’t have a problem with taking a little from everyone to help those without — be it welfare, the elderly, the veterans, providing training. Raise up all of society and everyone wins, not just me. Different attitudes, different to reconcile.

That difficulty in reconciliation is playing out in a lack of toleration. Whereas in the past we might have written off the dichotomy because we liked the person even if we hated the attitude; today, we’re quick to drop the ban hammer. Perhaps it is because Facebook and other social media make it so much easier to find new friends that don’t require the mental toleration effort. When faced with a friend with whom you continually butt heads, there’s not a lot of penalty by just ignoring them, by “unfriending” them on social media, by banning them from everyday contact — relegating them to be brief person-to-person contact where you feign politeness. I know I have to fight that tendency — I know there are friends who will constantly respond to my articles and disagree, and other friends for whom reading just raises the blood pressure. I’m sure some of them will comment on this disputing my points.

I’m perhaps too idealistic to believe that the conservative side has no empathy, no concern about others. Perhaps the circle they care about is smaller, perhaps their end goal is the same and we disagree only on the means to get there. But then again, perhaps they are just in it for themselves, and caring is only a veneer. But even when faced with that evidence — and we’ve seen it in a few leaders — it just goes against my fundamentals. But then again, a common complaint in college was that I was too nice.

But whether the “other side”, however, you see it, is good, pretending to be good, pretending to be evil, or is pure evil, we need to find a way to work things out and meet in the middle. Unlike some other countries, the two state solution is not an option for the USA (and there’s now even a debate as to whether it is even an option elsewhere).

This entry was originally posted on Observations Along The Road (on cahighways.org) as this entry by cahwyguy. Although you can comment on DW, please make comments on original post at the Wordpress blog using the link below; you can sign in with your LJ, FB, or a myriad of other accounts. There are currently comments on the Wordpress blog. PS: If you see share buttons above, note that they do not work outside of the Wordpress blog.

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As you may know, I vanpool to work. I’ve been doing so since the early 1990s; I’m currently the operator of the van. This means that I lease the van from the vanpool company, collect the fares monthly from my passengers, and pay the lease. We get a nice incentive from LA Metro for keeping our van at least 70% full, and my employer takes care of fueling the van for us (although we pay for the fuel and the fuel attendant). Riders who work at my employer get a tax-free credit of what they pay for the vanpool to a maximum $255 a month as an IRS credit. Combine this with lower insurance costs for driving less, and I actually save money by living further away from work and not driving my personal vehicle.

One of the downsides, however, is I periodically have to find new riders (PS: If you commute from the northern San Fernando Valley to El Segundo, (Vride Finder; on the Metro Finder, enter start 91324, end 90245 and we’re van “Tribure/Chimineas Northridge  91325” Van 1645) working 7am to 330pm M-F, 📲 call me or 📧 email me or PM me if you are on FB). So my virtual ears picked up when I read an article today about how to encourage employees to not use their personal vehicles.

The answer: eliminate the subsidy that employers get for providing parking, and make employees pay to park. Keep the subsidies for transit and car/vanpools. Quoting from the article:

Among the more galling subsidies, writes Susan Balding at Greater Greater Washington, are commuter parking benefits. Many employers provide free parking as a perk, and the federal tax code allows car commuters to write off up to $255 a month in parking expenses.

Thanks to a change in the law in 2015, transit riders can write off the same amount, but the impact is overwhelmed by the traffic-inducing effect of the parking benefit. Baldwin says if we’re going to make a dent in congestion in major cities, parking subsidies have got to go:

And this:

Parking benefits, you likely won’t be surprised to hear, also drive up congestion. And beyond that, they leave governments with even less money to repair roads and keep up public transit systems: As of 2014, the parking benefit translated into about $7 billion a year in lost tax revenue (because the money used toward the benefit is not taxed). To put that in perspective, the Federal Transit Administration’s total appropriations in 2016 came to just over $11 billion.

Now taking transit can be time consuming. One article shows that transit, unless you have a convenient route, can take twice as long as driving. But carpooling and vanpooling doesn’t have that problem (well, unless you’re like our van, and we run a surface street route to make it easier for our riders — this adds about 1/2 hr on the valley end). Quoting from that article:

For New York metro residents who take public transportation, a door-to-door commute averages about 51 minutes. That’s much longer than the 29 minutes typically spent by those who drive alone. Similar discrepancies exist around Los Angeles, where despite the region’s traffic woes, drivers arrive at work an average of 22 minutes faster than public transportation riders. In nearly every metro area, driving to work remains far quicker than using a bus or train, taking less than half as long in some places.

So, here’s my question to you: If you had to pay to park at work, with no subsidies, would that encourage you to take transit, carpool, or vanpool?

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According to Donald Trump, we’re in a war. But this is not the war against ISIS; it is not the war against terrorism. But it is a war for the soul of America.

Let me explain. An article in the LA Times this morning had the headline: “The real goal of Trump’s executive orders: Reduce the number of immigrants in the U.S.” Why does Trump want to do this? Here’s how the article starts:

Behind President Trump’s efforts to step up deportations and block travel from seven mostly Muslim countries lies a goal that reaches far beyond any immediate terrorism threat: a desire to reshape American demographics for the long term and keep out people who Trump and senior aides believe will not assimilate.

In pursuit of that goal, Trump in his first weeks in office has launched the most dramatic effort in decades to reduce the country’s foreign-born population and set in motion what could become a generational shift in the ethnic makeup of the U.S.

Think about it this way: Before the 1960s, what was the goal of immigrants? To blend in. To become part of the American culture, to melt into the great American melting pot and become indistinguishable from everyone else. Distinctive cultural traditions were lost: this was the era of Reform Judaism and religious practice that looked like Christian practice. It was white bread — everyone blending in. Comfortable conformity. This is the era where the White Man was superior. It is also the era to which much of small town America aspires: it is in many ways the epitome of small town America. This is the era that Trump, and many of his followers, pine for.

When you look at the post-1960 era — and especially what America has become — it is best expressed by a phrase from that era: “Black is Beautiful”. We celebrate our distinct culture. It is the era of Black Studies and Women Studies and Asian Studies in college. It is the era of wearing our religious identity “in your face”: hijabs, kippot, turbans, all are beautiful. We celebrate our origins and we keep them separate. We are no longer a homogenous melting pot with a uniform flavor: we are a diverse multiflavored broth where you can taste every distinct flavor. We don’t hide our diversity, we insist and treasure it.  We insist on it at work because it makes us better thinkers. We work to make up for past mistakes with affirmative action programs and providing extra advantages to classes previously disadvantaged — all so we can have more diversity. We don’t want our immigrants to assimilate and blend in. We want them to stand out, celebrate their origins, and be diverse.

[ETA: In a comment on Facebook, I used this analogy: Think of America as a large box of crayons of all colors. The Trump Administration wants to go back to the melting pot: where these crayons are melted together (assimilated) into a single homogeneous color, all the same. He is protesting the approach of the recent generations, which is to recognize that while we are all crayons, it is the variety of colors that makes us beautiful and stronger.]

President Trump, his advisors, and all their followers hate this. Their answer: reduce those immigrant groups that won’t assimilate into the whole. The Mexicans. The Muslims. (and I wouldn’t be surprised if he didn’t go after the Orthodox Jews at some point, the Amish having been here far too long). How do we do this? Hmmm, just look at those executive orders.

(Psst. There was once another leader in the 1930s who wanted a similar goal for his nation. We know how that ended, especially for those groups that were different.)

Seeing the truth is the key. Pay no attention to the man behind the curtain.

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According to the LA Times, President Trump is conquering conservatives at CPAC. They state that his dominance at the forum, the Conservative Political Action Conference, is hard to miss. Even those who do not agree with all of Trump’s ideas seemed pleased with the excitement in the halls of the waterfront convention center outside Washington. And they believed he was winning over the conservative movement, even if Trump has historically low popularity ratings with the wider public.

So, here’s my question: Do Conservatives really believe that:

1. We should deny anyone the right to an attorney and the ability to defend themselves when faced with deportation?
2. We should permit public officials to personally profit — beyond their legal salaries — from their public office?
3. We should permit states to have the right to dictate where people can go to the bathroom, but not what they can do recreationally, even when the people have voted to permit a particular behavior?
4. The right to practice my religion can interfere with your right to practice your religion (and vice-versa)?
5. The government has the right to impose one religion’s beliefs on someone else?
6. The government should take away rights and privileges that have been granted to US citizens?
7. The government should not treat all people equally, and ensure freedom from discrimination based on skin color, sex, religion, or any other factor that has been used to discriminate?
8. The government does not have an interest in ensuring the citizens of the United States have clean air to breath, clean water to drink, and clean soil in which to grow crops?
9. The government does not have in interest in ensuring that medicine distributed in the US is safe and effective, and that food is safe to eat?
10. Use of nuclear energy should be permitted everywhere, without suitable oversight?
11. When Federal tax dollars are distributed to educational institutions, that those funds must be used within the bounds of what is legal under the Constitution?
12. The government does not have an interest to ensure that workers are safe, get paid on time, and are not taken advantage of by large employers?
13. The government does not have an interest in ensuring infrastructure and public spaces exist that benefits the nation, and that might not be profitably operated by a private concern?
14. The individual states should not work together for their mutual benefit?
15. A free press is the enemy of the people, and we should restrict the press to only agree with the government?
16. Some people are inferior to other people?
17. People cannot speak out when they disagree with what the government is doing?
18. Standards for ethics and integral behavior are different depending on the political party of a public servant?
19. It is acceptable for a foreign government to provide things of financial value to actually or potentially influence the behavior of a public servant?
20. Is it reasonable to allow anonymous whistleblowers of government abuse, as long as facts are confirmed independently before any prosecution?

If you believe in one or more of these, please let me know which ones and a strong rationale of why you hold that opinion.

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A few articles in the political news today caught my eye, and appear to demonstrate a disturbing pattern:

• A Pattern of “Yes” Men in his Administration. This news item from the NY Times describes how Pres. Trump overruled his newly minted secretary of state, Rex W. Tillerson, and rejected the secretary’s choice for his deputy at the department, Elliott Abrams, a conservative who had served under President Ronald Reagan and President George W. Bush. This leaves Tillerson without a trained assisted to help guide the first-time government official around the State Department headquarters. But what is really interesting is why Trump rejected him. According to the article, the rejection came after Trump learned of Mr. Abrams’s pointed criticisms of the president when he was running for president, the administration official said. Among those criticisms was a column headlined “When You Can’t Stand Your Candidate,” which appeared in May 2016 in The Weekly Standard. You don’t back Trump, you don’t get the job. Never a good sign when the President surrounds himself with “yes” men.
• A Pattern of Nepotism for Advantage. In the same article was a discussion about how the leading candidate for Solicitor General, Charles J. Cooper, said he was withdrawing as a possible nominee for solicitor general of the United States “after witnessing the treatment of my friend Jeff Sessions,” who was approved as attorney general Wednesday evening after bruising attacks by Senate Democrats over his civil rights record. What’s interesting here is not the criticism issue from the Senate, but who is left. According to the article, “His withdrawal appears to leave George T. Conway, a New York lawyer who is married to Kellyanne Conway, a top White House aide, as the leading contender for solicitor general.” Let’s see, his Secretary of Transportation is married to Mitch McConnell. His Solicitor General would be marred to Conway. No problem there.
• A Pattern with Judges. Also in the NY Times was an interesting op-ed from Sen. Chuck Schumer on Judge Neil Gorsuch. The article noted how the Judge refused to answer questions regarding his positions on various past cases, or even how the Constitution would be interpreted. From this, Schumer had a very interesting observation: “As I sat with Judge Gorsuch, a disconcerting feeling came over me that I had been through this before — and I soon realized I had, with Judge John G. Roberts Jr. He was similarly charming, polished and erudite. Like Neil Gorsuch, he played the part of a model jurist. And just like Neil Gorsuch, he asserted his independence, claiming to be a judge who simply called “balls and strikes,” unbiased by both ideology and politics. When Judge Roberts became Justice Roberts, we learned that we had been duped by an activist judge. The Roberts court systematically and almost immediately shifted to the right, violating longstanding precedent with its rulings in Citizens United and in Shelby v. Holder, which gutted the Voting Rights Act.”
• A Pattern of Racism. An article on Vox explored why Pres. Trump keeps referring to Sen. Elizabeth Warren as “Pocahontas”. It is a reference to her run for Senate and a claim that she had been told she had Native American relatives in her past, but insufficient to claim membership in the appropriate tribe. Although Warren told the story, there is no record she ever tried to use that status to her advantage. The pattern here? According to Vox: “Trump’s use of this particular nickname combines several of his worst habits: his inability to let perceived insults slide, his bullying mockery of opponents — and most of all, his general cluelessness on race issues. Trump has decades of racist statements and behavior under his belt. He has a particularly bad habit of essentializing people based on their heritage or ethnicity. Just look at his repeated comments alleging that federal judge Gonzalo Curiel, who presided over two class action suits against Trump University, is biased against Trump because of his Mexican heritage. (Curiel is American, born in Indiana to Mexican immigrants.) Conflating all Native Americans with “Pocahontas” is another example of Trump’s racist habits.”Trump’s inability to discern the difference between Sen. Warren and Pocahontas is no accident,” Cherokee Nation citizen Mary Kathryn Nagle told MSNBC’s Adam Howard. “Instead, his attack on her native identity reflects a dominant American culture that has made every effort to diminish native women to nothing other than a fantastical, oversexualized, Disney character.”

Some of Trump’s patterns appear to be biting him in his orange tush:

• Violations of the Logan Act. Federal law prohibits private citizens from conducting diplomacy with foreign nations. But, according to the NY Times, that is exactly what current National Security Advisor Michael Flynn did. Specifically, he discussed lifting of Russian Sanctions with Russia before his confirmation, while still a private citizen. Even more significantly, he lied about doing so to Congress, and apparently, so did VP Mike Pence.  From the article: “Federal officials who have read the transcript of the call were surprised by Mr. Flynn’s comments, since he would have known that American eavesdroppers closely monitor such calls. They were even more surprised that Mr. Trump’s team publicly denied that the topics of conversation included sanctions. The call is the latest example of how Mr. Trump’s advisers have come under scrutiny from American counterintelligence officials. The F.B.I. is also investigating Mr. Trump’s former campaign chairman, Paul Manafort; Carter Page, a businessman and former foreign policy adviser to the campaign; and Roger Stone, a longtime Republican operative.” Pence’s inclusion is interesting — it could provide the opportunity to impeach and remove Pence, get an acceptable replacement VP, and then get Trump removed or resigned. Worked for Richard Nixon.
• Violation of Federal Ethics Law. Federal law prohibits administration officials from promoting or endorsing a private business. Yet that is exactly what Kellyanne Conway did when she told people to go buy Ivanka Trump’s products. She has supposedly been “counseled” about this. Related to this is the President’s behavior itself. The Stop Trading on Congressional Knowledge Act, or STOCK Act, was intended to close a loophole to prevent legislators from using nonpublic information for private profit or engaging in insider trading. But a lesser known section, 18 U.S. Code § 227, also restricts the president and vice president from using their office to influence or make threats about an employment practice of any private company, especially if it’s solely driven by partisan political feelings. The section of the law that applies is sufficiently broad, says Markovic, who has written on the Trump conflicts issues, to extend to other employment decisions such as vendors or independent contractors like Ivanka Trump.

It is interesting how the Obama administration was relatively scandal-free; certainly after months and months of investigations, nothing was proved. Here, there is loads of evidence of scandal — in just three weeks — but nary a single investigation. I guess it isn’t wrong if it is done by a member of your own party.

Yeah. Right.

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