4) Seeing Obama this time around makes it even more striking how off he was last time around.
5) In addition to wishing Obama had pounced on Romney for having no answer on pay discrimination aside from the free hand of the market, a quick reference to the difference between actually knowing and having a lifelong history of working with women vs. needing people to put together a binder of them for you would have been pretty awesome. Nobody found Hillary Clinton in a binder, but that actually might explain a lot about Sarah Palin.
6) There's probably no way to cram this into the pacing of the debate...but we could talk about the fact that Mitt Romney did not actually create Massachusetts from scratch? I find it pretty grating to watch him brag about successes that are the result of several hundred years of a political culture that values publicly funded education & equal opportunity. I'm guessing it's a lot harder to to get the best gender balance in high level state positions in the country if you start out in a state that isn't already the home of a lot of really successful women.
Wednesday, October 17, 2012
Tuesday, October 16, 2012
Debate!
Some random, rapid fire thoughts about the debate:
1) I wish Obama would have pointed out that Romney's answer to what he would do about pay discrimination for women was "nothing - the magical hand of the free market will fix it."
2) Mitt Romney really seems to have a strange but genuine hatred of single mothers. And China.
3) The amount of adrenaline on display in both the candidates is pretty spectacular. I feel like making coherent points in that kind of setting is probably one of those much harder than it looks kind of things.
1) I wish Obama would have pointed out that Romney's answer to what he would do about pay discrimination for women was "nothing - the magical hand of the free market will fix it."
2) Mitt Romney really seems to have a strange but genuine hatred of single mothers. And China.
3) The amount of adrenaline on display in both the candidates is pretty spectacular. I feel like making coherent points in that kind of setting is probably one of those much harder than it looks kind of things.
Saturday, October 13, 2012
Undecided
James Fallows is doing a series on undecided voters, under the general theme of "who the hell are these people?" which gives me a great opportunity to revisit my growing animosity towards people who call themselves fiscally conservative and socially liberal. So I'm brainstorming new, more accurate ways that this could be phrased:
"I don't like paying taxes, but I do like strippers and porn."
or
"I don't believe in funding the federal government, and the fact that this makes bigots and fundamentalists my most natural political allies has not yet led me to reexamine my views"
"I don't like paying taxes, but I do like strippers and porn."
or
"I don't believe in funding the federal government, and the fact that this makes bigots and fundamentalists my most natural political allies has not yet led me to reexamine my views"
Monday, June 4, 2012
Election tomorrow...
Good article on Prop 28: http://articles.latimes.com/
Best info on Hub Walsh/Casey Steed I've found, although it takes some commitment to get through it: http://www.mercedsunstar.com/2012/05/23/2357400/off-the-99-podcast-walsh-steed.html. Still not really sure who I'm going to vote for. They both sound like intelligent, conscientious guys.
Best info on Hub Walsh/Casey Steed I've found, although it takes some commitment to get through it: http://www.mercedsunstar.com/2012/05/23/2357400/off-the-99-podcast-walsh-steed.html. Still not really sure who I'm going to vote for. They both sound like intelligent, conscientious guys.
Sunday, June 3, 2012
Holy Jungle Primary Batman!
Hey, so the California primary election is Tuesday, and while it will probably be a pretty low turnout affair since both Presidential nomination contests are wrapped up, you should still vote...precisely because it's going to be a low turnout affair and that's when "they" try to pass really stupid, horrible laws through the initiative system and just generally try to ruin our lives.
Well not exactly, I can't actually say that either of the initiatives on the ballot this time are pure, raw evil...but they still deserve to be voted on by more than 30% of the voting population. On top of that, somewhat excitingly, this is going to be the first year in which California has a non-partisan primary...in November, instead of having a Democratic nominee and a Republican nominee to choose between in state legislature and congressional races, the candidates on the ballot will be the top two vote getters from the primary, whatever their party. I don't think this will matter much for Merced, since races here were pretty competitive already...but for someplace like San Francisco it could mean Nancy Pelosi facing serious competition from someone just slightly to her left or right. Or it could mean a massive clusterfuck of underinformed voters who don't even have the shortcut of voting for whichever party holds their loyalty. Anyways, since I know you're all waiting with baited breath, here's how I'll be voting....
Initiatives:
Prop 28 - Yes. This is one of those initiatives that sneaks through my policy against ever voting in favor of any initiatives by virtue of the fact that it undoes some of the evil of an earlier initiative by changing around the way term limits work. Right now, members of the state legislature typically start out in the assembly, stay there until they reach their maximum number of terms, and then afterwards have to compete to win one of a smaller number of seats in a slightly bigger district that may only overlap partially with their previous district to be elected to the state senate if they want to stay in government. This process serves very little purpose other than to confuse the incentives of ambitious young legislators (They're supposed to represent their constituents, but is that their current constituents or the ones they hope to have in just a few years? And should they view the representatives from neighboring districts as allies, or soon to be competition?) and make the assembly the subordinate to the senate in experience instead of equal. If Prop 28 passes, term limits will stay in effect, which is less than ideal, but at least individuals will be able to choose to make a career in either the assembly or the senate, instead of letting graduation from the first to the second be the de facto norm. It probably won't make a huge difference in governance, but I like the idea of my representative spending up to12 years really becoming an expert on the issues of my district...assuming that it's anyone I want to vote for in the first place.
Prop 29 - No. I mean, I hate cancer as much as the next person, but I have several issues with the way this law would work. First of all, the mindset that tries to pay for things that the government should theoretically be doing by getting one set of voters to approve a tax on people who are most likely not the ones voting annoys me. And it annoys me a couple dozen times as much if the tax is also regressive, which a tax on smokers is. I understand the desire to force people to stop smoking (or prevent them from starting) by raising the costs, and I guess there is good data out there that it's a strategy that works, but for some reason I tend to think more about the addicts who won't stop smoking but will now also have less money for their families...and I dunno, it doesn't seem quite fair to me. The real problem I have with this law though is that it would tie up yet another portion of California's tax revenue (sure, a new source of revenue, but it uses up a potential source of revenue that could theoretically be used for something else) for a purpose that marginally informed California voters thought "sounded good." Sure, cancer research is swell...but should we be increasing funding for it while we're slashing the budget for foster kids, people with disabilities, public health inspectors...you name it, we're slashing it? At the very least, that should be a decision that the state legislature has the flexibility to make, and possibly change its mind about in a few years if the economy changes, or if the program does not turn out as well as expected. The initiative process is way too inflexible a process to allow coherent budgeting if anyone can get something passed by identifying something that sounds good (cancer research!) and a group of people to pay for it who sound bad (smokers!), and that's why our state is fucked right now.
Congress:
District 16 - Jim Costa.
I'll cop to not having done nearly enough research on this one, but there's really just no way that I'd elect a Republican to congress, even in a jungle primary. And the one other Democrat who's challenging him doesn't seem to have a website, so yeah...moving on.
State Assembly:
District 21- Adam Gray, I guess.
This race is both interesting and not interesting at the same time. There seems to actually be some controversy, but a lot of it seems to be character based and it's really hard to judge that when you're talking about small time local candidates who only even have a couple of stories in the local newspaper. Adam Gray apparently never graduated from college, which doesn't really bother me at all, and may not have been completely honest about that, which might bother me a little bit, and then described his role working with university students at UC Merced in a way that might have been misleading...which I'd want to understand better before I formed an opinion on it one way or another, because frankly, the terminology could get pretty mixed up quite innocently, or also not so innocently. On the other hand, one of the other candidates might have gotten caught driving under the influence of an illegal substance. Or he might have gotten framed. Why can't they just disagree about property zoning laws, or something I have some hope of understanding? But I'm probably going to vote for Adam Gray despite woeful ignorance because he has a flashy website and seems like he could probably beat the Republican, and it might be all I'm hoping for right now is a dutiful cog in the Democratic machine. (Since no doubt the Republican, despite sounding like a pretty decent guy, would be a dutiful cog in his party's machine and set right to work defunding government).
Local:
Merced County Supervisor, District 2 - ???????
This may be the first election ever where I've gleaned a significant amount of information from lawn signs. Hub Walsh signs seem to correlate well with other signs that I approve of, and I've also seen them on apartment buildings...which I take as a point in his favor in an area where being against apartments and the people who live in them actually seems to be a viable political stance. His opponent, Casey Steed, does not keep quite as good of company in the world of lawn signs, and visiting his website I see discouraging things like a lot of hype about lowering salaries for board members...this is almost never a budgetarily significant amount of money and almost always a sign of a slash and burn attitude towards government. To be fair though, I don't really see the slash and burn approach in Steed's write ups on various issues. He comes across as a genuinely thoughtful guy, with a slightly Republican tinge to his thinking, but not nearly as reflexively as I was expecting based on where his lawn signs hang out. Hub Walsh's website is much more polished, and while it touches on some good things from my point of view (clean air, safe drinking water, transit, housing "options"), in the end it gives very little away, except that he's a well established guy not really sticking his neck out. So I'm actually a little torn. Steed is endorsed by the Republican party, but that's not a deal breaker for me in local level politics the way it is at the state or federal level, and I like the idea of thoughtful people in office and competitive local politics, so that may be enough to get him my vote. Especially since I'm feeling a little frustrated that in the two state level races I don't see much option except for to vote for the pre-decided, establishment Democrat. I can't quite commit to bucking my party tonight though...maybe I can find more info tomorrow.
Well not exactly, I can't actually say that either of the initiatives on the ballot this time are pure, raw evil...but they still deserve to be voted on by more than 30% of the voting population. On top of that, somewhat excitingly, this is going to be the first year in which California has a non-partisan primary...in November, instead of having a Democratic nominee and a Republican nominee to choose between in state legislature and congressional races, the candidates on the ballot will be the top two vote getters from the primary, whatever their party. I don't think this will matter much for Merced, since races here were pretty competitive already...but for someplace like San Francisco it could mean Nancy Pelosi facing serious competition from someone just slightly to her left or right. Or it could mean a massive clusterfuck of underinformed voters who don't even have the shortcut of voting for whichever party holds their loyalty. Anyways, since I know you're all waiting with baited breath, here's how I'll be voting....
Initiatives:
Prop 28 - Yes. This is one of those initiatives that sneaks through my policy against ever voting in favor of any initiatives by virtue of the fact that it undoes some of the evil of an earlier initiative by changing around the way term limits work. Right now, members of the state legislature typically start out in the assembly, stay there until they reach their maximum number of terms, and then afterwards have to compete to win one of a smaller number of seats in a slightly bigger district that may only overlap partially with their previous district to be elected to the state senate if they want to stay in government. This process serves very little purpose other than to confuse the incentives of ambitious young legislators (They're supposed to represent their constituents, but is that their current constituents or the ones they hope to have in just a few years? And should they view the representatives from neighboring districts as allies, or soon to be competition?) and make the assembly the subordinate to the senate in experience instead of equal. If Prop 28 passes, term limits will stay in effect, which is less than ideal, but at least individuals will be able to choose to make a career in either the assembly or the senate, instead of letting graduation from the first to the second be the de facto norm. It probably won't make a huge difference in governance, but I like the idea of my representative spending up to12 years really becoming an expert on the issues of my district...assuming that it's anyone I want to vote for in the first place.
Prop 29 - No. I mean, I hate cancer as much as the next person, but I have several issues with the way this law would work. First of all, the mindset that tries to pay for things that the government should theoretically be doing by getting one set of voters to approve a tax on people who are most likely not the ones voting annoys me. And it annoys me a couple dozen times as much if the tax is also regressive, which a tax on smokers is. I understand the desire to force people to stop smoking (or prevent them from starting) by raising the costs, and I guess there is good data out there that it's a strategy that works, but for some reason I tend to think more about the addicts who won't stop smoking but will now also have less money for their families...and I dunno, it doesn't seem quite fair to me. The real problem I have with this law though is that it would tie up yet another portion of California's tax revenue (sure, a new source of revenue, but it uses up a potential source of revenue that could theoretically be used for something else) for a purpose that marginally informed California voters thought "sounded good." Sure, cancer research is swell...but should we be increasing funding for it while we're slashing the budget for foster kids, people with disabilities, public health inspectors...you name it, we're slashing it? At the very least, that should be a decision that the state legislature has the flexibility to make, and possibly change its mind about in a few years if the economy changes, or if the program does not turn out as well as expected. The initiative process is way too inflexible a process to allow coherent budgeting if anyone can get something passed by identifying something that sounds good (cancer research!) and a group of people to pay for it who sound bad (smokers!), and that's why our state is fucked right now.
Congress:
District 16 - Jim Costa.
I'll cop to not having done nearly enough research on this one, but there's really just no way that I'd elect a Republican to congress, even in a jungle primary. And the one other Democrat who's challenging him doesn't seem to have a website, so yeah...moving on.
State Assembly:
District 21- Adam Gray, I guess.
This race is both interesting and not interesting at the same time. There seems to actually be some controversy, but a lot of it seems to be character based and it's really hard to judge that when you're talking about small time local candidates who only even have a couple of stories in the local newspaper. Adam Gray apparently never graduated from college, which doesn't really bother me at all, and may not have been completely honest about that, which might bother me a little bit, and then described his role working with university students at UC Merced in a way that might have been misleading...which I'd want to understand better before I formed an opinion on it one way or another, because frankly, the terminology could get pretty mixed up quite innocently, or also not so innocently. On the other hand, one of the other candidates might have gotten caught driving under the influence of an illegal substance. Or he might have gotten framed. Why can't they just disagree about property zoning laws, or something I have some hope of understanding? But I'm probably going to vote for Adam Gray despite woeful ignorance because he has a flashy website and seems like he could probably beat the Republican, and it might be all I'm hoping for right now is a dutiful cog in the Democratic machine. (Since no doubt the Republican, despite sounding like a pretty decent guy, would be a dutiful cog in his party's machine and set right to work defunding government).
Local:
Merced County Supervisor, District 2 - ???????
This may be the first election ever where I've gleaned a significant amount of information from lawn signs. Hub Walsh signs seem to correlate well with other signs that I approve of, and I've also seen them on apartment buildings...which I take as a point in his favor in an area where being against apartments and the people who live in them actually seems to be a viable political stance. His opponent, Casey Steed, does not keep quite as good of company in the world of lawn signs, and visiting his website I see discouraging things like a lot of hype about lowering salaries for board members...this is almost never a budgetarily significant amount of money and almost always a sign of a slash and burn attitude towards government. To be fair though, I don't really see the slash and burn approach in Steed's write ups on various issues. He comes across as a genuinely thoughtful guy, with a slightly Republican tinge to his thinking, but not nearly as reflexively as I was expecting based on where his lawn signs hang out. Hub Walsh's website is much more polished, and while it touches on some good things from my point of view (clean air, safe drinking water, transit, housing "options"), in the end it gives very little away, except that he's a well established guy not really sticking his neck out. So I'm actually a little torn. Steed is endorsed by the Republican party, but that's not a deal breaker for me in local level politics the way it is at the state or federal level, and I like the idea of thoughtful people in office and competitive local politics, so that may be enough to get him my vote. Especially since I'm feeling a little frustrated that in the two state level races I don't see much option except for to vote for the pre-decided, establishment Democrat. I can't quite commit to bucking my party tonight though...maybe I can find more info tomorrow.
Tuesday, May 15, 2012
Game of Thrones
I don't have anything too particularly interesting to say about Game of Thrones lately, except that I kind of hate the characters they've created to be Robb and Jon's love interests. I mean, it doesn't help that they're only in scenes with Robb or Jon, who were already characters I was wishing the show could just forget about already. Has either shown an ounce of personality this whole time? But now they've gone and inserted these uninteresting, implausible women to share screen time with them...and damnit, I want that screen time back and replaced with one of the Lannisters.
One of the best parts of the series, in my opinion, is the way that it handles womens' roles in a medieval setting. Between Cersei, Sansa, Margaery, and even Myrcella you have a pretty broad theme going on with the reality of arranged marriage, the variety of ways that different characters adapt to the limits of their autonomy, and how they manage to scrounge some power and influence regardless. Even Daenerys, who most of the time is also a character I wish would just toss her screen time back into the pot and get out of the way, is cool to watch as she negotiates the possibility that she could make a strategic match for herself with the guy from Qarth, if she chose to, since her royal lineage is the one thing that his money can't buy otherwise. In contrast, I feel like Florence Nightingale of Westeros and that Eskimo girl ought to be prancing about in comic book style leather bikinis (maybe Eskimo girl's could include a fur cape, for realism) based on the amount that they represent any kind of realistic depiction of the kind of dilemmas that women would face in that kind of society. They're nothing but foils for the already boring male characters they're meant to attract, and it shows, and I'm really hoping they die next episode. (That's the one good thing about the show, if you really truly hate a character, there's at least a 50/50 chance they'll die soon...if only that didn't also apply to the ones you like).
One of the best parts of the series, in my opinion, is the way that it handles womens' roles in a medieval setting. Between Cersei, Sansa, Margaery, and even Myrcella you have a pretty broad theme going on with the reality of arranged marriage, the variety of ways that different characters adapt to the limits of their autonomy, and how they manage to scrounge some power and influence regardless. Even Daenerys, who most of the time is also a character I wish would just toss her screen time back into the pot and get out of the way, is cool to watch as she negotiates the possibility that she could make a strategic match for herself with the guy from Qarth, if she chose to, since her royal lineage is the one thing that his money can't buy otherwise. In contrast, I feel like Florence Nightingale of Westeros and that Eskimo girl ought to be prancing about in comic book style leather bikinis (maybe Eskimo girl's could include a fur cape, for realism) based on the amount that they represent any kind of realistic depiction of the kind of dilemmas that women would face in that kind of society. They're nothing but foils for the already boring male characters they're meant to attract, and it shows, and I'm really hoping they die next episode. (That's the one good thing about the show, if you really truly hate a character, there's at least a 50/50 chance they'll die soon...if only that didn't also apply to the ones you like).
Thursday, May 10, 2012
Prep School
So it turns out Mitt Romney was kind of an asshole when he was younger. I mean, I actually have pretty mixed feelings about the whole anti-bullying fervor that's so prominent right now. I'm not a fan of bullies by any means, but I also feel like it doesn't take much courage or introspection to be against one thirteen year old kid beating up another thirteen year old kid, and that it's kind of telling that that's the kind of anti-gay discrimination that we've decided to fixate on. Plus, based on my own memories of middle school...relationships between kids are complex. Sometimes it's the kid throwing the punch that's been picked on the most, and sometimes mockery is a type of self defense too. Or it's a type of flirtation. Or it's who knows what. It doesn't really seem like a situation where a zero tolerance policy is applicable, and the kids I knew at least would be hard to divide up simplistically into victims or perpetrators.
On the other hand, there is nothing particularly complex about a gang of guys pinning another one down to cut his hair. I don't think it even particularly matters if Romney thought the guy was gay. This was the 1960s after all, long hair was a big deal back then, and it seems just as likely that Romney was showing off his political intolerance. Mostly though I think it shows a sense of humor that's surprisingly lacking in empathy towards other people (or animals...nobody would know that story about the dog if he didn't think it was hilarious).
Anyways, I wasn't going to vote for him anyways, so it doesn't really matter.
On the other hand, there is nothing particularly complex about a gang of guys pinning another one down to cut his hair. I don't think it even particularly matters if Romney thought the guy was gay. This was the 1960s after all, long hair was a big deal back then, and it seems just as likely that Romney was showing off his political intolerance. Mostly though I think it shows a sense of humor that's surprisingly lacking in empathy towards other people (or animals...nobody would know that story about the dog if he didn't think it was hilarious).
Anyways, I wasn't going to vote for him anyways, so it doesn't really matter.
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