"Blow up the bags of sham" – Jean Arp
So, last night: Glad the debates are over. Glad this one went as it did. Whether or not one agreed with Biden on policy, he talked sense. He was clear and spoke on stuff most people understand. It was a standard yet solid political performance. In a “normal” debate, he’d get a 7. Against Trump,…
Thursday Notes: Well, we are at a point in the election where seemingly there isn’t a lot we can do. Wrong. The other day Jo Reid likened the end of a campaign with the final length of a foot race. No runner wanting to win a race looks at the finish line as the end…
Lately, there has been a rash of interest in term-limits for both appointed and elected officials. The death of Ruth Bader Ginsburg prompted discussions about the wisdom of term-limits for appointed offices. Senator Diane Feinstein’s detachment from the times that we live in led to talk of term-limits for elected officials. On the surface, term-limits…
Today’s Comment is my November 2020 voters guide. While a lot of it focuses on California’s fall propositions, I encourage those of you living outside of California to plow through this. What happens in California now is either happening or will happen where you live. But before I get to the propositions, let me knock…
In the very early hours of Friday morning, the White House announced that Donald and Melania Trump tested positive for COVID. The immediate response by many was something a little short of schadenfreude. People were not quite taking pleasure in Trump’s bad news. The response was more like satisfactory scorn. After listening to ten-month long…
Today’s Washington Post has a wonderful article on postal workers responding to Trump’s attempt to sabotage USPS with some quiet civil disobedience. In a strange twist on protest, postal workers are showing their dissent by doing their job, something Trump does not want them to do. Mechanics in New York drew out the dismantling and…
There are thousands of people like Carter Williams out there, people who change people’s lives for the better, but most of us never have heard of. We know and pay attention to the deaths of a John Lewis or RBG, as we should, but folks like Williams pass on and get little attention, unless one…
Polls do not predict things. They measure the answers to specific questions. about certain topics, usually how someone feels about someone or something (candidate, policy, breakfast cereal) and what their intentions are (vote, not vote, buy, not buy). A pollster quantifies the answers are quantified. There is no soothsaying in what is quantified. Polls are…
This week saw a revival of concern about Trump “refusing to leave office” if he loses the election. The concern is based on a series of articles, starting with a piece in the Atlantic by Barton Gellman, and Trump’s own refusal to commit to a peaceful transfer of power. In the past, I’ve attacked the…
On Friday, around 5 p.m. Pacific time, my phone started buzzing. Every text said the same thing, “RBG died.” I turned to my friend Julian and told him. “Are you sure?” he asked. I went to my Washington Post app and the news covered the screen. I held the screen for Julian to see, “Yup.”…