Omicron Thoughts

 The announcement of a new variant of Covid apparently has the world in a tizzy.  It is thought to be more infectious than the prior ones but as far as I can tell not more lethal.

As it spreads a bit we see reactions from countries and questions as to whether the vaccines will be effective.

Not being a scientist I'm in no position to know but that isn't stopping anyone else so here's my opinion.

The vaccine will be less effective until they modify it.

It is unlikely to be more lethal but it has some different symptoms.

It is becoming much like our present day flus, new variants every year that will require new vaccines.

Like the flu it will always be potentially lethal but like the flu, which was extremely virulent at first it will be part of the background noise.

There will be more and better treatment options as we go.

Mask wearing in public will be more common.

Just my thoughts.

Thoughts

I was watching on the news a group of about 20 white nationalists march in a local town on Saturday.  It was very unclear what the reason was and they marched, waved flags shouted some nonsense and eventually went home or maybe out.  

I guess the chant about how they will not be replaced might be the most relevant to why they marched.  They will be replaced, we all will, but they mean they want to be replaced by more white people.  They should stay home and make babies if that is the case.

The distinctions they make are absurd really.  White people do not represent a separate piece of the human race.  It's also a flexible group which used to exclude many people who are now welcome with open arms 

I don't know about these individual marchers but most of them looked like they wouldn't turn down a date with almost anyone even if it involved race purity.

Human nature being what it is, when people are placed in close proximity to each other there is interaction.  Hating a group is easy, haring an individual is harder.  Once you think of them as people the fight is pretty much over.

The replacements are likely to be a darker shade of pale.                                                                                                                                            

Modern Life

 Considering world history and archeological records we live in a unique time and place.  Generally, we are safe from surprise attack simply because we exist.

We aren't really safe but the kind of thing we lived with throughout world history where an invading army would attack our city, capture it, kill or enslave most of its population and force it to pay heavy tribute is not something we expect to happen.

It does still happen in some parts of the world where warlords have control but I can go to sleep pretty sure I'm not going to wake up as Viking, Huns, Goths, Mongols or any number of other raiders devastate my city.

It's not as far away as all that if you consider tactics used in recent wars.

We talk about slavery as a horrible crime and in this country we associate with our treatment of African captives, but throughout history it was more widespread.  Romans enslaved an unknown but sizable number of men and women from the areas they captured and used them for various purposes.

They were still slaves whether they were assigned to salt quarries or someone's household.

The idea that you could be a respected citizen of you city or village only to be stripped of everything and walked off in chains the next day is not a real possibility..

We get to squabble over pronouns.

Price Fluctuations

 Yesterday for a number of reasons, including a new Covid variant, impacts on the stock market and oil prices.  Oil was impacted by potential decrease in activity because of the new variant, extra oil going on the market from the Strategic reserve and then the traders covering positions once the price moved.  

We really should be reducing our use of oil on a long range but interestingly during the Pandemic last year many people crowed about how the reduced usage wa good for the planet.  It sort of was but not much, it was a one year blip, that led to very low prices and a minor reduction in emissions.

We don't realy have a shortage of oil, we simply have speculators bidding the price up or down based on potential changes.  If they are convinced oil is going up they buy at current prices to sell later at a profit.  The reverse is also true.

If we had an actual shortage, we would have lines to get oil and some places would have none.

Just speculation and greed.

Seasonal Work

For some reason this is Black Friday, not a celebration of Black culture but simply a day that shoppers buy so much that the bottom line of many stores goes into the black, or profitable.

That's a statistical measurement and not an actual one.  I would suspect it describes very few stores.  There is no doubt that the Christmas season is very significant to retail and therefore also to their distribution chains.  I have fond memories of this time of year going way back to when I worked part time jobs in High School.  It was a good way to make a little money, and I do mean little, while being part of a bustling world where everything was sort of critical.  I used to work in a shipping department of a high-end clothing store folding clothes for shipping.  The customers were often people I had heard of and everything had to get packaged and shipped in time for Christmas delivery.  

Thinking back I remember it as a fun time although on the first day the head of the department literally took out a bull whip and cracked it over our heads.  I didn't think he would ever actually use it but some of my fellow workers said he would.  It provided a buzz and a lot of conversation, an ice breaker and it ended up providing us seasonal workers something in common.   

I was impressed with how well he handled it.

Today he would probably be charged with harassment.

That was a different world.

 

A Day of Thanks

Today is a day we give Thaks and we have a lot to be thankful for.  Not everything is perfect but it never has been. 

Still we 're not mired in a long ground war in Asia, Jobs are plentiful and while still active we have tools to combat the pandemic.  We also are finally starting to fix our infrastructure and hopefully address problems facing the American families.

Oil prices jumped as demand returned and the demand for goods have led to some supply chain bottlenecks.  Those things will quickly pass in the scheme of things.

We have a long way to go to address climate change and the faster we start the better.  At least we realize it's a problem. 

Some point to the historical stories of pilgrims and Indians and say it never happened the way we tell it.

Not sure why I would care, we know didn't treat native Americans very well but giving thanks for what is happening today is unrelated.

I think we can take one day out of the year to count our blessings.

After the Weekend people can get back to bickering.

Human Infrastructure

 How much has the interstate highway system been worth to the country over its existence?  I don't know if it can be measured but it has provided better access, better ability for trucks to move cargo and ultimately safer driving.  It was a big cost for its time and fiscal conservatives said we didn't need it, but infrastructure does pay dividends.

We've already passed the physical infrastructure part but the human infrastructure part is still pending.  Providing services to all our residents helps to level the playing field for working families who otherwise couldn't afford child care 

We have terrible income inequality in this country and one way to combat that is to take social infrastructure and fund it with treasury funds.  This removes significant expenses so it amounts to an indirect pay raise for our middle and lower classes.  There is a squeeze on the Middle Class where they make to much to get certain benefits but not enough t afford them.  It forces tough decisions and problematic home life.

Investing in families is never a bad thing.  The more we can free up middle class people to pursue their dreams the more return we will see in family values and outcomes.  Problems will still exist but if all children get the preschool they need to compete, the health care and a better home life, we are certainly on the right track.

Midterms

 There is a year to go before the midterms but we knew the results right after the Presidential Election.  Of course this was based on prior performance which as every prospectus ever warns is not a guarantee of future performance.

Now we know that the off year elections didn't go that's mainly based on Virginia and New Jersey as far as I can tell.  The fact that the candidate in Virginia for the Democrats was a prior Governor but I think that's almost always a mistake.   You can't serve as Governor without making enemies (and friends) but the enemies are more motivated.  

Now thanks to a few situations like the supply chain backup and the gas prices we see low approval numbers for Biden.  So the election results predicted after the last election for the mid-terms are almost a certainty now.

They may turn out to be right but they may  go the other way.  There are some causes that might inspire more participation, which is generally bad for the Republicans.  Gas prices already started to come down and the comparison point with last year will soon reflect the initial price increases as covid decreased.

Covid is certainly alleviating but we need to push vaccination which will help a lot.

Supply chain is starting to catch up and in a few months won't be much of a story.  

The infrastructure plan is going to create jobs (and traffic jams) all over the country.

Assuming the build back better passes there will be some immediate relief to many Americans.

One might expect Biden's numbers to increase but we will see.

Remember the prediction was based on a solid sample.

Even though it didn't always hold up.

Legal Rules

Why do we vote for judges?  You would think that they should be non-political and selected based on Merit.  I recently had to vote on a whole bunch of judges that I really knew nothing about, so I defaulted to party lines.  I would like to think that they will distribute justice fairly and evenly without prejudice or bias, but I don't really know.   

I'm under the impression that this is not how most countries handle this.  In most European countries a council of experts reviews applicants and make recommendations to the appointing official. Can politics play a role?  Clearly it could but not as clearly as in this country.

Judges clearly need to know the law and the precedents as well as the rules of evidence.  Because of out precedent system, we have rules that often favor the defense.  Take the fruit of the poisoned tree theory.  This holds that if the police screw up part of an investigation, say illegal search or failure to obtain a proper warrant, the evidence obtained can not be used.  

This came about when the Supreme Court decided that no other remedy would serve to correct police misconduct.  Well what about the dangerous evidence that is no longer admissible?  There are two main parties involved, the accused and the public.  Police do represent the public but the public has very little to do with their behavior.  When evidence gets thrown out due to a technicality, the public is put at risk.  

The legal system is there to serve the public.  It serves it best by uncovering the truth.  When the truth is suppressed it is not doing its job.  

Really Just Gun Violence

 There are problems with our jury system, it can be unpredictable and arbitrary and perhaps the biggest issue is that the lawyers who represent the State and the Accused aren't often at the same skill level.

Its a relic of our feudal past when the only alternative was to leave it up to an even more arbitrary system.

Its hard to imagine a black man going to another state, carrying a rifle, exchanging taunts with a crowd, shooting three and killing one. being acquitted.  In fact its hard to believe he would have been allowed to walk away in the first place.

The people involved will have to live with their consciences and in some cases civil trials.  

Why this is even a political cause is odd.  No one opposes the jury system and while the judge may have been a bit biased, the trial was essentially fair.

The people of this country have to decide what sort of laws they want and maybe Wisconsin should look at its self defense statutes.

It isn't the first bad verdict and it won't be the last.  As long as the jury was working in good faith, it simply is.

Justice?

 We saw other examples of our criminal justice system last week.  We saw two men convicted in the murder of Malcom X exonerated after nearly 60 years and we saw another man found not guilty of murder though there is no doubt he killed two men.

Over the years we have seen many miscarriages of justice many of which we only know about because of subsequent corrections.  Of course it isn't much of a story to write the person committed the crime, was caught convicted and sentenced appropriately except maybe right after it happened. 

Most of the time the authorities get it right.  Often the cases are so shut and dry that they are resolved simply via plea bargains.  

Watching TV shows you might get the impression that many innocent people take plea bargains and if you ask incarcerated people they mostly claim they were innocent.  Most weren't.

Our system does at times convict innocent people and many of those people are poor minority people.  We however mostly get it right.  In fact we have many safeguards in place to protect defendants although most of them were put in place because of abuse.

In fact most of our criminal justice system runs on the barter system.  Suspects are simply trying to get the least amount of time while the authorities are mostly trying to get a conviction.  The victims generally are hardly involved in most of this although they may be asked to agree to the sentence.

It sort of works.  Sometimes it fails spectacularly.

Sedition?

 Last night in a performance designed to delay the House vote on the Build Back Better bill, the progressive half of Biden's agenda, the House leader of the Republicans set a record for talking while saying nothing.

It was a long meaningless thing and it accomplished nothing although it might have garnered some sound bites after editing.

The only goal, if there even was one, was to force the vote to the dead of night but that failed as the Democrats simply shifted the vote to Friday.

One could debate this bill, any bill really, but the opposition here simply opposes any Democratic initiative.  Its part of the slow laborious process to move this country into this century as far as taking care of our people and our climate.

At some point, either during the Clinton Administration or maybe the Obama one, the Republican party has one objective only, defeating the Democratic incumbent.  In a number of elections since then they were able to get vicories while losing the popular vote because of the electoral college.  

They also have a coordinated plan to entrench minority power via redistricting, suppressing hostile votes and allowing state legislatures to change outcome.

Its time the American people realized we are in the midst of a slow moving coup designed to destroy American Democracy.

Normal, not New

 There are people who believe the radical right's rhetoric about Joe Biden and how he s ineffective.  Well then how did he accomplish more in just 10 months than the prior occupant did in 4 years?

We are actually out of Afghanistan even if the exit looked a bit messy on TV.  Things happen, but we are no longer risking our young men.

We have seen a great decease in Covid although there are significant groups still refusing the Vaccine. Yes the vaccine did start under the prior administration but most of the country returned to mostly normal behavior.  

A lot of relief money was injected into the economy and i worked as unemployment has decreased and there are plenty of jobs available.  We have seen some price increases but with some exceptions people are shrugging that off as sales are showing strong increases.  

Wages are up and we haven't seen an influx of undocumented immigrants. While that problem is not sved, it may be unsolvable, the border is no worse than it was previously.

We now have a bi-partisan infrastructure bill that will fund needed improvements to infrastructure.  I get a kick out of right wing commentators who attack obscure provisions that mean almost nothing.  It will be a great improvement over the previous administration inability to get a bill introduced, let alone passed.

We are now getting close to passing the second part that will be a great benefit to the regular citizens of this country.  Interesting how the media played up all the negotiations as if they were destroying the administrations policies instead of the normal give and take of Washington politics. Maybe the last 4 years of near dictatorship confused them?

In the media everything is blown up out of proportion.  Life in America is returning to normal and we are entering a holiday season prosperous, with no wars and plans to combat climate change.

Isn't that what we want?

Inflation Reports

 Looking forward we can expect our inflation number to stay about the same if current prices also stay the same.  This is the year over year number we are so fond of and because it measures changes from 12 months ago, we already know last years input.  Since there was no significant increase last November, the year over year number will stay abut the same unless there is a significant change in current prices.  The base numbers started to increase earlier this year so figure 4 to 5 more months of inflation headlines.

If you want to know what is gong on now you really need to look at the monthly number measured against last month which was much lower than the year over year number.  

There is certainly inflation, there almost always is, and its higher than recent years but the surge in demand is unlikely to last past the holidays, although it might.

Our supply chain problems plus economic recovery or maybe just growth create upward price pressure.  How long will it take to resolve supply chain issues is dependent on having enough workers.

We may be seeing a demographic impact as the population ages and the workforce shrinks.  Working age population has been flat over the last few years while we see increases in elderly people, although we may need to redefine that.  

The only age demographic with significant growth ia elderly people.  

People live longer and become net drains on the economy instead of contributors.

We are seeing some decrease in savings but the cause for this is a bit uncertain until more data is available.

Crisis? Where?

 Apparently we are now in an "Inflation Crisis" according to some right wing publications.

This is based on a year over year measurement in October which showed a 6,2% increase from the prior October.  The core inflation which excludes oil and other volatile items was 4.2%.

That is up from what was a period of record low inflation but hardly seems the crisis, considering the fact that it is impacted by the supply chain issues and other events that won't last forever.  Or maybe they will.

Is it possible that the supply chain is simply irreparably damaged?

Is our national food industry irreparably broken?

It doesn't seem likely, although we are facing a shortage of workers as women seem unwilling to return to their old jobs and many people don't want to commute like they once did.

Adjustments are necessary and almost certainly will be made.  

Energy prices will decrease, as will food and import prices.

The eonomy always self corrects and right now it has to work through the Covid era.

We really seem to be in a chicken little world as everything is dramatically portrayed.

Just carry on, it will be fine.

Intentional Misinfomation

 I don't remember exactly when but at some point is some security briefing I remember being told how our enemies were intent on destroying us from within.  We were too strong for a direct attack but our openness made us vulnerable to various types of cyber attacks.

I look around at where society is today and think, they were successful.  The internal divisions have grown so deep that at least one side believes it will take violence to win.  I know that social media has opened the door to bad information and provided fuel for the fire of hatred they spawned.

I should probably start taking notes but I notice more and more how people on socal media attack the Government as a matter of course.  Gas prices are up, blame the Government, 

Its also true in network TV shows where the Government keeps secrets, covers up things and lies to the citizens for selfish purposes.  

It just seems too organized to be the work of a few conspiracy nuts  It also doesn't seem like what I would call normal opposition politics, unless of course they are at war.  Yes some of it is promoted by right wing news media which seems odd, but our foreign enemies don't want us to become them they want us to fight among ourselves.

They create issues out of no issues quite effectively.  One of the talking points they seem to be pushing is how oil and gas prices were influenced by canceling some pipeline projects.  Sounds almost reasonable until you realize those projects were not operational and could not impact the current prices.  Maybe future prices but the increase today is unrelated.

I watch a show on a local channel most morning called the new normal.  With very few exceptions they simply talk about previous practices, nothing new.  

We live in a pretty desirable age over all.  Our country is at peace, there are plenty of jobs, technology is reducing many headaches.  Some problems remain and some will always last.

The acrimony in our culture would imply things are falling apart.  For there to be such a disconnect between perception and reality, I suspect intent.  

Short Economic Analysis

 Starting in the 1970s more or less, the US entered a period of deregulation that has shaped our world today.  After World War 2 and during the period following we had significant Government regulation but economists and the Republican party (and some Democrats) argued that free market would reduce prices, increase production, create jobs and generally create growth.

The premise certainly worked in many ways, but the jobs weren't always here.  Take the electronics industry.  We pay a lot less for electronics than we would if they were American made.  So we stopped building televisions and started selling imported ones.  The consumer won but the electronics worker lost.  

This is still the era of free markets but free markets work when the playing field is level.  China was a great winner from this era as well as the American consumer.  Most of the job losses were in manufacturing states and more jobs were gained in service industries.

Is this model a bad one?  Well if you lost your job in manufacturing, not so much but if you work in Health Care or many other service industries, it was pretty good.

Now this continues while we also increased technology and complex service suppliers.  The odds are that your technology was manufactured elsewhere but your software wasn't.

Consider this a great leveling of resources where expensive unskilled labor can be found in cheaper locations.  This brings down our costs of products but leaves our unskilled labor unemployed.  

The obvious answer is to train them, but realistically, many of them don't want to be trained so the reality is they take low paying jobs, drink too much and resort to things like opioids.  They turn their resentment to visible targets, immigrants, liberals, and the coastal elites while still thinking the business owners and Republicans are their friends.  Well their hero, Ronald Reagan cost them dearly even if the trade bill was signed by Clinton.  

This will ultimately self correct for the nation but not for individuals.  The political consequences are a significant number of  discontented people who feel betrayed.

Maybe they were.

Lying With Factual Statistics

 Statistics are the best way to lie while reporting factual data.

Prices and wages for example vary over time.  Generally wages go up mare regularly but prices can have big decreases as well as increases.

So when the economy got disrupted a lot of prices fell as inventories needed to be sold off.  Some items became hard to get as demand for retail paper products didn't offset the fall in commercial products of the same type.

Pandemic restrictions led to any number of odd outcomes but there was less demand for many items while some had increased demand.

As we saw demand pick up and since production was reduced we started to see shortages.  Now we like to report statistics a certain way, so for example we saw significant inflation in October measure against last October.  That is factual.  

Now what do we know about last October?  Well ithad sen demand drop due to covid but otherwise not much.  We had seen during the pandemic signifcant decreases n some prices.  Inflation last October was reported at 1.18%.  Economists think 2%inflation is a healthy number.  

So are we in some sort of inflationary crisis?  Certainly not but it gives news people something to talk about.  That leads to some fairly wild speculation about causes. 

For example, stopping construction on a pipeline not yet in production does not impact it because, well it wasn't operational yet.  That could impact the future but it depends on whether the output has another way to get to market and if we even need the output.  

One of the things that I think isn't being covered is our labor shortages.  Many of our food industries are labor intensive and they need seasonal workers.  Seasonal workers have been disrupted via recent immigration policies.

Still a fairly short term increase in some prices is not a crisis for most people.

For some we have been in crisis mode already.  

National Service

 Today we honor the people who served and survived the experience.  They all gave up some period of their lives to serve this country.

The idea of serving the country is a good one.  Military service is clearly not for everyone but some form of mandatory service could go a long way to unifying this country.

Providing young people an opportunity to be productive, possible in exchange for college or trade training would allow them to get out of their comfort zones.  It would also make them engage with people different then them on an equal basis.

Assuming they could be used productively the country would benefit and so would they.  

Its been proposed before and is alsmost certainly not going to happen. 

Pity.

Inflation Thoughts

 Inflation is one of the ways that the economy self corrects itself over time.  Prices seldom go up uniformly so as prices of used cars rise, new cars get more popular and vice versa.  Of course when the cars are impacted by an outside issue like chip shortages you see less availability of new cars increasing the demand on used cars.

The outside pressure is the shortage of chip components.  

We see a big deal being made over the inflation numbers, but it still looks like a temporary increase that will fix itself once the supply issues sort themselves out.  Of course that is tricky and if you look at history all inflationary increases were temporary to some extent.

So how long will it last and is it really a problem?  The current surge in buying is to some extent pent up demand from the pandemic.  The pandemic also contributed to reduce supply as restrictions impacted production of certain items.  The pandemic also contributed to the backup of container ships as harbors were short of workers to process them.

There is probably enough pent up demand and a certain amount of relief buying to carry us into the next year.  Will the media coverage create additional political issues as they harp on the ruinous inflation?  Well it might.  Most Americans see some increase in gasoline.  Certain grocery items have also increased.  

As the various media harp on it, it leaves an impression.  Where I live the local news report every morning about what stations have the cheapest gasoline.  It certainly adds a sense of urgency to the whole situation.

An item of interest is when they tell us the price and say it is the highest since a past year.

That means it isn't the highest ever.

Polls Time Sensitive

 There are sure a lot of predictions being shared about the id-terms which are a full year away.  Some polls show Biden down and potential destroying his party's chances next year.  Of couse that is now and he was up last year so who really knows?

In science and the social sciences, there is a potential problem that when you do a study you impact it.  You are either manipulating the objects to study them or are influencing people you interview by your reactions, even if involuntary.  Its one of the things that makes polling a bit capricious.

People, at least most people want to tell you what you want to hear.  This might not even be conscious.  As a species fitting in is a good survival technique, it creates a safer space than being alone.  So when youget interviewed, with a few exceptions you are trying to feed back the right answers.  

Polling can be importan to a campaign telling it what is popular and what is not.  How predictive it is is another matter.  His popularity should increase now that the party has passed the infrastructure bill.  When these polls were taken the situation being ortrayed was how the Democrats were in disarray and possibly unable to pass anything..  . 

Now of course they have.

Thanks for the Infrastructure, More to Come

 President Biden is expected to sign the infrastructure bill today and it is a major achievement that many didn't think possible in today's Washington.  It passed in a bipartisan way although by no means evenly.  Some Republicans, a minority, voted for it and some Democrats, also a minority didn't vote for it.  Still it passed and billions of dollars are going to flow into all parts of this country to shore up infrastructure and create jobs.

The negative conservative media highlights that the country is doing badly but it really isn't.  Yes we have an increase in oil and gas due to the surge in economic activity worldwide, but a surge in economic activity is a very good thing.  We have record prices in the stock market, low unemployment although some people have left it, an exit from Afghanistan and some progress in climate issues. The surge in economic activity has led to a small increase in inflation which will likely recede soon as supply chains catch up.

Our radical conservative media has taken a surge in economic activity as we recover from covid and portrayed it as a problem.  Dealing with fast growth is a bit of a problem but its a good problem.  With the new bill and money flowing we may have to deal with fast growth a bit longer.

The next bill provides big improvements for the people of this country with most of it offset by taxes on wealthy people.  We are waiting on the congressional budget office to detail the impacts.  Passing it is the way to shore up families providing long needed family benefits to equalize opportunity to all our people.

Its a good start to the Holiday season.  America has a lot to be thankful for and its on the upswing.

Conspiracies?

 I think a lot about why people, at least some people, will believe outrageous claims about things the Government does while ignoring the actual data.

There have been a few instances where the Government, or a part of it, did bad things.  The study about syphilis is one but even that, while clearly racist, was believed by its proponents to have long term good impacts.  This doesn't excuse it, people were harmed and we should have known better, but it wasn't presented as an evil plot.

We also have treated the Native Americans badly over the years, but throughout history conquers have been cruel.  Similar to the way Africans and Asians were considered to be in the way of European Christians trying to civilize their lands we didn't take their needs into account.

The transgressions are fairly rare, although some think they are constant and if you believe the Government faked the moon landing or plotted to kill JFK you are probably too far into the ether to be reached.

There generally are no deep dark secrets although in the course of conducting Government business not everything is disclosed.  First it would be too voluminous and second what matters is the ultimate decision.

Think about some of the conspiracies so far.  They generally rely on a simple idea, the Government can't answer every possible question.  So is periods of Oswald's life are vague, what about that?  Could the moonshots have been faked?  Probably not with the technology of the time but now they could.  Ignore the fact that many nerds here were able to ping artifacts on the moon that would only be there if we were.

Ignore everything that proves you wrong and you can claim its still possible.

It isn't. 

Infrastructure half done

 Policies passed by the Government should favor the most Americans possible.  So a tax cut benefitting the richest should be a bad policy while infrastructure helping everyone should be good.

However, there seems to be a failure in communication.  The first was viewed by many Americans as a good thing because they got a small temporary decrease while the latter is viewed as excessive spending.

The fact that an infrastructure bill has passed and is about to be signed, if not signed already, is a significant accomplishment that even had some bipartisan support.   It is something that the last administration never could do.

America relies upon its infrastructure and it has been neglected too long.  With this bill we can address some of its issues.  

The social infrastructure is just as important but it still faces a few hurdles.  In some ways our country is relying on employers to provide important benefits which means what you get depends on where you work.

Its time for our country to standardize those benefits for our citizens. 

Elections Musings

 November is the month of elections, veterans and giving Thanks. We hve an election every year and this was a year without significant elections for the Federal Government but we did have some significant State elections.

I'm not sure why States would schedule elections historically on off-years since it pretty much guarantees lower turnout.  That might be the goal.  getting people, at least certain people to stay home and not vote seems to be a major goal for some.

Getting people to vote should be the goal.  Some worry that there is a lot of voter fraud and they point to things that are not voter fraud as evidence it exists.

I'm not familiar with every State but the one I live and vote in has not adapted fully to modern technology, and I believe that is likely the case most places.  For example, much of what they know requires self reporting, so if you move and don't change your voter registration you will stay on your old district rolls.

If you move out of state you might end up as registered in two states.  

Now it is possible but somewhat unlikely the if the two states are adjacent you could vote twice, but it would be pretty foolhardy since if caught the punishment could be severe.  The people who say voter fraud exists cite things about dead people registered to vote.  Well once again, self reporting fails when the person dies.  Giving the fact that dead people can't actually vote the only danger would be if someone cast a ballot for them, which going back to 2020 happened a few times and just wasn't a real problem.

I saw a headline about the fact that in one State, 35,000 dead people were still registered to vote.  Cleaning up voter registration roles is not the problem and that sort of report is used to make people think it is.

If it said they voted you would have something.

Bad Press

 One thing the radical conservative media do quite well is set the discussion.  By that I mean it attacks a particular point which leads to a response setting the stage for the discussion.

For example, most of the discussion about the end of our pressence in Afghanistan related to the Airport confusion and not the fact that 20 years of involvement, billions of dollars and avoidance of future deaths were being ended.

By steering the discussion, the facts don't change just the perception.  So the exit from Afghanistan registers with many Americans as a bad thing, not the end of a long fruitless war.

Take immigration.  This country was built on immigration and the impact of it is almost universally favorable with a few exceptions.  They complement the labor force and help the economy, not hurt it.  They have very little impact on most Americans but supplement our labor force in jobs that are often hard to fill without them.  By the second generation they are as American as anybody.

Yet most discussion about them revolves around negatives pictures and portrayals.  Yes they are held in containment when they first arrive and containment is not a paradise.  This is an important go to for the radical conservative media pulled out whenever they need it. 

The idea that this country is becoming more diversified is something portrayed as the replacement of white Americans in this radical conservative world.  Not replacement just supplementation.    The country of today is not the country of 1776 or the 1800s or even the 1900s.

It grows and changes and we add more Americans, of various sin tones and religious beliefs.

Its who we are despite the negative radical conservative media.

Apathy

 There is a simple element of human nature that plays into elections and explains a lot at times, anger motivates people.

Our system of voting requires a certain amount of motivation.  I almost never fail to vote but yeaterday I did wondered a bit what I was voting for as I prepared to leave.  I did vote but there were almost no candidates or issues I cared about very much.

I could easily have expressed my views in an easier fashion.

You have to wonder about why we have elections on years like this when everything is pretty local and the motivation is simply not there, unless you are angry about something, like losing last time.

I know a lot of effort is put into studying why elections follow certain patterns, and I haven't done any of it, but I do know that if I am angry I am there.  If I am content and happy, maybe not.

The solution is to make voting easier if we want to be inclusive.  

Some really don't want to be so they count on apathy every so often to help them out.

We serve it up a lot.

Election Day, Vote

 There are people in this country who are convinced that they are the actual real Americans with rights not shared by the "Others".  The "others" is everyone that doesn't vote like they do.  They most likely have a "real" job, if they are working, a "real" religion and a "traditional" family that doesn't tolerate this new radical idea that people can choose who they want to be.

It is a mostly white, mostly male dominated sector where men are really men and own enugh guns and pickup trucks to dhow us.  Things were fine until these socialist radical leftists messed it all up with their social equality, feminism and satanic gender identities.  

They are the defenders of the real America and for some reason they have decided a New York ex slum lord, ex developer, ex reality star who has trouble with reality, is their representative.

They are so sure of themselves that they are willing to ignore our great history, or reinterpret it to support their ownership rights.  They weren't the first ones her so they base their claim on violent expansion and the rights of conquest.

Millions of people who may have been here before them are descendants of people brought here as slaves, and since they look different  will always be treated as such.  If you came from the far east and look it, you also will never be one of them, really.  In fact is some convoluted way, people from countries to our south, who originated with European stock are not tainted by their new countries and not acceptable.

The best way to stop them is at the ballot box.  We simply have to get out and vote.

Not too much to ask, although some seem to think it is.

Subversive Christianity

 I doubt this is something most Americans know, although they might have seen it in a history book, but fundamentally the reason Europe was Christian was because the Roman Empire made it the official religion under the Emperor Constantine.  That spread it to all the areas they controlled while missionaries expanded it further.

This was originally Catholicism until the Protestant Revolution although it had a Western Branch under the Pope and an eastern Branch.

The countries of Europe further spread it via thec olonial expansions into North and South America.  The non-European countries might have some Christians but generally don't embrace it and practice Islam, Buddhism, Hinduism, and other Religions.

Christianity at its heart is not a democratic religion.  It was originally under a pope but those who formed protestant sects it is generally run by bishops or elders with the central authority being the Bible, a book written by numerous authors.

There are other books claiming authority but the current bible includes the ones that passed examination as supporting the general views of the cult.

Generally most followers don't really pay attention to its tenets talking about the ten commandments (an old testament list) while ignoring the teachings of Christ who taught that loving they neighbor was fundamental.  They mostly don't.  

The history of the religion includes support for slavery, oppression of women, religious wars and plenty of violence which by definition is not neighborly love.

Individuals may practice his teachings but the religion or cult as a whole certainly hasn't.  In fact it spreads much more hate than love.

They are interested in applying the old testament precepts to our Government, a totally undemocratic concept.  It would be as bad as Sharia Law.  We have seen some examples of this in some localities in the past and it was tyrannical and puritanical.

They get to try to undermine our democracy tax free and therefore we all subsidize their subversive activities.  

I for one don't want to support them or any other equivalent group.