In 2006, while a graduate student at Antioch University Seattle, there was an Open Space event where I tried to promote the idea of "replacing classrooms with diagnostic portfolios." A school is trying to teach specific things, so they should teach those things until point by point the students prove they know those things, and thus should abandon the classroom structure all together. Now, 10 years later, upper level admin are going rogue at MIT to do something very similar: http://www.chronicle.com/article/MIT-Dean-Takes-Leave-to-Start/235121?cid=trend_right_a
Think of swimming lessons. They have groups of student at different levels, and when a student has mastered the level they are on, they move on to the next level, not before, and not after. Because if you don't teach swimming this way people drown.
A friend of mine tried to put her 14 year old son in her more talented-when-it-comes-to-swimming 11 year old son's swimming level, because she just figured the 14 year old could handle it. He ended puking up water in the pool gutter from his constant barely not drowning he was doing instead of swimming, and back in the more novice swimming class. He lost his tolerance for swimming lessons all together, and now he and his brothers are doing parkour classes instead.
As students are plummeted forward through classes on a rigid time line they don't have time to develop, least bit maintain, demonstrable skill. They find challenging material overwhelming, and often abandon the subject all together.
Taking the subject of mathematics for example, it is impossibly demanding for a teacher to be expected to get every single student to learn every single thing over the course of the school year. The result is a loss of interest in mathematics from students, bad over all test scores for the school, and not enough well prepared students for the future workforce.
What if instead we taught Math like we do swimming lessons. Instead of dividing students into classes and years, divide them into weeks-long levels, with one teacher per level, and the students stay in that level until they are competent at that level. This does not require a development in curriculum, because we already have Khan Academy. Just as the rogue MIT administration has determined that lectures and classrooms are extremely outdated in the face of things like Wikipedia, Youtube and other internet resources, it's time to stop torturing students instead of teaching them:
Let me summarize the point for you clearly: If you make this about Trump's personality, (which is easy to do because his neon physical appearance, lifestyle, and criminality is so very larger-than-life,) you will make him much stronger politically. Remember when Hillary was content to let Trump hang himself with his own rope by letting him just keep talking? How well did that work for her?
Making this about Trump's villainy is handing the narrative right on over to him. Consider just for a moment the power of name recognition. Trump's name is out there now in an irrevocable way. He now has the most name recognition of any president in history. The best.
If he is what is in the mind of the voters, the voters will vote for him. All of this constant onslaught of attacking his moral character because of his amoral cabinet choices (military leaders, known racists and scam artists) plays into Trump's strategy, which is to simply keep the narrative all about him.
Obama's personality was over the top. First black president, played basket ball, attended Black Church. Smarmy-annoying-lawyer Chicago-Politician attitude. Impeccable political strategy. There was a lot to like there for metrosexuals, but what most lefties didn't realize, is there was even MORE there to HATE for ammosexuals!
McCain and Romney lost to Obama in very significant ways, because they got in what I call Obama's "personality vortex." The more corrupt, wall street, silver-spooned, drug using, pandering, Joker-like they made him out to be - the more they turned Obama into a super villain - the more Obama's victory was assured. "Bad press is better than no press" means that if your opponent isn't currently making headlines and you create a headline for him by attacking him, you have just done your opponent a huge favor.
Look at Ronald Reagan's personality vortex. It was so powerful that after his eight years he even got George H. W. Bush elected, far more potent than Obama's vortex. Even more perilously for the people of the USA, Bill Clinton's sax-playing personality vortex was so strong that he got reelected even as he passed overtly racist policies, pumping up the prison industrial complex, dismantling the public safety net, and sending jobs out of our country with NAFTA.
Now we are caught in Trump's personality vortex. It is exponentially stronger than even Reagan's was, and the progressives are not only going to lose 2020, but at this rate they will lose 2024 as well. Instead I strongly recommend the following strategies:
Talk about POLICIES, not about PEOPLE (unless they are your people, but then you must focus on policies all the more to compensate.) In the face of a Trump personality vortex, you must show why your IDEAS are better than their ideas, because in so far as this is about individual virtue, the bigger personality will win regardless of how virtuous they aren't.
Have policies that matter! Propping up Obamacare as it fails to contain health care costs was a fatal error for Hillary. Even though Medicare For All (espoused by Sanders) was seen as less politically viable - it is that very controversy that would have focused more attention on Hillary. More importantly, Medicare For All had it's own personality vortex as a policy that would have attracted votes. In today's era of mechanization and radical loss of jobs, the left should be all about Basic Income right now, but instead they flounder while Elon Musk is left to proselyte the idea on his own. Now that the Electoral College has proved to fail to protect us against demagogues, how is it that progressives aren't turning this slave-era form of voter suppression into a major political issue?
Point attacks AWAY from the opponent. It's NOT Trump's racist cabinet picks when the whole GOP stands by, holds their nose and nods - that is the entire GOP failing to protest Trump's appointing of racists and charlatans while militarizing our government. That isn't Trump, it's the whole GOP. Make them OWN that. More importantly, as with Medicare For All, it isn't just the GOP to blame, it is all of us: our country is out of touch with the fact it would be better for businesses (because of international competition with government subsidized health care for their employees) and individuals (who's insurance premiums are clearly raising faster than their taxes would have from a single payer system) alike to to have a single payer system.
Seize the Change brand, and hold on to it for dear life. Hillary's status-quo strategy was ill conceived from the beginning. Manufacturing jobs and fly-over states are so compromised that it will be a very long time before protecting the status quo will be a viable political strategy. How did the DEMOCRATS become the pro-war, pro-insurance, pro-corporate-oligarchy, defending status-quo party? That happened when the DNC thought conservatism would be a good way for a progressive party to win 2016. Wrong.
By death gripping the change brand, generalizing blame and focusing on policies that matter, it is far easier to draw attention to the more progressive candidate, steering clear of Trump's personality vortex, and by attrition making him seem like an old boring idea from the past, along with the GOP and their anti-people agenda. Don't let conservatives scapegoat Trump so they don't have to own their own garbage. Don't let progressives use Trump as an excuse for their own political ineptitude and lack of conviction. Every time you see some post or article demonizing Trump, remind them of the fact they are erring, drop something along these lines in the comments:
Though I certainly wouldn't ever vote for a Pyramid Scheme Pharaoh like Trump...
... I'm not convinced Hillary's nuclear winter would have been all that much better than Trump's global warming. When it comes to who won between two candidates who weren't Marco Rubio or Bernie Sanders (thanks to Hillary,) I am fairly neutral.
However, on the night of the 2016 election I asked friends "why isn't anyone talking about election fraud, considering the difference between 538 and the actual outcome of the election? This is strange considering that the FBI and Russians hackers have already messed with our politics this election." Trump aggressively protested the recounts with his usual bluster, and then some, with wild eyed comments about how he would have won the popular vote if it wasn't for supposedly "MILLIONS" of fraudulent votes. Does He Protest Too Much? Could it be that:
Russian hackers found a way to tamper with our election in ways not already discovered?
Trump doesn't want the focus on voter suppression to be associated with the electoral college?
The one case of voter fraud in 2016 was in favor of Trump, does he know of more cases?
Trump had non-Russian help electronically altering the vote results as the W had in 2000?
Since Trump was elected, he settled a fraud case for Trump University (not to be confused with ACN or Trump Network) for $25,000,000. What you have to realize is far more so than any previous President-elect, Trump is capable of extraordinary large-scale fraudulent schemes, and that this in fact is at the core of his business dealings that have given him fame. Not only did he disastrously have notorious MLM Pharaoh Michelle Van Etten speak at the GOP Convention this year...
... he has appointed none other than the Queen of the ultimate Pyramid Scheme, AMWAY, Betsy DeVos, to lead the US Department of Education (yikes, so much for effective business education.) Beyond that the most prominent Ponzi scheme in recent memory was the Bernie Maddoff's, and Trump's selected Treasury Secretary, Stephen Mnuchin, made over $3,000,000 off of that same scam. (Does that really sound like a good "treasury secretary" to you?)
When Ross Perot was the king of 3rd Parties, I was all about Ross. When Ralph Nader was the dominant 3rd Party candidate, I was all about Ralph. However this election both the Libertarian and Green Party candidates:
Did not dominate the majority of 3rd party voters.
Were both incredibly flaky, adding baggage that did not represent the interests of their parties (such as for example Jill Steins apparent aversion to use of Wifi and Screens in K-12.)
However Democrats are notoriously squeamish about street fighting over election quality, and this is exactly what cost Al Gore the election in 2000. I thought Hillary would at least stand up for herself which would have been consistent with her public image, but she apparently couldn't call in to concede quickly enough even though the election numbers didn't seem to make sense. Was she somehow conspiring with Trump on some secret agenda?
Crazy as she may be, at least Jill Stein actually believes in doing the right thing. When:
the president elect is a known con-man, and
he proceeds to promote other scammers just as far and wide as he possibly can, and
the election results were at odds with the most reliable polling analysis available (538), and
there had already been election manipulation by Russians AND
election manipulation by the FBI...
...an election recount is certainly in order. More important than any political agenda is the quality of the democracy our republic is built upon. We need to know exactly how much election manipulation there was, and exactly how it was done, in order to preserve the USA as a legitimate institution:
I am not saying this is healthy, or that you should be in the habit of eating this if you want to avoid an early grave. I am just saying that technically speaking, I have developed a whole-grain carrot cake recipe (this is for a huge cake, it would probably be a double recipe for most households):
Grated Carrots: 6 cups
Dry Ingredients:
4 tsp baking powder
4 cups whole wheat pastry flour
2 tsp salt
5 tsp ground cinnamon
Wet Ingredients:
8 eggs
2 ½ cups of vegetable oil
5 tsp vanilla extract
4 cups of white sugar
Icing Ingredients:
16 oz Cream Cheese
3 tsp vanilla extract
1 tsp salt
32 oz powdered sugar
3 oz water
Preheat oven to 350
Oil & Flour a large baking pan.
In one bowl, mix dry ingredients.
In second bowl, mix wet ingredients.
Mix wet & dry ingredients together.
Mix in grated Carrots
Pour evenly into baking pan from step 2.
Place in preheated oven. Check at 50 minutes.
In third bowl, mix icing ingredients together until they form smooth icing.
After cake is done as has sat for one hour, carefully apply icing.
There is about an 8% difference between the popular vote victory for Hillary (1%) and the electoral college vote victory for Trump (7%). This represents a significant constitutional crisis that I believe will very soon erupt into Economic Civil War.
The problem is that when it comes to how we can live our personal lives, the Supreme Court of the USA is the ultimate authority, AND they are always selected by the President. To make matters worse, the Republican representatives in government just blocked Obama from getting a supreme court nomination for over twice as long as the last longest appointment took. Understand that Americans value freedom, and what is happening is that conservatives in rural areas have massive disproportionate power to dictate their inbred goat-raping values to people in diverse urban centers:
In other words, one Cowboy in Cheyenne gets to cancel Planned Parenthood, the Environmental Protection Agency, Marriage Equality and Right to Choose for over three tech workers in silicon valley, in spite of the fact California basically pays Wyoming's bills.
There are four possible resolutions:
State secession.
A constitutional amendment changing the way the USA selects its supreme court.
A voluntary adoption of the Popular Vote Interstate Compact.
A coerced adoption of the Popular Vote Interstate Compact.
Humor and jokes about the West Coast of the USA breaking off to join Canada in 2016 could be real policy proposals in a few election cycles, just as only humor and jokes in the past were the only sign of a President-elect Trump:
However, what is much more plausible is that the economic powerhouse that is the West Coast of the USA conspire to help the secession movement in TX help TX leave the union. When it comes to politics, the difference between the USA and Candada is Texas.
There are two ways a constitutional amendment could change the way Supreme Court Justices are chosen:
Shut down the electoral college and have the President chosen by popular vote.
Change the selection of Supreme Court Justices to popular vote instead of presidential nomination.
In our current political climate a constitutional amendment seems even less likely than state secession.
The Popular Vote Interstate Compact is a voluntary agreement that can be adopted into law by individual states, to change the way their electoral college votes are awarded to automatically going for whoever won the popular vote. It's obviously the right thing to do, the moral imperative. Unfortunately the attention-whore swing states and morally-bankrupt fly over states have resisted this gesture of civilization:
If the West Coast of the USA gets nasty enough, state and city boycotts can coerce states into signing on to the Popular Vote Interstate Compact. Florida is especially vulnerable because of their dependence on tourism, and when they fold the rest of the states-against-freedom will understand that the West Coast isn't playing around about this.
Sure there will be retaliation, sure there will be cries of panic in the fly over states and DC. But who cares? The USA used to have slavery and not allow women to vote, sometimes change is loud. It's time to take our engorged West Coast tits out of the mouths of these spoiled-baby fly over states and show them who pays the bills in the USA!
The reason why Trump and Obama energized the electorate was they represented change, unlike the elderly statesman John McCain, Mitt "White Obama" Romney or Hillary "Female Obama" Clinton. The American public, left and right, is incredibly unhappy with the status quo. Change is the new political paradigm.
It is important for Americans everywhere to start finding common ground on what change we want, and to start acting to create that change. We should do two things in order to get the change we want:
Find common ground.
Be incessant.
Considering the fact that the Hillary supporters eventually capitulated to most of the Sander's platform, and considering how enthusiastic the support was for Trump when the time finally came to actually vote and how enthusiastic so many Libertarians are about Trump, we can divide most politically minded Americans into two camps: Camp Trump and Camp Sanders. These two camps might have more in common than they have different. Both camps:
are shamelessly populist. Both strongly believe in the will of the people over special interests.
are pro-peace. Both sides want to see radical cuts in military spending and much less overseas military adventures.
want the economy in the USA altered to serve the working class.
are very suspicious of trade deals that put the interests of corporations over the interests of people.
want money out of politics.
want our Constitutional Rights to be respected.
want strong states rights so that people in South Carolina can live differently than people in California if they want to.
want medical costs under control.
want wide spread economic prosperity for basically everyone.
want to preserve cultural traditions.
want everyone to have a practical and affordable education.
want to prevent terrorism in the United States.
want everyone to use their time constructively.
want people with substance abuse problems in treatment, not in jail.
do not want to have to migrate to another town in order to survive.
want to prevent unwanted pregnancies.
want affordable health care.
love Elon Musk style innovations that create energy independence for the USA.
want medicaid expansion to replace Obamacare.
One place the left and right can act on common ground is, strangely enough, on Gun Control. Right now Trump is pushing a "Guns Everywhere" agenda. That is GREAT news for Gun Control advocates! Why? Because Texas - cowboy central - has the BEST gun regulation in the USA, called the "License to Carry" which applies to both concealed weapons AND open carry weapons. It includes finger prints, an extensive application, gun SAFETY training (to keep children from being shot accidentally,) AND weapon competency training (again to keep children from being shot accidentally):
This isn't even a compromise, it's a win/win between both Gun Control and 2nd Amendment activists!
Think big. Think past where the politicians have already gridlocked. For example, consider the Basic Income Elon Musk was recently talking about. Earned Income Tax Credit in the USA and the Alaska Permanent Fund are two CONSERVATIVE examples of this that ALREADY exist and are ALREADY popular with conservatives. Conservative Marco Rubio has tried to figure out to use an EITC system as an alternative to minimum wage. Basic Income could potentially replace:
Social Security
Food Stamps
Homelessness
Hunger in the USA
MINIMUM WAGE (massively increasing how easy it would be to start new businesses and non-profits)
Incarceration (it costs us $40,000 to keep someone locked up, and we do this for 1% of our population already. It is far more American to pay them $20,000 to obey the law in the first place, as with the Alaskan Permanent Fund Dividend.)
Unemployment benefits
Welfare (insofar as it still exists)
Every 100 years, 90% of jobs disappear to mechanization, and within the next few decades we should see all drivers (truck, delivery, taxi, uber, bus, school bus, etc.) replaced by self-driving vehicles. How are we going to retrain all those drivers? We are going to march them down to the local community college so they can learn computer programming to run driverless cars? Sorry, as always is the case with mechanization, there won't be enough new jobs to replace even 10% of those drivers.
This is America, a free country. These drivers WILL be able to find something constructive to do, IF they have a Basic Income to rely on after their jobs were mechanized, such as taking care of family members, volunteering, starting new projects, or otherwise contributing to their communities. But without Basic Income then they will be more likely to leech off unemployment, pretending to care about searches jobs they have no skills or interest in, learn to cook meth and smuggle heroine, launder cash and otherwise take society down with them.
Before you say "Basic Income will never happen in the USA" remember that:
It already is happening in the USA in the form of EITC, it is just not happening enough. The alternatives (SSI and EBT) are already very politically problematic.
The USA used to not give women the right to vote.
The USA used to have legalized slavery.
But nothing like win/win Gun Control or Basic Income is going to happen if we don't get aggressive with our political representatives. We need to get loud and stay loud about what we want. When politicians from the left AND right are getting significant pressure to change in the areas we find common ground, it will be easier to get the change we need:
There is only one person in this entire world who is responsible for the Democrats loosing 2016, and that is Hillary Clinton. This is true for three reasons:
She insisted on replacing Sander's best idea (Medicare for All) with her already failed idea (public option. See 4 below.)
I was very uneasy about this election for several reasons:
1 - 2 above.
Trump utterly dominated the media, it was all about him, all the time.
With what was perhaps the absolute apex of hubris, Hillary's campaign was "happy to let him have the attention of the media."
Hillary insisted on propping up Obamacare instead of going for Bearnie's "Medicare For All." Obamacare kept getting more expensive for individuals and businesses, while allowing the main culprits - the health care insurance companies - do as they please.
Hillary perpetuated culture war with her "deplorables" comment. That kind of elitism belongs in the GOP, not with progressives.
Hillary's high-price-tag hawkishness. Should my taxes really go to killing Arabic speaking children with American bombs?
And what really terrified me about her, kept me up at night, is that she basically represented no significant diversion from Obama's domestic policy - no actual change in a country starved for change.
Now Obama and Hillary are saying progressives should give Trump a chance? The same m*********** who is gutting the Environmental Protection Agency - are they so out of touch that they have some other place in mind besides Earth for humanity to live? After 8 years of obstructionism - we couldn't even get a supreme court justice appointed in over twice as long as it took to appoint the last one - now we should just stand by and watch Trump do what now exactly?
We are supposed to give Trump a chance, like the chumps who fell for Trump University and Trump Network? We are supposed to stand by while Russia and our own FBI are not held accountable for interfering with this election? We are supposed to capitulate in the face of a massive popular vote win in spite of a massive electoral college loss? THAT is what is best for DEMOCRACY?
It is time to clean house in the DNC (WARNING: foul language follows that is tamer than what I use in private on this same topic):
For a very long time now I have been infuriated by the priorities of the left. Some things matter a LOT more than others. In development land there's a theory called "Bike Shed," which states that the trivial, easy to understand, peripheral issues dominate everyone's attention (a critical resource in democracy) while important, complex, critical issues are too much work for people to bother with:
I spent the last few days after Trump's election in South Seattle in mid-November needing to REMOVE my coat instead of adding more layers. Global warming effects us all, to such a degree that this is one way the USA actually threatens the rest of the world: we ARE the world's biggest problem now that we have elected a president who has promised to let industry do whatever they like to our natural environment. Terrorism and Nuclear proliferation? They got nothing on US.
How did we get here? How is this possible? If there are so many critically important things going on right now, how is it we have failed to reach any kind of common ground?
Priorities. In ANY relationship, when one person starts to get really heated over a specific subject, the other person should ask themselves "is this worth it? Do we need to have this much conflict in our relationship, or should I compromise?" When there is no exploration of each other's ideas, and one side is convinced of their own inherent virtue, then that relationship dysfunctions and ceases to serve those in it.
Lets look at some things here that might not have been prioritized well.
Bathroom Equality
If someone told me, as a CIS male, I had to dress up as a woman when I go out, or I could not use the bathroom, that would be horrifying and inconvenient for me. I would feel rejected by society, I would be loud about this injustice. When the LGBT community complains about restroom use, I might not completely understand, but I can clearly see the problem.
But let me tell you that as a CIS male I am uncomfortable using the bathroom in public all the time anyways. Society constantly judges men by their penis size. Consider my options when I need to use the public restroom:
If I stand and pee in a urinal, wow, creepy. What if kids are around? What if some guy peeing next to me is taller or shorter than me? What if I hear a sound in his direction and want to look his way? What if one of my friends shakes my shoulders and says "ha, I knew you couldn't aim!" Society is forcing me to expose myself against my consent.
If I pee in the toilet, I am a big sissy for not standing to be judged like the real men. Or maybe someone will want to kick my ass because they think I was born female. Or maybe I am just not man enough to make the water flow in front of others. Or maybe my penis is so shockingly inadequate that I can be hardly considered a man in the first place and should hence not pee in front of others anyways.
Ironically, if I have to take a legitimate crap, no matter how loud and how stinky, I still have to be worried about 2.
Unisex bathrooms are MUCH better for CIS males. I am relieved when in medical settings I have business to do and all that is available are single occupant restrooms. Trans-friendly bathrooms are everyone-friendly bathrooms.
But it was really clear that this was pissing off the right. They were willing to get violent over traditional bathroom use. It was clearly going to influence the election, and bathroom equality became the new sexual equality issue.
But now that the left has lost the election, ALL sexual equality progress is now in jeopardy, with multiple supreme court vacancies likely over the next few years. Marriage equality? Reproductive rights? Was bathroom equality really worth the damage done?
The damage was also done to the very planet we ALL have to live on, so no, sorry, it wasn't worth it.
Gun Control
I am really not comfortable with the idea that at any time a bullet could come flying off the street, go through the walls of my home, and kill one of my family members. Just thinking about it makes it hard for me to sleep.
However the USA is so saturated with firearms that any legislation, no matter how draconian, would take DECADES to significantly reduce the number of firearms available to the general public. But you know who does have some GREAT ideas about regulating guns? The far right.
But you wouldn't know that, because you have been so convinced of your own righteousness, that you haven't realized there was effective gun control common ground just laying around for a few decades now. The far right would like to have a concealed carry permit that is recognized across state lines. This was a real opportunity for the LEFT to say "OK, how about everyone with a gun in public require a TEXAS license-to-carry":
An almost Utopian level of regulation by left-wing standards, and it's just laying there, right there in Texas, like a ripe apple falling towards your hand from a tree.
But you didn't know. Were all the self-righteous thumbs up from your bleeding heart friends worth losing the election over this? Because now what Trump's pushing for has nothing to do with the Texas version, it's just "go ahead and bring guns into military recruiting centers and basically anywhere else, with basically no training at all to speak of, because nothing could possiblie go wrong."
This election loss is destroying the air we breath, the food we eat, the water we drink, the land we live on. So no, sorry, as Sanders noted, the Gun Control debate was not worth it.
Obamacare
One major reason why the left lost the election was because health care expenses increase too rapidly for our incomes to keep up with, and Clinton continued to support Obamacare in the face of that. You can't keep propping up Obamacare when the price in the health insurance exchanges keep going up 20% per year.
Single payer was the alternative put forward by Sanders. Did you notice all those NPR interviews with the old white guys in the midwest during the primaries who said "my first choice is Trump, but my second choice is Bearnie!" The rust belt deplorables have almost no problem at all with single payer. Their problem is that having had real industrial jobs in the past, they have been exposed to practical mathematics which quickly tells them Obamacare must be Repealed and Replaced: 20% per year, that's the problem.
Single payer is anti-establishment, and that's really what the deplorables were all about (and think about it - they must be also pissed about medical bills and lack of medical care access):
And as Trump lights the health insurance industry on fire and leaves it to die, as he has been saying he wants to do for some time now, he's probably going to do it using compromises with the left, gradually raising he income limits on getting medicaid (adding fuel to that fire.) Ironically we probably will have something like unto single payer with Trump, perhaps even more so than the "public option" Nixon-era crap Clinton had in mind.
Why didn't Hillary take Trump & Sanders "medicare for all" proposals seriously? Was Obamacare worth losing the election over? Will I be allowed to have a campfire in 2017 when Cascadia's ecosystem is as dehydrated as a tumble weed in August in Phoenix AZ?
Labor
You will find that most deplorables and libertarians completely agree with lefties more on the following sentence: "all other things being equal, if a woman does the same job as well as a man does, she should be paid the same amount." Hearing about continued pay inequality for women enrages me - and pretty much everyone else as well. Low hanging fruit, easy to find common ground on, right?
Wrong, because it is shadowed by a much more extreme and earth-shattering problem. Just as it is pointless to try to save an antique sofa with a fire extinguisher when the rest of the building is burning down around you, any type of workplace equality is becoming less and less relevant to voters everywhere. The problem is mechanization.
Here's the number you need to understand: every 100 years, 90% of jobs humans do are replaced by machines. This is great for social progress, as it reduces slavery, women feeling forced to stay at home, hazardous work environments, unsustainable lifestyles and so on. Mechanization IS progress.
The problem with mechanization is "how do we adapt to it?" The midwest deplorables have adapted to mechanization by voting for Trump.
The battle that must be fought for here, and which has been completely neglected by the left, is the need for Universal Basic Income. I know this sounds like nanny-state cradle-to-grave entitlement, but stop thinking in terms of the 1980's and instead imagine a world where every cab driver and truck driver has been replaced by a self-driving vehicle.
In THAT imminent world we are all now currently relocating to, where machines DO EVERYTHING, the only thing that matters is WHAT THE MACHINES ARE DOING. The machines will be providing goods and services. What those goods and services are and how much are provided will be the most important decisions society faces. In that world, spending money on goods and services will determine what the machines do. In that world Universal Basic Income will be as foundational to Democracy as voting rights.
Captain of industry Elon Musk has raised this issue, yet the DNC just sits there, slack jawed and ineffective:
Ironically Marco Rubio and his developing theories about EITC was the closest thing in the political sphere we've had lately to serious conversations around universal basic income. Raising the minimum and wage and tuition free education doesn't matter much in the face of jobs constantly disappearing. Was all that worth loosing the election over?
Conclusion
The left needs to prioritize, because WE LIVE IN THE FUTURE. The left (and everyone else) should be focusing on issues of real consequence:
With wide spread protests of the Trump presidency throughout the USA, it is easy to think that protesters are not respecting the institutions of our democracy. But consider the following:
Clinton got over 350,000 more votes than Trump, while Trump got over 50 more electoral college votes than Clinton by the time the election was decided. If this was another country, you would think the electoral college was there for the express purpose of suppressing the will of people.
The FBI clearly tried to influence the election with opportune timed announcements, making a big deal out of e-mails that never materialized into charges.
The FBI seemed to collude with Russia, as Russia hacked DNC computers and took other various steps to leak information. Meanwhile the FBI was silent about the Russia's criminal influence.
Though Harry Reid threatened the FBI with the Hatch Act, so far no action has been taken against the FBI.
Sanders was expected to take such conservative states as Utah in a massive landslide victory, when the nomination was stolen from him by Hillary's supporters in the DNC.
Does that sound like a legit election to you? Should Gore have conceded the election in light of the evidence we have now of the election fraud from the Florida voting machines?
Should millennials stand by and watch the votes of people in their 70's voting for other people in their 70's destroy the natural environment of the world that the millennials still have to spend the rest of their lives in? Would that be the responsible thing to do?
Though I certainly am horrified by Trump's election, as a Tai Chi guy I try to always look for opportunities when bad things happen (and unforeseen consequences when good things happen.) There are opportunities created by Trump's election:
The electoral college, with Hillary having won the popular vote, is now despised by powerful (and most other) people on the left and right.
Postmodernism - the crippling vice of the left - has been fatally weakened and will hopefully soon die. Self righteous identity politics have been proven an ineffective strategy in the face of representative democracy.
Facts matter. Don't expect Obamacare to be politically viable as costs on exchanges keep going up 20% per year.
Political qualifications no longer matter for office. Michelle Obama 2020? Easy.
Clinton era neoliberalism is clearly dead, with Trump elected on an anti-Globalization platform.
Bush era neoconservativism is clearly dead, with every Bush family member openly opposing his election.
Peace is now possible. No matter how much the thought of a white supremacist president enrages me, I can't help but wonder "how many Arabic speaking children will now be saved from American bombs because of this election?"
Elections are no longer bought, as Trump was massively outspent by Clinton. The Party with the Most Effective Message Wins.
Elections are harder to steal because electability really matters. Clinton clearly underhandedly stole the Democratic nomination from Sanders, as Bearnie Bros warned time and again that Clinton's electability was a huge problem. Sanders represented a landslide victory that would even take Utah in the face of the Trump hatred found there (think "everything west of the Mississippi.") She stole the nomination, we were supposed to be cool with that, and Trump is the price that has to now be paid.
The youth vote matters. If you ignore what the youth of the country want and need, you are ignoring the future of our country, and they won't vote for you.
State-level political evolution is guaranteed. Some states will have the laws you want, and others won't, and young people (the future population) will be voting with their feet.
Trump must act to dismantle Obamacare. Health insurance provided by employers, with labor now politically maimed, will soon be a thing of the past. The last thing he would repeal, if he repeals it at all, would be requirements to take preexisting conditions. First goes the individual mandate, then goes the state boundaries in health care markets. Either of these things alone, if health insurance companies are to be believed, would destroy our current health insurance industry. The only alternatives are single payer or regulated medical fees, either of which amounts to socialized medicine.
On one hand the electorate was supposed to pay for increased global security, while not only needs were neglected at home, but also our own personal security concerns (2nd Amendment) were belittled and ignored. Hopefully the left has learned their lesson and will focus on important relevant issues (single payer, affordable education, and dare I say Universal Basic Income as recently suggested by Musk) instead of political bike-shed such as bathroom equality or gun control:
I hear Nintendo is announcing some new hardware innovation again, and we should all be saving our lunch money for the Next Big Thing. This is the same thing they always do. They come up with a hardware gimmick and then remake all their old games for the new platform, usually not even using the new gimmick:
The original NES used to come with a robot. How many games did they (or any 3rd party developers) make for that robot? Since the NES, how many of their new platforms have come with robots?
The Super NES came with more controller buttons than any game could actually use. Since then, how many platform games have needed that many buttons? More than use crappy robots, but still a low fraction.
The Game Cube introduced mini-DVDs. The piece of crap didn't even play DVDs and as far as I know none of their systems since have played DVDs in spite of being disk players. The other innovative thing about that platform was the compact design... and that was the last time they made a cube-shaped game platform.
The Wii added the wand. Thank goodness for that, because where would the gaming world be at now if it weren't for wands. Look at all the amazing wand games that came up that changed the gaming world forever on the Wii. Oh wait, the wand made exactly zero impact, even on Nintendo games, and again they just pumped out exactly the same old side-view-scrolling-jumping-crap they always make, which technically did use the buttons and track pads and joy sticks on the wands, but did not use wand functionality.
The Wii U added game-boy-like controllers to the Wii design (may as well, the wands were useless) because you know what we all need more than anything else? Two screens to watch while playing a game instead of one. Oh wait, I guess not.
Generation after generation of Game Boy has been produced with only the slightest bare bones enhancements, and then remarketing nearly identical games from the last gen to the new gen platform.
Numerous other failed projects like the Virtual Boy, 64DD, power glove, etc. had the least inspiring possible level of innovation.
Nintendo has made only two hardware innovations that impacted game design:
The track pad on the original NES controller instead of a joy stick. It was innovation, a step back in technology from a joystick, but innovation none the less which did massively impact consoles (for the worse, since joysticks are better.)
The alternative/fix to the track pad, the analog/thumb joystick on the Nintendo 64.
Nintendo has no problem selling you a new console, making you pay for their risks, and reselling you the same old crappy games for the 7th time in a row in 3 decades.
The main problem Nintendo has for innovation is an extreme intolerance for indy developers. Their policy for 3rd party developers is the most draconian I have ever heard of. Though their hostility towards 3rd party developers likely caused the downfall of the Wii U as the 3rd party devs abandoned the platform in droves, their policy towards indy developers is even far worse, which basically states: "If you are not a major established game company with lots of money and highly experienced game developers, you are unwelcome to even experiment with our platform."
A note here on Nintendo censorship: River City Ransom, the best game for the original NES, has only been brought to one other Nintendo platform. RCR was part of the Double Dragon franchise and was a violent street fighting action RPG, and it was 3rd party. Nintendo's policies guarantee that their best games will NOT come out for new platforms, only the same lame cliche Nintendo crap.
Want a good platform? Don't get another nintendon't, instead get a PS4.
I have been volunteering on Dale Magneson's campaign for Judge in Kitsap County. Obviously I am supporting him in this election, and here I am going to explain why.
First let me start by clarifying that I really like his opponent, Judge Bassett. Bassett is the first openly gay Judge in Kitsap. He's heavily involved in issues around family, adoption, child advocacy, etc. In his personal life him and his husband do more than talk, they themselves take care of a number of children. There's every reason to like this guy, and if he wins, I believe we will be in good hands. (The two gripes I have are things he's rumored to have said, such as "how old are you" in response to meeting someone from Dale's campaign, and "they will let just about anyone run for judge" in a public comment indirectly referencing Dale, leading me to wonder if Bassett is slightly elitist.)
Magneson has more legal experience, practicing as a lawyer for 28 years.
Magneson grew up in Bremerton.
Magneson raised his family in Bremerton.
Magneson is an Army Veteran.
Magneson worked at PSNS.
Bassett in contrast is from Florida, and has lived in Bremerton for less than a decade since he last lived in Florida. He was appointed to serve here by the Governor, and was not elected. This is key: if Bassett wins, he will be the first openly LGBT judge elected in Kitsap, but that election will mean nothing if he is not strongly opposed. This is the main reason why I have no problem working hard against Bassett even though I like him as a candidate.
But here in lies the two problems about this campaign, and is why I am supporting Magneson so strongly:
In the otherwise progressive state of Washington, there is now a tendency for Judges to be APPOINTED instead of ELECTED, and then run in future campaigns UNOPPOSED or with very weak opposition. This is very bad for our democracy, which should be headed towards more direct democracy and less authoritarianism. ALL appointed judges must be strongly opposed, because this creates a win/win situation: a) if the appointed judge is defeated, then hip-hip-hooray, democracy has been restored. b) if the appointed judge is elected in the face of significant opposition, then the appointed judge has been forced to recognize that he is accountable to the will of the people, and hip-hip hooray, democracy is restored. (No thanks to Tim Eyman, radical right wing policies using loop holes of direct democracy have done significant damage to WA, and the progressive reaction is to have our democracy be more authoritarian, but process really matters here, and we must not give up our right to elect local judges!)
Local-vs.-from-Florida is a really big deal in Kitsap. If you have known anyone with legal troubles in Kitsap, there's some chance you may have heard complaints that the judges in this county are very disconnected from the local culture here. Your friend says one thing, the judge clearly hears another. At one point Bassett's website bragged that his father was a judge and Bassett has always aspired to be a judge. In no place in WA is that kind of father-to-son handing down of occupation considered a good thing. On the right wing conservatives see that as the worst kind of bureaucratic nepotism, and on the left wing we have a clear example of patriarchal authority being handed down from father to son. On the East Coast that kind of generational aspiration is respected, but here in WA that is pure heresy. This is an example of how Bassett does indeed have some cultural disconnect with this area (as do most of his peer judges in Kitsap.)
As a lefty I have no sympathy at all for the 2nd Amendment, and if you ask me the so-called "militias" mentioned there in at the time were bounty hunters that collected escaped slaves. However a big part of why I live in Kitsap is our access to the out of doors, and guns are a critical part of Kitsap culture and why I love this place. As someone who is much more concerned about kids accidentally shooting themselves than I am about intentional gun violence, I feel responsible, safe, child friendly gun ownership needs to be encouraged in Kitsap (while IMHO more casual glocks-under-pillows "self-defense" gun ownership should be discouraged.) The most critical infrastructure for encouraging responsible gun ownership is shooting ranges - yet ours are under constant attack from our own county administration. They have been trying to shut down the all-VOLUNTEER Kitsap Rifle & Revolver Club for 17 years. This is just one example of how we need local judges who are sensitive to our local issues. Simply being on the correct side of the national political climate does not begin to prepare someone for the local issues here in Kitsap.
We need cultural diversity in the Kitsap Superior Court, and that means having one of our own, a person who grew up and raised their family here, who has worked in the Shipyard, who is a veteran, who understands our motivations and language we use, regardless of where we stand on the political spectrum.
Many see Magneson as a ideological black-box, finding his personal agenda hidden (unlike Basset, who's lifestyle implies very specific politics, to his credit.) I grew up with attending the same church congregation as Magneson, and attended Sunday school with his children for over a decade. Here's what I can tell you about his ideology:
He strongly believes in getting his facts straight before making a decision or acting, and is quick to question assumptions.
He believes that when someone has a job, they should do that job as good as they can, with the least amount of bias possible.
He values political neutrality.
I have talked with one of his sons recently, trying to figure out who Magneson would support as president in the general election. I personally am a hard-left post-Bearnie DNC platform supporter, while his son is a disillusioned former Trump supporter. After some interrogation, his son still has no idea who Magneson would support for president. We both know Magneson will vote, as he sees that as his duty, but we don't know who for. Normally in our congregation we grew up in being private about politics would suggest left-leaning views, however his son can't get a read, and neither can I, and most of those congregation members are fairly conservative.
I can't tell you where Magneson stands on the local shooting ranges, because Magneson's opinion will be based on what he finds out about the situation and law, should any such situation appear before him as judge, and it would not be based on his personal political biases - which he basically keeps under lock and key. Magneson cares a lot more about the PROCESS, the fairness, the justness, than he does about his personal political beliefs. Magneson's agenda IS political neutrality, with strong support for the political process, and his bias is simply having a local voice as a judge in Kitsap.
There are two sides to this post, a secular side and a religious side. I will present the secular side first, warning the reader before it goes religious.
I don't want to defend my leftiness here. You don't have to read too many random selections of my political or religious posts to figure out I am a far-flung lefty social-justice-warrior type of person. Obviously I am very concerned about numerous issues regarding sexuality, politics and religion.
As an amateur anthropologist, I can't change the fact that I am a straight white guy. My question in this post is largely about what is the appropriate role for a heterosexual male in the new cultures we now find ourselves in. I am not defending any privilege or trying to justify any advantages, I just want to reorient to the new reality.
Secular
Society is inherently, by default, matriarchal. There has not been any globally influential culture where women did not exercise considerable authority over their children. Though this is a generalization, in today's industrialized democracies women have more authority over their children than men do.
The question then is what roles should fathers play, considering that the mother's role in most cases is guaranteed. There are numerous arrangements in today's industrialized democracies: strong authoritarian fathers ruling with an iron fist over their household, more laid back fathers attempting equal power sharing with the mothers, fathers separated from the household but who still regularly spend time with the children, estranged fathers who rarely see their children, and absentee fathers who's identity might even be concealed from the children. Besides investment in time in the children, a father's investment of financial resources in the children also varies greatly.
Let me here define purely matriarchal cultures as where women have clear authority above and beyond men in the same culture, usually with far less binding definitions of marriage than what we normally have in industrial democracies. Such cultures have failed to transition to industrialized democracy, 1st world level that most people on Earth want to live in. In fact they tend to be extremely marginalized, normally at the complete mercy of far more influential neighboring cultures who better manage the contributions men can make to child rearing.
This is patriarchal chaos: the mismanagement of the potential contributions men can make to the culture. I do not here justify extreme patriarchy, where instead women's contributions to culture are stifled. For example the trend in the USA of men making more money than their female peers must be putting the USA at a disadvantage as women are given unequal incentive to contribute. However in any culture the women's contribution is guaranteed, and the question remains to what degree do the men contribute.
I recently read a blog post on how roosters, when their numbers are not sufficiently culled, routinely gang rape hens. It amazes me that animals with such simple brains could even grasp the concept of that kind of team work for that abstract of a cause: could it be that the most man-hating criticisms of maleness are true and in the wrong circumstances we are all gang rapists? This post apocalyptic road warrior scenario seen in some sci-fi films is one extreme example of patriarchal chaos.
The other extreme is where the men do not engage or contribute to the rearing of children what so ever. At first is seems like this far-fetched scenario would only be possible in one of the marginalized purely matriarchal cultures alluded to above. However there are numerous examples in recent history where a male parent was so involved in his career that even though he technically remained in the household with the children, compared to the mother, his time contributed to rearing the children amounted to a handful of hours per month, so that in the end his contribution was almost purely financial.
Numerous examples also exist where fathers contributed nothing at all in time or financial resources. In nearly all of these cases the mother is considered to be at a major disadvantage in society along with her children. Such cases exist also with fathers, and even with males making more on average than females in the USA, the father in this case still is considered to be at a disadvantage along with his children, simply because he does not have another parent with which to share the burden of raising children. But it is far more common to have mothers without the involvement of fathers, and their resulting disadvantage is the other end of patriarchal chaos I refer to.
Managing the resource that is maleness - or in other words patriarchy - is key to industrialized democracies. Sexual harassment laws in the workplace are a good example. When a man is being paid, it is reasonable to expect him to keep from making advances on his female coworkers - because THAT is part of what he is being paid to do. Today's definition of professionalism demands that male coworkers refrain from complicating the relationships in the workplace with their rooster-like instincts.
But what about in VOLUNTEER organizations? At a paid job, what the man's needs are being met through him receiving a pay check in exchange for his labor. But at a volunteer position what needs of his are being met and how? I hereby assert that in volunteer organizations men are NOT being paid to reign in their rooster-like instincts.
I think this is why we see more division of sexes when it comes to volunteer organizations ("Boy Scouts" vs. "Girl Scouts," "Masons" vs. "Eastern Star," etc.) In some cases it is fine and good for hetero couples to pair up as a result of their participation in the volunteer organization (Church-based singles groups, many college clubs, etc.) However when the volunteer labor of married people is desired, especially child rearing heteros, new hetero couples forming from these married heteros is extremely destructive, creating more patriarchal chaos in the form of divorces and less involved fathers.
This is the end of my explanation of patriarchal chaos from a purely secular perspective:
Religious
As an LDS who is clearly lefty, I understand the concerns around how the LDS religion handles major issues around sexuality, especially LGBTs and issues around women "not having the priesthood." Here I am not defending the Church's stance on anything LGBT, or their definition of who does and does not hold priesthood in spite of the literal text of various sacred temple ceremonies, nor do I think it is wise to tell women they do not hold the power of God to bless others, when the exact opposite teaching was practiced for the first half of our religion's existence. I am not here challenging or demanding that the LDS leaders to change their views, but I see these concerns clearly.
With that said, obviously the term "patriarchal chaos" is derivative of the term "Patriarchal Order" in LDS theology. With the most common and important type labor contribution in the all-volunteer LDS Church (Home Teaching and Visiting Teaching), or in other words the primary form of overt ministry our religion engages in, women contribute as much or more than men do. As you can see from the last few paragraphs from Secular section above, I think this is possible not because the type of labor is sexually divided (Home Teaching and Visiting Teaching are identical in practice,) but WHO we do that labor with is sexually divided.
If women are formally recognized as holding the Melchizedek Priesthood after their temple endowment, this will create the following problem: asking a partner in a hetero child-rearing couple to spend significant time with a partner in a different hetero child-rearing couple of the opposite sex. So let's say a wife of a bishop is called to be the Elder's Quorum President. She calls a newly wed male college student to be her first counselor and single mother to be her 2nd counselor. Can you think of a place in secular society where it is considered appropriate for a married man to be spending many volunteer hours alone with a single mother and a woman of another marriage without his wife present? Social catastrophe, if not happening in most cases, would still happen frequently enough to counter the Church's family-building agenda and efforts.
THAT is the bag of worms the LDS church is not prepared to face when it comes to recognizing women as priesthood holders. Right now we are keeping it simple. Patriarchal Order is invoked to prevent patriarchal chaos, because as our excommunicated polygamist child bride raping enemy rivals have proved, under the wrong circumstances, we may not be any better than roosters:
A friend of mine who is a minor political celebrity in his own right, and a Bernie Bro extraordinaire, recently approached me and asked the following question: "I don't know if I should vote for Hillary Clinton or if I should vote my values and vote for the Green Party." First I will give you my answer to him, and then I will elaborate:
Supreme Court vacancies alone make voting Green Party in 2016 a naive decision. Sure it would be hilarious to see the USA have to deal with it's own cultural baggage head on with a Trump presidency, but the recent decades have shown us what you get with a hard-right supreme court, and THAT my Bernie Brothers, is NOT funny.
The plan all along with Bernie Sanders, and if you recall until about a month ago this was ALL of our's mantra: "The point is to influence the party platform." Bernie did that, massively up ended the party platform, and 90% or more of Bernie's agenda has become vanilla DNC party platform stuff: free school, public option, $15 minimum wage (science fiction outside of WA,) legal weed, carbon pricing, etc. etc. Mission accomplished: now are you going to stick to the original Sanders game plan and vote DNC or not?
The DNC's new platform has become legit socialist. They aren't doing basic income, but neither is most of Europe. As far as becoming as cool as Candada is concerned, the DNC platform is trying to get there as fast as possible. Now what happens if the DNC swings this hard left and loses the election anyways? If you hate progress in the USA, vote against the DNC after them having transformed their party platform to be as progressive as possible!
But to the question of is it sound to vote 3rd party right now. With Trump making a mockery of the GOP, if you are a right winger, then yes of course you should be voting Libertarian at this point. However on the left the 3rd party options are not so great. If you think that the Green Party demonstrates your "values," consider:
The Green Party has become the anti-vaxxer party, the perfect definition of opposite-of-progress.
They have also become anti-wifi and anti-screens in school. They are completely blind to the value of Khan Academy, which is the single most socially just thing that has happened to education recently.
The Green Party platform is chuck full of other idiotic nonsense. Take for example from the Green Party Platform this putrid gem: "The Green Party accepts as a goal a world in which persons can freely choose to live in and work in any county he or she desires. We recognize that this would be impractical without reciprocity between nations. " Oh really, I need Mexico or Canada's permission to move from King County to Pierce County? Since when? Oh, maybe they mean "Country" with an "r." OK... then now me being allowed to move and work in any country I want is now super important? So I should be able to live and work in some country that currently does not allow me to move to and work there... AS IF I WOULD EVER WANT TO DO THAT?
The US has real problems that effect real people. If you think the Libertarians are only concerned about strange economic issues that only impact the very wealthy, check out that Green Party Platform some time. The DNC platform now represents serious left values, UNLIKE THE GREEN PARTY.
I have more than my fair share of concerns vs. anyone with the last name of Clinton running for public office. However, you want your very progressive, ideological politicians legislating law. You want Bernie Sanders and Elizabeth Warren writing laws and passing them, getting them to the desk for the president to sign. You really shouldn't be wasting their talent in the White House, BECAUSE THE WHITE HOUSE DOES NOT LEGISLATE.
What you want in the White House is people that are politically skillful, such as Obama. Obama's sleek and shockingly accurate political maneuvering is impressive to behold. The difference between Obama and Hillary in the 2008 primaries over health care is that Hillary wanted the individual mandate - a position left of what Obama wanted - but yet what Obama passed included Hillary's individual mandate. What you want in the White House is a skilled politician, not an ideologue. Hillary's wicked trickery far surpasses Bernies to be sure, and that is exactly WHY you should be voting for her if you voted for Bernie.
Around 2003 I was involved in the education program at the King County Jail on 5th Ave as an assistant teacher for GED and ESL classes through Americorps for over a year. The GED graduation numbers there had recently improved when the educators started planning on the inmates coming back to jail after they were released, because this allowed them to focus on getting them up to speed on one or two sections of the GED at a time. Most of the time, if an inmate didn't have a GED, if they were in jail, you could safely bet they would be back.
And what was the point of them getting a GED anyways if they weren't going to be able to get into college, because their crimes would have likely disqualified them from getting financial aid? Were they even guilty? Did it really matter if they were just going to plea bargain for time served anyways so they could get back to their families and jobs?
When the worlds supposed icon of freedom (USA) has the world's highest incarceration rate, you know there's a problem. When did slavery end in the USA? What do you call it when you lock someone up so they can't leave and the only employment options they have pay them far less than minimum wage? What do you call it when minorities are disproportionately represented in that "justice" system? Slavery, as in actual pre-civil-war race-oriented slavery.
How do people go to jail and/or prison? Who puts them there? Who keeps them there? I am not talking about who is responsible, I am talking about who literally does the hands on dirty work: the Police.
"Give me liberty or give me death" is a USA core morality. We believe it is OK to kill to gain or maintain our freedom. If a female was forcibly locked into a strangers basement and used as a sex slave, and she used lethal force to escape, we would elevate this female to the status of an exalted hero for her accomplishment.
Say what you want about rape culture in the USA, but there is clearly one place where rape is considered a virtue in the USA: prison. We often racistly declare that justice has been served with the following statement: "Well, he's got a big black room mate named Buba now." In other words getting prison-raped is part of the justice we assign to criminals. How is trying to put a man in prison different from trying to lock up a female in your rape dungeon?
2nd Amendment gun rights advocates constantly suggest we need armed militias to keep our government in check. If completely innocent blacks are being frequently killed or incarcerated by police, and an organized group of blacks retaliate with firearms against police, is this not the ultimate example of using firearms to keep our government in check?
In 2009 I was the Security Supervisor for Seattle City Hall. I worked with police to get video footage of an off duty security guard getting cut in half by an out of state party bus. In the dim light it looked like the bus cut a bag of red apples in half as the red parts rolled down the hill towards Seattle City Hall. An officer who had responded to the scene expressed to me that "when I first saw the uniform, I thought to myself 'oh no!' But then I looked down at the cloth badge, and realized it was only a security guard, and said to myself 'thank God!'"
He didn't blink. He didn't look at me and say to himself "oh wait, this guy is working for a private security agency." It was a simple and natural fact to this detective that police lives were far more valuable than the lives of security guards. A police officer hadn't been the victim here, sympathy for security officers was the farthest thing from this detective's mind. Other police in the room had not corrected him, but only nodded and sighed in relief as well. I knew at that time the SPD was heading towards dark places.
Word on the street is the culprit was discovered, but that no criminal charges were ever pressed. Would the result have been the same if that had been an off duty police officer instead? If security guards are not cop-like enough for cops to consider significant, can we really expect cops to highly value the lives of the average black person?
Most of the cops I have interacted with have been excellent people and problem solvers, and I was very glad they were there to help at that time. However most public health safety risks don't kill everyone every day. If a small-yet-significant daily risk persists, it becomes a dangerous health risk over the course of years and decades. I suspect these police shootings are more closely related to the violence in our society created by the proliferation of handguns, than it is to the issue of racism specifically.
If our police need to have guns, those guns should stay in the police cars, not be a standard part of the police uniform. They should not spend all this time in the academy training to draw light weight firepower. Instead they should have sniper riffles, assault riffles, and shot guns available for when they need firepower, but not bring that firepower with them into most situations. Instead of spending all that time in the academy learning to fast draw like a sheriff in an old western movie, they should instead master the art of the baton, and live by it:
Besides replacing the side arm with a baton keeping the assault riffle in the trunk, I would imitate the United Kingdom's policing style in other ways. In the UK deaths at the hands of the police are far less common, and the incarceration rate is much lower:
It takes special kinds of people to be cops. They have to be willing to risk their lives, serve the community, believe in obeying rules, have a high level of mental and physical competence, and be good problem solvers. What do you call it when those people are set apart from the rest of us, given a mandate to incarcerate, and teach them to use lethal force against us as a high priority as part of their training? Divide and conquer:
