Group News Blog

DNC Night One

2024-08-19T20:18:00.001-07:00

A quick visit from Kamala.

AOC. Hillary. Heartfelt speeches from family, friends, and firebrands who pour their heart out, like Texas Representative Jasmine Crockett.

Stunning heartbreaking courage of the three woman who just shared their abortion stories with a national audience.

The Reverend Raphael Warnick, U.S. Senator (D-GA) who just brought the entire room to their feet.

And minutes from now, Dr. Jill Biden, and then President Joe Biden.

I have not seen this kind of enthusiasm for a national candidate since Barrack Obama came to Denver in 2008 to be nominated. GNB was there.

I have not seen this kind of HOPE since Barack Obama ran for and became President. GNB was there.

And best of all, in my life I have not ever seen this kind of JOY in a campaign. And we are all here now.

For over sixteen years our colleague Sara Robinson, the brilliant futurist, has begged Democrats to return to the emotional core of what it means to be an American. Regular people. With everyday American values.

To make clear that the Democratic Party stands for what Americans stand for:

Family and friends.

Community that cares for each other.

A good job.

The right to make your own medical decisions.

Equal protection for all.

The dream and possibility of America for everyone.

And a love for our country that cuts to the core, lifts us all up together, and fills our hearts with hope, with joy, and with a shared vision for the future.

Welcome to the Democratic National Convention for introducing to America, the next President of the United States, Kamala Harris.

My Apologies

2024-04-15T14:21:00.000-07:00

[edited to replace second with minute because I'm a moron]

GNB has been slow to load for years.

Literally.

At some point in the past someone told me "it's because we're not active so it's on a slow server" and I believed them.

This morning I got an email from Jesse Wendel (aka, the boss) asking if there was anything I could do about how slowly the We Fight On image loads.

I'm not really a web guy, but I did a quick search on how to time a website and it turns out the Safari Develop tab Web Inspector will tell you how long each thing on the page you're viewing took to load.

All I had to do was load the page (endure the 1+ minute load time) and open the inspector.

And it wasn't the We Fight On image and it wasn't the server.

It was a css file called 'ft.css' which was trying to be loaded from a specific IP address -- at which it was not, apparently. It caused an average delay in load of just over a minute (which doesn't sound like a long time, but it really is).

I found out how to see the source of the page in Blogger (it's in the themes section) and did a quick search for 'ft.css', commented out the line that was loading it, did the same for 'counter.js' for good measure (it wasn't nearly as long a delay but it wasn't loading, so why try?).

And the page is fast.

I'm sorry I didn't dig into this years ago and save anybody looking at the page a lot of time.

Countdown to Trump Criminal Trial #1

2024-04-13T22:21:00.000-07:00

Trump Mug Shot, Fulton County Sheriff's Office, State of Georgia

Monday, April 15, 2024, in New York City, former President Donald Trump goes on trial.

The Hush Money Documents Fraud in order to interfere with the 2016 Election Interference case.

Or as the media would like to put it, the Porn Star & the President.

Mr. Trump is charged with FALSIFYING BUSINESS RECORDS IN THE FIRST DEGREE, in violation of New York State Penal Law §175.10, for a total of thirty-four (34) Class E felony charges.

The indictment includes a Statement of Facts, the People’s story of Mr. Trump’s alleged crimes.

This is the first of at least four criminal trials of the former president. Combined these four cases currently include eighty-six (86) felony indictments.

And people are flipping out. Little bit.

As the trial begins, the first ever criminal trial of a former President of the United States, here is what I think is important to remember…

This is how it is supposed to work.

Forget all the media covering every breath, breathlessly.

The media want one thing: to freak you out. Why? Scared people tune in, and the media needs to keep you captivated. That is how they earn their living.

And also, forget all the politically biased people ranting either:

a) it is all a fraud and unjust and wrong, or

b) it should have happened years ago, but it doesn’t even matter because he’ll get away with, as he always does.

All these opinions are just more horseshit.

Focus instead on this, if you would…

This is how it is supposed to work.

The law, especially criminal law, is not a reality show. Many reality series not withstanding.

The law has rules. It has protections and safeguards. It has ethical constraints which are enforced. It has history, cases, libraries filled with books, and legal librarians. The law has procedures.

None of it happens to the relentless urgency or pace of modern media. The law takes the time that it takes. And it works the way that it does. Regardless of what others think.

Criminal law, criminal courts, and criminal trials, are all very much a thing unto themselves.

And again, this is how it is supposed to work.

Maybe the best basketball movie ever is “Hoosiers.”

Hoosiers is a tale of small town high school kids from a never even heard of it before rural town called Hickory, and their basketball coach whom the townspeople didn’t want, whom eventually (spoiler) go to the championship. The movie is damn near perfect.

When these rural kids from Hickory first walk into the arena where they will play the biggest game of their lives, with state and national press, and tens of thousands of screaming fans, they’re taken aback. Most of them have never been in an arena like this in their lives.

So Coach lets them have a moment. And then, this happens:

Coach Dale has a measuring tape.

Dale: “Buddy, hold this under the backboard. What is it?”

Buddy: “15 feet.”

Dale: “15 feet.”

(He walks under the rim)

Dale: “Strap, put Ollie on your shoulders. Measure this from the rim. Buddy? How far?”

Buddy: “Ten feet.”

Dale: “Ten feet. I think you’ll find it’s the exact same measurements as our gym back in Hickory. Let’s get dressed for practice.”

Here’s my point. Forget all the drama.

What is about to happen in a Manhattan courtroom starting Monday, April 15, 2024 — a criminal trial — is also happening in over a thousand criminal courtrooms across the United States that very same day.

Yes. We’ve never had a former President criminal indicted or tried before. That is an actual first. “thank u, next.”

A criminal trial in a city, state, or federal court, is the definition of routine.

There are tens of thousands of judges in our many towns, cities, counties, indigenous nations, fifty states, the District of Columbia, and our multiple territories, as well as the military courts, and the federal circuits.

Criminal trials have gone on in roughly the same way for the last 248 years since our nation was declared. Some changes here and there. Manhattan courts are different than New Orleans, which are different than Santa Fe. But not by much.

Criminal trials are a deeply practiced, well understood phenomenon. We’ve been doing them a long time. We know how to do them. We do them well. Are we perfect? No.

Especially in criminal cases, rich people, white people, straight men, and police, all typically get breaks everyone else does not. Like the American Dream, we can always get better, and over time we usually, eventually do.

But the waiting for this trial is done. This trial begins Monday, April 15. Period.

No matter your media or social media feeds, there is nothing here worth freaking out.

Trials have robust protections for everyone, from the accused, to the lawyers on both sides, to the judge and courtroom staff. Plus they have security. Oh my do they have security.

Like how awesome we are at delivery pizza — totally routine and deeply practiced — America knows how to put people on trial for their alleged crimes. We do it a lot.

At the end of a trial, there are three possible outcomes for each criminal charge: Guilty. Not guilty. Or unable to reach a verdict, what is called a ‘hung jury.’

A more senior court can interrupt a trial, however that is exceedingly rare.

The United States Supreme Court is not going to stop this trial. The New York State appellate courts are not going to stop this trial.

This trial is happening, and when it is done there will be verdicts, one for each of the 34 felony charges.

If (or as seems more likely, when) Mr. Trump is convicted, after time for probation reports and other absolutely normal and routine procedures, he will be sentenced. He could be fined. He could be sent to prison. Or both.

If Mr. Trump is convicted, after being sentenced, he will appeal. This too is normal. It does not mean he is getting away with anything.

This is how law works.

So…

On Monday, try to ignore the media clickbait — it is designed to scare or anger you.

Live your life. What happens will happen.

And if it all gets to you anyway, well then, just remember one thing…

This is how it is supposed to work.

Rule of Law vs. Anyone (including Trump)

2024-03-02T12:36:00.000-08:00

Trump Mug Shot, Fulton County Sheriff's Office, State of Georgia

Earlier today a good friend asked me if I didn’t think the upcoming March 25th, 2024, criminal case in New York City against former President Trump, wasn’t just minor stuff that no one else would be prosecuted for?

Let’s review…

Civil and business cases post presidency:

1) Trump’s company was convicted in 2022 on 17 criminal charges including tax fraud. Their CFO also plead guilty to multiple felony counts, and spent time in prison.

2) A 2023 jury in New York City found that Trump defamed and sexually abused E Jean Carol. In two trials for damages, he was ordered to pay a total of $88.3 million dollars. He is currently appealing, although a bond has not yet been posted on $83.3 million dollars from the second trial.

3) A 2024 New York State Court found Trump liable for financial fraud. He was ordered to pay over $464 million dollars including pre & post judgement interest. He is currently appealing, although a bond has not yet been posted.

4) A consolidated case including multiple U.S. Congressman, and two U.S. Capitol police officers, suing for damages over the January 6th attempt to violently overthrow the 2020 presidential election. Both the trial judge and the Court of Appeals held Trump was not immune as he was acting in his personal capacity as a presidential candidate, not in his official capacity as president.

There are four current criminal cases against the former president, for 91 felony charges. Trump has pled not guilty to all charges.

Federal criminal cases:

1) January 6th (Washington DC) on 4 felony counts for efforts, conspiracy, and obstruction in attempting to overturn the 2020 presidential election and stay in office after having lost. The case was scheduled for trial, but is currently resolving an immunity dispute.

In a dispute over immunity, both the trial judge and the Court of Appeals ruled that former presidents are liable for criminal acts committed while president, that to allow otherwise would put presidents beyond the law which is against the very nature of the United States and the Constitution. The immunity dispute is currently scheduled for argument April 22, 2024 in the Supreme Court.

2) National Security and Classified Documents (Florida) on 40 felony counts for intentionally keeping and concealing classified documents, including war plans, and nuclear weapons documents, and for obstructing justice. The case is currently in pre-trial motions.

State criminal cases:

3) RICO conspiracy case (Georgia) on 13 felony counts of conspiracy and obstruction, for efforts to overturn the 2020 presidential election in Georgia. The case is currently in pre-trial motions.

4) Hush money & records fraud (New York City) on 34 felony counts of falsifying business records in an attempt to hide hush money paid to a porn star, all done in an attempt to influence the 2016 presidential election in New York and the nation. The case is scheduled for trial, March 25, 2024.

My friend got all of them except the last one, starting next month. They thought it silly to charge Trump for business records fraud and hush money payments, that it was just too small.

I disagreed, and explained why as follows…

Rule of law vs. Anyone (including Trump)

My bottom line is these Trump cases are necessary to stop a career criminal mob boss from destroying or badly damaging the Rule of Law.

That is why both Capone and Gotti were tried repeatedly, until they brought them down any way that they could. They were MOB bosses, career criminals. You get them any way you can, BECAUSE of the danger they are to the law, and to society.

Fuck the politics, or even the minor cases being minor.

In Trump’s case none of it is minor anymore BECAUSE he is a lifelong criminal, a mobster breaking the law everywhere, while weaponizing and destroying the institutions which we as a country depend on to protect all of us.

Trump not only must be convicted and imprisoned, he must be publicly seen as a convicted criminal.

His conviction and imprisonment won’t stop the cultism, but it will make it very clear to the rest of our country, and to our allies, that while we bent, in the end we did not break. That the United States remains a country truly under the Rule of Law. Period.

When people today, and children not yet born, think of using violence and crimes to overthrow elections or to win them, the historical record needs to be clear: have the politics you want. But cross THIS line, and you will be caught, convicted, and imprisoned. Even if you were the President. NO ONE gets to fuck with our elections, or our national security.

I don’t care what they convict him for. The consequences to our nation and western democracies of leaving him not convicted, not sent to prison, are simply too grave. And yeah… I want the Jan 6th case to proceed. But in the interim, I want him convicted now and I am no longer picky about how.

Capone. Gotti. Trump.

Remember — Trump is from New York. He has operated there his entire life, like his criminal father before him. New York knows who Trump is. He has victimized New Yorkers for half a century.

New York is taking down a lifelong gangster whom for over fifty years has been breaking New York laws, accused of sexual assaulting & raping New York residents, and stealing from New Yorkers, while running a deeply criminal organization.

Like other mob bosses, they will take him down any way they can. As they should.

Taylor Swift: The ERAS TOUR Concert Film Review

2023-10-21T13:21:00.022-07:00

“I dreamt of you all summer long." —"betty,” folklore

"And all at once, you are the one I have been waiting for." —"King of My Heart," Reputation

"NICE!" —"Bejeweled," Midnights

"Are you ready for it?" —"...Ready For It?," Reputation

Opening Weekend brought in almost $100 million in U.S. sales, the second best October opening for a film ever.

THE BEST CONCERT FILM I HAVE EVER SEEN. PERIOD.

Unconditionally recommended, even if you're not a Taylor Swift fan.

In every century there is a concert they talk about decades later. For the 20th century, it was Woodstock. For the 21st century, it will be the Eras Tour.

The concert film puts you in the middle of a 72,000 person sold-out crowd, often just feet away from Taylor, her dancers, and her backing vocalists and band.

From the opening shots of the deliriously screaming crowd in LA’s SoFi stadium, to the gorgeous power strutting of Taylor and her backing dancers during “…Ready for It?,” through the final love fest of “Karma” at the concert’s end, this is Taylor Swift at her best ever. A show that blows out of the water every live concert I have ever seen.

While no doubt the film will come to streaming, catch it on the Big Screen the final three Thursday-Sundays, as it was made to be seen: all-encompassing audio that shakes the room yet is crystal clear, other people totally "wonderstruck" (some perhaps dancing off to the side in the aisles,) and a visual image so big it feels like you're up on stage with Taylor.

Not to be missed. Concert of the Century.

#TSErasTour

Stand Your Ground Laws

2023-04-22T13:18:00.001-07:00

Cross posted from my personal blog: Mischievous Ramblings II

I am not a lawyer. I have attended many classes and read many sources on self-defense law with respect to both firearms and martial arts. This is a distillation of my acquired information and should not be considered legal advice but a basis for discussion. I welcome learning that I am incorrect in my understanding.

This article from The Hill summarizes many issues I have with the general coverage of “Stand Your Ground” laws, especially with the inaccurate terminology “Shoot First”.

That said, every SYG law is different and some are undoubtedly more poorly written than others. And there are unquestionably racist, homophobic, and misogynistic biases in the US justice systems, state and federal.

The essential feature of an SYG law is this:
1) in a public place that you are
2) legally allowed to be,
3) if you are innocent,
4) when presented with a threat of lethal force,
5) you have no duty to retreat before
6) using lethal force in defense of self or others.

People and coverage tend to gloss over everything except 6). The initial 5 elements are critical, as is an understanding of basic self-defense law. SYG laws do not modify the general rules of using force in defense of self or others, they modify _one specific aspect_, which is removing the "duty to retreat".

Point by point:

1) SYG does not generally apply if you are in your own home or domicile. This can include and RV, motel room, rented housing or owned housing depending upon local law and interpretation. The applicable concept in this case is “castle doctrine”, which is the common law idea that “a man’s home is his castle” and thus there is no duty to retreat.

Yes, it’s sexist, as for much of American history it was literally a "man’s" home.

But that means that SYG laws are about public spaces, not homes. Generally speaking, there is already no "duty to retreat" from your own home.

2) You can’t break into a generally public space and claim SYG as a defense. This is kind of part of 3) but it would also presumably apply to someone in violation of a curfew or illegal assembly order. You must be legally in the space you are in.

3) If someone is in the process of committing a crime, SYG does not apply to them. This means that, for example, a felon illegally in possession of a firearm has no SYG rights.

4) Self-defense law in the US (varies by state) does not generally allow the use of lethal force in defense of self or others unless/until lethal force has been threatened or deployed against you. This is called “proportionality of response”. A gun or knife or bludgeon is lethal force. In many places, legally, a toy gun or replica gun, certainly an unloaded gun, counts. A fake knife might well count. A large strong individual with only fists confronting a small weak or physically disabled individual might constitute lethal force under the doctrine of "disparity of force". A single individual threatening individual violence might not be lethal force but a group might be. This is all subsumed under the general idea of a “reasonable person” — if a "reasonable person" thinks they (or others) are in imminent danger of death or severe bodily injury, they are entitled to utilize lethal force in defense of self or others.

Most places explicitly disallow use of lethal force in defense of property. There is overlap here with castle doctrine when we are talking about home defense, but in most places you cannot shoot someone who is walking out of your house with a TV or expensive jewelry. Or stealing your car.

5) is the crux of SYG. Many interpret common law as presenting a “duty to retreat” before using force in defense of self or others. "Castle doctrine" is explicitly the idea that one has no duty to retreat out of one’s home (domicile) before using such force.

SYG explicitly removes this duty to retreat from public areas. As a concept (implementations may vary), this is _ALL_ SYG does.

Note that “duty to retreat” presumes a safe mechanism for retreat. If your only escape from someone threatening to bludgeon you to death with a baseball bat is to run across 12 lanes of freeway speed traffic at rush hour, you have no safe avenue of retreat and claiming SYG as a defense is unnecessary. Again, this predicated on what a "reasonable person" would believe in your circumstances.

Now I happen to think that avoiding a lethal force encounter by retreating is the best option both legally and morally.

6) Generally speaking, one is entitled to use "proportional" force in defense of self or others against unlawful imminent threat of or actual use of force. In the absence of SYG, a "duty to retreat" if possible safely can generally be assumed, but if safe retreat is not possible (for self or others) or under SYG, one cannot be required to retreat before using "proportional" force in defense of self or others.

Long, I know. But a careful examination of points 1-5 makes it clear that many if not most cases with SYG invoked in popular media and mythology are nothing of the kind.

* Asshole who shot the kid through his front door? Not SYG. Castle doctrine might be relevant but to me the ultimate question is: how is someone standing outside your door (or even opening your storm door to knock on your actual door, if that happened) a threat of force? Because it’s not.

* Shithead who fired on people who accidentally drove up his driveway and we’re leaving when he shot? Not SYG. No threat of force.

* Even Trayvon Martin's case didn't involve SYG. SYG was never invoked as a defense and evidence was presented at trial (the range and angle at which Martin was shot) which would have make SYG irrelevant. Much more relevant to the Martin case would have been questions of innocence and initiation of a force encounter (who threatened whom?).

And so on.

It's moving into a different post at this point, but I want to add some stuff:

If SYG laws aren't "Shoot First" laws, what, if any, is their negative effect upon homicides in the US?

First, I think there's good statistical evidence that SYG laws increase homicides.

Second, I think that SYG laws encourage stupid people to use force inappropriately and illegally. The percentage of gun owners who get formal training is small. As a dilettante who enjoys shooting pistols, there have been years in the last decade when I got more training on my own annually than many cops get -- including not just shooting training, but training in the legal use of force in self defense.

There is all kinds of misinformation in the online (and RL) gun culture about this, from the old “if you shoot someone who’s burglarizing your house and they fall down outside, drag them back inside” to “as long as you say you were in fear for your life it’s ok to shoot” and a million others.

Third, I think the twin cultures of fear and militarism/machismo in the gun community contribute largely. Fear and the idea that retreating makes a coward drive the adoption of SYG laws, as they are generally unnecessary in the greater scheme of self-defense law.

People like the shithead the asshole governor of TX wants to pardon for murdering a protester (who was _legally_ open carrying a gun -- itself a symptom of excess machismo in the gun culture) build up online personae based upon their willingness (and eagerness) to use lethal force against people they fear and hate.

I believe the term "assault rifle" inaccurately used in marketing to describe semi-automatic rifles was first used in an ad talking about "Your Man Card", as though owning one made you more masculine, more virile, and less resistible to attractive women (not unlike beer ads, actually).

I had an instructor tell me about his security: a four layer multiply backed up system of cameras, sensors, lights, and alarms, with loaded guns stashed (safely to prevent children's access, as he's a grandfather) in every room in the house. When I asked him what he was afraid of, he replied "I'm not afraid of anything".

Right.

Can speech justify violence?

2018-04-24T15:21:00.001-07:00

One often hears some variant of the phrase "speech never justifies violence".

Is that true?

Morally, for some people, perhaps. Legally, not at all.

Imagine the following circumstance:
A man carrying a baseball bat approaches you. When he is within a few feet of you, you draw a concealed firearm and shoot him dead.

Was your action legally justified? Unless the man exhibited behavior that demonstrated an imminent threat to use the bat against you, absolutely not.

Now this:
A man carrying a baseball bat approaches you. When he is twenty feet away, he says "I'm going to bash your brains out." When he is within a few feet of you, you draw a concealed firearm and shoot him dead.

Was your action legally justified? Damn right.

What's the difference? His speech.

The essential requirements to justify the use of force in defense of self or others are generally considered three:

Ability: the physical ability to cause great bodily harm, permanent injury, or death. A gun, knife, or club certainly qualifies, as would significant disparity of force (the potential attacker being larger, younger, fitter, or a group of people).
Opportunity: the opportunity to apply that ability. A person with a club or knife who is 100 yards away has ability, but not opportunity. Likewise if there were a 20' fence between the attacker and potential victim.
Jeopardy: behavior which a reasonable person would find imminently threatening. Brandishing a bat (when not playing a game in which the bat is used) might qualify depending upon circumstances. Repeated stabbing motions with a knife upon approach might qualify. A verbal threat to use force against you definitely qualifies.

In addition, the potential victim must be innocent and any threat must be imminent. A statement that "I'm going to get a gun and shoot you" is clearly not an imminent threat, and the requirement to leave and obtain the ability also demonstrates that the threat is not imminent. The similar "I'm going to shoot you" from a person wearing a gun in a holster or holding one in their hand is clearly imminent.

In the above two scenarios, ability and opportunity are present via the baseball bat and the proximity of the potential attacker. Only in the second scenario is the imminent threat present.

The only difference in the scenarios is the speech.

Contrived? Perhaps. But also a clear exception to the idea that it's never justified to respond to speech with violence.

Documenting the Confederacy, Part 4: Documenting Secession: Florida

2017-08-29T14:24:00.001-07:00

We, the people of the State of Florida in Convention assembled, do solemnly ordain, publish and declare: That the State of Florida hereby withdraws herself from the Confederacy of States existing under the name of the United States of America, and from the existing Government of said States: and that all political connection between her and the Government of said States ought to be and the same is hereby totally annulled, and said union of States dissolved: and the State of Florida is hereby declared a Sovereign and Independent Nation: and that all ordinances heretofore adopted in so far as they create or recognize said Union, are rescinded: and all laws or parts of laws in force in this State, in so far as they recognize or assent to said Union be and they are hereby repealed.

Florida Ordinance of Secession, adopted 10 January 1861

Florida's Declaration of Causes remained unpublished, and is undated. It was authorized on 21 January, 1861 but the committee was discharged on 1 March without the document being accepted.

Unlike the other states, Florida puts States' Rights (actually, their denial of rights of other States) right at the top. They deny the ability of either individual States or the Union to make their own laws regarding slavery:

…The nullification of these laws by the Legislatures of two thirds of the non slaveholding States important as it is in itself is additionally as is furnishing evidence of an open disregard of constitutional obligation, and of the rights and interests of the slaveholding States and of a deep and inveterate hostility to the people of these States.…

Elements dealing with slavery include:

…It is denied that it is the purpose of the party soon to enter into the possession of the powers of the Federal Government to abolish slavery by any direct legislative act. This has never been charged by any one. But it has been announced by all the leading men and presses of the party that the ultimate accomplishment of this result [...to abolish slavery...] is its settled purpose and great central principle. That no more slave States shall be admitted into the confederacy and that the slaves from their rapid increase (the highest evidence of the humanity of their owners will become value less.…

And they jump directly into racism, proclaiming immediately that slaves (i.e. Africans) are idle, vagrants, and criminals, and that considerations of humanity should not be extended to slaves (clearly indicating that they are not humane to their slaves):

...Their natural tendency every where shown where the race has existed to idleness vagrancy and crime increased by an inability to procure subsistence. Can any thing be more impudently false than the pretense that this state of things is to be brought about from considerations of humanity to the slaves.…

And that (OMG!) they might possibly to required to live with and be legally equal to "the african")

...we will not confiscate your property and consign you to a residence and equality with the african but that destiny certainly awaits your children…

Finally, they raise a new issue: that the North isn't paying its fair share. Ironic, when you consider that, in 2014, Florida received between $4 and $5 from the federal government for every $1 in taxes they send and gets almost exactly 1/3 of its general funding from the federal government.

...It is time that the northern consumer pays his proportion of these duties, but the North as a section receiving back in the increased prices of the rival articles which it manufactures nearly or quite as much as the imposts which it pays thus in effect paying nothing or very little for the support of the government....

Collectively, Florida's arguments against the Union are more expansive than some other traitor states, but slavery, racism, economic opportunism, and opposition to states' rights fit in well with the rest.

Part 3: Documenting Secession: Mississippi

Documenting the Confederacy, Part 3: Documenting Secession: Mississippi

2017-08-16T13:32:00.002-07:00

Third flag of the CSA, the "Blood-Stained Banner" made it clear (as the

"Stainless Banner" did not) that it wasn't a white flag request to negotiate.

Only used for a few months in 1865.

AN ORDINANCE to dissolve the union between the State of Mississippi and other States united with her under the compact entitled "The Constitution of the United States of America."
The people of the State of Mississippi, in convention assembled, do ordain and declare, and it is hereby ordained and declared, as follows, to wit:
Section 1. That all the laws and ordinances by which the said State of Mississippi became a member of the Federal Union of the United States of America be, and the same are hereby, repealed, and that all obligations on the part of the said State or the people thereof to observe the same be withdrawn, and that the said State doth hereby resume all the rights, functions, and powers which by any of said laws or ordinances were conveyed to the Government of the said United States, and is absolved from all the obligations, restraints, and duties incurred to the said Federal Union, and shall from henceforth be a free, sovereign, and independent State.
Sec. 2. That so much of the first section of the seventh article of the constitution of this State as requires members of the Legislature and all officers, executive and judicial, to take an oath or affirmation to support the Constitution of the United States be, and the same is hereby, abrogated and annulled.
Sec. 3. That all rights acquired and vested under the Constitution of the United States, or under any act of Congress passed, or treaty made, in pursuance thereof, or under any law of this State, and not incompatible with this ordinance, shall remain in force and have the same effect as if this ordinance had not been passed.
Sec. 4. That the people of the State of Mississippi hereby consent to form a federal union with such of the States as may have seceded or may secede from the Union of the United States of America, upon the basis of the present Constitution of the said United States, except such parts thereof as embrace other portions than such seceding States.
Thus ordained and declared in convention the 9th day of January, in the year of our Lord 1861.
Source: Official Records, Ser. IV, vol. 1, p. 42.

From "Ordinances of Secession" at constitution.org

Mississippi declared its secession from the Union on 9 January 1861. It's worth noting that Abraham Lincoln had not even been on the ballot in Mississippi, which voted nearly 60% for the Southern Democrat John Breckinridge, 36% for John Bell of the Constitutional Union Party, and Northern Democrat Steven A. Douglas received less than 5% of the vote. Jefferson Davis, elected to the US Senate from Mississippi, said in his final speech to the Senate:

She [Mississippi] has heard proclaimed the theory that all men are created free and equal, and this made the basis of an attack upon her social institutions; and the sacred Declaration of Independence has been invoked to maintain the position of the equality of the races.*

"A Declaration of the Immediate Causes which Induce and Justify the Secession of the State of Mississippi from the Federal Union" begins:

In the momentous step which our State has taken of dissolving its connection with the government of which we so long formed a part, it is but just that we should declare the prominent reasons which have induced our course.
Our position is thoroughly identified with the institution of slavery-- the greatest material interest of the world.
...

and continues:

... by an imperious law of nature, none but the black race can bear exposure to the tropical sun.
...
It has grown until it denies the right of property in slaves, and refuses protection to that right on the high seas, in the Territories, and wherever the government of the United States had jurisdiction. ...
It advocates negro equality, socially and politically, and promotes insurrection and incendiarism in our midst.
Utter subjugation awaits us in the Union, if we should consent longer to remain in it. It is not a matter of choice, but of necessity. We must either submit to degradation, and to the loss of property worth four billions of money, or
...

Mississippi leads directly with "it's about slavery!" and follows up with "OMG! Equality for Negros!" and "It's going to cost of billions of dollars".

Again, Mississippi wanted to deny northern states the right to abolish slavery within their own territory. That's for anyone who thinks "States' Rights" had anything to do with secession.

* Apparently the Declaration of Independence's "We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness" didn't actually mean that men were created equal and that among their Rights was Liberty. The only explanation is that the people of Mississippi either 1) couldn't read English; or 2) didn't consider black people actual people.

Part 2: Documenting Secession: South Carolina
Part 4: Documenting Secession: Florida

Documenting the Confederacy, Part 2: Documenting Secession: South Carolina

2017-08-16T13:32:00.001-07:00

AN ORDINANCE to dissolve the union between the State of South Carolina and other States united with her under the compact entitled "The Constitution of the United States of America."
We, the people of the State of South Carolina, in convention assembled, do declare and ordain, and it is hereby declared and ordained, That the ordinance adopted by us in convention on the twenty-third day of May, in the year of our Lord one thousand seven hundred and eighty-eight, whereby the Constitution of the United States of America was ratified, and also all acts and parts of acts of the General Assembly of this State ratifying amendments of the said Constitution, are hereby repealed; and that the union now subsisting between South Carolina and other States, under the name of the "United States of America," is hereby dissolved.
Done at Charleston the twentieth day of December, in the year of our Lord one thousand eight hundred and sixty.
Source: Official Records, Ser. IV, vol. 1, p. 1.

From "Ordinances of Secession" at constitution.org

According to Wikipedia, "An official secession convention met in South Carolina following the November 1860 election of Abraham Lincoln". The convention issued the above "ordinance of secession" on 20 December, 1860, and ordered seven members to draft a separate statement, which was adopted by the convention on Christmas Eve as "The Declaration of the Immediate Causes Which Induce and Justify the Secession of South Carolina from the Federal Union" (hereinafter "The Declaration").

...an increasing hostility on the part of the non-slaveholding States to the institution of slavery, has led to a disregard of their obligations, and the laws of the General Government have ceased to effect the objects of the Constitution. ... The State of New Jersey, at an early day, passed a law in conformity with her constitutional obligation; but the current of anti-slavery feeling has led her more recently to enact laws which render inoperative the remedies provided by her own law and by the laws of Congress. In the State of New York even the right of transit for a slave has been denied by her tribunals; (emphasis mine)

Regardless of questions of Constitutionality, South Carolina's Declaration makes it quite clear that slavery is the reason for their secession.

Part 1: The Confederate States of America and Treason
Part 3: Documenting Secession: Mississippi

Documenting the Confederacy, Part 1: The Confederate States of America and Treason

2017-08-15T20:06:00.000-07:00

Second flag of the CSA, the "Stainless Banner", incorporating the

battle flag of Lee's Army of Northern Virginia on a field of white

to represent "the heaven-ordained supremacy of the white man

over the inferior or colored race"

The states of the Confederacy (the "CSA") declared their secession from the United States (the "Union") in a collection of documents which are called the Ordinances of Secession. Several of the CSA also issued "Declarations of Causes" which provide supplementary information.

For those who haven't kept track, the eleven states of the CSA were: South Carolina, Mississippi, Florida, Alabama, Georgia, Louisiana, Texas, Virginia, Arkansas, Tennessee, and North Carolina. They formed a self-proclaimed nation in 1861 after the election of Republican Abraham Lincoln and fought the Union until 1865, when they were defeated. The last four states listed (Virginia, Arkansas, Tennessee, and North Carolina) did not declare their secession until after the attack of Fort Sumter by the other seven secessionist states.

No foreign government ever officially recognized the CSA as an independent country. According to US precedent (notably SCOTUS Texas v. White), unilateral secession is an impossibility because the Constitution creates an "indestructible" union: the Articles of Confederation call the Union "perpetual" and the US Constitution created a "more perfect union".

[Salmon P.] Chase, [Chief Justice], ruled in favor of Texas on the ground that the Confederate state government in Texas had no legal existence on the basis that the secession of Texas from the United States was illegal. The critical finding underpinning the ruling that Texas could not secede from the United States was that, following its admission to the United States in 1845, Texas had become part of "an indestructible Union, composed of indestructible states." In practical terms, this meant that Texas has never seceded from the United States. (Pavkovic & Radan, 2007, p 222)

Precedent leaves open the possibility of successful rebellion (as the CSA did not achieve) or an Act of Congress permitting secession.

Legalistically speaking, so far as the United States and the rest of the world is concerned, the CSA never existed as an independent nation. Had they succeeded, they would have. Because the CSA never legally existed, the taking up of arms against the Union met the definition of treason in 18 US Code 2381:

Whoever, owing allegiance to the United States, levies war against them or adheres to their enemies, giving them aid and comfort within the United States or elsewhere, is guilty of treason...

During the war, President Lincoln had issued a number of pardons for treason and rebellion. President Johnson chose not to have wholesale trials of 3/4 million soldiers who served in the Confederate Army. Instead, he issued a series of general pardons, with a large number of exceptions. In a final act on Christmas Day, 1868, President Johnson declared:

unconditionally, and without reservation, ... a full pardon and amnesty for the offence of treason against the United States, or of adhering to their enemies during the late civil war, with restoration of all rights, privileges, and immunities under the Constitution and the laws ...

Meaning that that vast bulk of Confederate participants in the Civil War were granted a pardon for Treason.

Why is that significant? One word: Burdick. OK, three words: Burdick v. US.

Burdick is a 1915 SCOTUS decision that clearly establishes an individual is allowed to reject a pardon. As a result, the state cannot compel testimony covered by the 5th Amendment by offering a pardon -- the defendant must accept the pardon. In accepting a pardon, however, one confesses guilt of the crime pardoned:

This brings us to the differences between legislative immunity and a pardon. They are substantial. The latter carries an imputation of guilt; acceptance a confession of it.

Thus, any member of the Confederacy (in particular any member of the Confederate Army or Navy) who accepted their pardon and was not tried for treason confessed to the crime of treason against the Union.

One specific person of note, however, attempted to confess and was denied for 110 years, then accepted retroactively. General Robert E. Lee, specifically covered by exception to the general pardon because he resigned his commission in the US Army to serve in the Confederate Army, and because his rank was above that of Colonel in the Confederate Army, made application to President Johnson on 13 June 1865:

Being excluded from the provisions of amnesty & pardon contained in the proclamation of the 29th Ulto; I hereby apply for the benefits, & full restoration of all rights & privileges extended to those included in its terms. I graduated at the Mil. Academy at West Point in June 1829. Resigned from the U.S. Army April '61. Was a General in the Confederate Army, & included in the surrender of the Army of N. Va. 9 April '65.

Lee signed an Amnesty Oath on 2 October 1865, complying fully with Johnson's general pardon proclamation. But Lee was never pardoned while alive, and President Ford signed a joint congressional resolution making the pardon effective 13 June 1965.

And thus, 110 years after the end of the Civil War and 105 years after his death, General Robert E. Lee confessed to treason against the United States.

Part 0: Introduction
Part 2: Documenting Secession: South Carolina

(Edit 2017.08.16: removed double quotation marks; fixed white background; replaced "Articles" of Secession with "Ordinances" of Secession; added 's' to Article(s) of Confederation)
(Edit 2017.08.17: corrected 1968 to 1868 as year of Johnson's final pardon; corrected 'effecting' to 'effective')

Documenting the Confederacy, Part 0: Introduction

2017-08-15T19:06:00.002-07:00

First flag of the Confederate States of America (CSA)

Found on the intarwebs, used without permission.

I found a blog a while back that was systematically going through a collection of documents about the Confederacy and pulling out the proof that secession was about slavery. I've since lost that blog, can't find it, and think perhaps it has slipped down the memory hole.

So I'm going to start doing that. I'll be periodically posting a link to each of the traitor state's document describing their reasons for leaving the Union and selecting pull quotes that describe their reasons. By doing so, I will be documenting, in their own words, that slavery was a significant reason for secession. It will provide a library of responses to "the Civil War wasn't about slavery, it was about ...".

There will be an opportunity to discuss the meaning of the Confederate flag, as well.

In the end, I hope to create, if not a definitive resource, a sufficient one.

Part 1: The Confederate States of America and Treason

Maintaining Sacred Space at Arlington

2017-08-09T18:39:00.001-07:00

Watch a member of "The Old Guard" get a bayonet through his foot while changing the guard at the Tomb of the Unknowns. Here's the story. There's a grimace, and there's blood showing on his boot. And that's it.

What discipline.

What dedication.

What an amazing thing that we, as Americans, receive such performance -- freely given! -- from a young man dedicated to our defense.

How disturbing that many of us don't deserve it -- and have no idea how to return even the most basic respect to troops like that.

Here's a comment I wrote last year on Facebook after a visit to Arlington National Cemetery. It was made on the Facebook announcement of this post about Colin Kaepernick on Stonekettle Station by Jim Wright:

I visited Arlington National Cemetery (ANC) recently. Within a few feet of entering the gate, I heard young men (high school students, I would guess) skirmishing and tussling behind me, and I asked them (rather sharply, I'm afraid) to settle down and quiet down and remember that this was a cemetery not a locker room, and that it was as close to hallowed ground as our system allowed us to create. They shut up, and one muttered an apology.

Ten minutes later, leaving the Info Center, as Roosevelt Drive turned off and the road became Eisenhower Drive, I saw a cassion approaching, with full honor guard marching behind it. I got off the road, to the left of the sidewalk, and waited, attentive (not at attention -- I'm not a veteran, and I know the difference) and removed my hat as it approached. I got a nod from the NCOIC of the detail, which amazed me, until I turned to watch the cassion pass, and saw that there were a half dozen people IN THE ROAD with their cell phone cameras up, plus a couple of dozen more on the sidewalk and blocking Roosevelt going up the hill. Every last one had a cell phone up, most of them had hats on, and, as I said, a half dozen were standing in the road in front of the cassion. Before it had to stop, the docents got them out of the way and told the crowd that filming, especially from the road, was disrespectful (at least that's what I assume they said, because the phones came down) and reminded them to remove their hats.

I couldn't believe it. They had to almost physically remove one kid from the road. And they never did get his baseball cap off him.

At Arlington.

I agree with Jim (like that matters -- he's way more entitled to talk about this than I am) that we arent Romans, or Spartans, or even Watusi (thank you, Bill Murray), but these people buried here, they or their family went when we said "go", and they came back (if they came back) burdened with what we had them do in our names.

And we should damn well have the common decency to remove our hats, get the hell out of the way of their bodies, and have some goddamned RESPECT for them at their final resting place.

And since we're going to honor them, let's do so by remembering the ideals for which they fought, which include everyone's right to protest injustice.

Even NFL players.

I don't know what we need to do to make it clear to (especially young) Americans just how special a place Arlington National Cemetery is. But I think we need to figure that out.

Comments

2017-02-21T21:19:00.001-08:00

I have successfully regained comments on the individual post pages. As a result, I have also begun to examine the backlog of 8200+ comments from 2012 - 2014. So far I have found four real comments from the last few months and hundreds of spam comments from 2014 and before.

I will therefore be deleting ALL the marked spam comments from 2012-2014 without examining them carefully for any gems that might actually be in there.

If there are any actual comments, I apologize. But they'd be at least 2.5 years old anyway.

A Day That Should Live in Infamy

2017-02-19T03:00:00.000-08:00

Manzanar War Relocation Center, on US 395, near Lone Pine, CA.
Photo by Evan Robinson.

Seventy-five years ago today, on 19 February, 1942, President Roosevelt signed Executive Order 9066, "Authorizing the Secretary of War to Prescribe Military Areas". Roughly 120,000 American legal residents of Japanese descent -- about 70,000 of whom were American citizens -- were moved out of coastal exclusion zones and incarcerated in concentration camps. Around 14,000 residents (or citizens) of German and Italian descent, as well as some refugees, were also rounded up and jailed under EO9066.

Assembly centers were set up at convenient locations like racetracks (Santa Anita in Southern California, and Tanforan in the Bay Area) and soon housed thousands of internees. By October, ten "Relocation Centers" were set up outside the coastal exclusion zones: Manzanar and Tule Lake in California; Poston and Gila River in Arizona; Granada, Colorado; Heart Mountain, Wyoming; Minidoka, Idaho; Topaz, Utah; and Rohwer and Jerome in Arkansas. Manzanar was the first, opened in March 1942. Tule Lake was the largest, housing nearly 18,800 internees.

American citizens and legal residents had everything taken away but what they could carry, were stuffed into horse stalls and temporary housing, then moved hundreds or thousands of miles away and crammed into tar paper shacks behind barbed wire perimeters with machine gun towers.

In 1944, the Supreme Court ruled in Korematsu that the exclusion zones were constitutional, but sidestepped the question of incarceration. In 1983, Fred Korematsu's conviction was overturned because the US government had knowingly submitted false information to the Supreme Court (in other words, the government perjured itself) and that the information was material to the Court's decision. Other significant decisions upholding curfews for Americans of Japanese descent were Yasui and Hirabayashi. Both were overturned in the 1980s for the same reasons as Korematsu -- government perjury.

So far as I can tell, no Supreme Court ruling ever addressed whether or not the internment (the incarceration of tens of thousands of legal residents and citizens) was constitutional, despite the occasional news story to the contrary. Some such stories claim that Korematsu touched on the constitutionality of the internment, but the decision included the language:

"The provisions of other orders requiring persons of Japanese ancestry to report to assembly centers and providing for the detention of such persons in assembly and relocation centers were separate, and their validity is not in issue in this proceeding."

which clearly excludes the question of the constitutionality of the internment. Ex parte Endo further muddies the water by the ruling (on the same day as Korematsu) that there was "...no authority to subject citizens who are conceded loyal to its leave procedure." In other words, the government had no authority to detain citizens not proven disloyal. But they may imprison anyone for refusing to be illegally detained.

The Roosevelt administration lifted the internment orders immediately before the Korematsu and Endo rulings were announced. Public Proclamation No. 21, issued on 17 December 1944, rescinded the exclusion orders.

Legislation was signed in 1988 providing that the survivors of the internment were to be paid $20,000 in redress, and additional legislation appropriating additional funds was signed in 1992. The internees did not get their property or belongings back, and fortunes were made by complicit white Americans who bought real property for pennies on the dollar during 1942.

And if, by chance, you think we would never do this again, let me quote from Executive Order: Border Security and Immigration Enforcement Improvements, issued 25 January 2017:

Sec. 5. Detention Facilities. (a) The Secretary shall take all appropriate action and allocate all legally available resources to immediately construct, operate, control, or establish contracts to construct, operate, or control facilities to detain aliens at or near the land border with Mexico.

Note that those to be detained are not "undocumented aliens" or "aliens illegally in the US", but any "aliens".

How many of you carry proof of citizenship with you at all times?

(Cross posted from Mischievous Ramblings II)

Simple Math on Canadians Coming to America for Health Care

2017-02-12T09:59:00.000-08:00

It's a common refrain whenever the cheap, effective Canadian health care system is brought up: "what about all those Canadians who come to the US for health care?"

Here is the simple answer. All numbers are from 2014. Links go to the sources.

In 2014, according to the Fraser Institute, 52,513 Canadians got non-emergency health care in foreign countries. Since there were about 35.5 million Canadians in 2014, that's about 0.15%.

In 2014, the Census Bureau reported that a sharp drop in uninsured Americans (caused by the first year of implementation of ObamaCare) meant there were 33 million uninsured Americans. The Census Bureau also reports that the population of the US in 2014 was about 319 million, so the uninsured population was about 10%.

The Canadian health care system underserves about 1/7th of a percent. The American system underserves slightly over 10% -- after the first year of Obamacare. The number the year before would have been about 13%.

In a single number, the American health care system underserves 70 times as much of the population as the Canadian system.

This number is conservative, as it includes Canadians who get non-emergency health care in other countries because of convenience or scheduling, when they might have gotten it at home, and reserves American under service to those completely without insurance, not including anyone who can't afford a co-pay or deductible.

(Cross Posted from Mischievous Ramblings II)

Why didn't I do this sooner? Oh, yeah....

2017-01-30T12:48:00.001-08:00

Transcend Travel CPAP/APAP.

Image borrowed for fair use from Intertubes.

Sara and I both use CPAP (Continuous Positive Airway Pressure) devices. These are small machines that sit by the head of our bed and force air through a hose, into a mask that covers our nose, and down our airway to our lungs in order to keep it open while we sleep. It is a treatment for Severe Obstructive Sleep Apnea (SOSA) which is a condition in which the airway closes periodically during sleep. We actually use devices called APAPs (Automatic Positive Airway Pressure). Each of us has two APAPs, one for home and one for travel that is smaller and runs easily off a battery.

As a geek, I want access to medical technology that I have to use, and I want data on my usage (my pulmonologist says that I am his poster boy for compliance, and seeing the data is part of that for me). As a pilot, Sara requires data from the CPAP for her flight medical. Both of us want to be able to program the devices to change their pressure parameters as our needs change. To do this, you need special software, and in at least one case, a special piece of hardware and cable for the CPAP. We have all of that. We have everything we need to access data on and program each of the four machines (two types) that we use. I have visited multiple pulmonologists in the 15+ years I've used CPAP, and never has one been able to read data off my machine. But I can. :-)

You also need a Windows machine. The CPAP market is not so large that the manufacturers build great software, and they only build it for Windows. Some of them use outdated hardware specifications (like 9 pin serial ports and 8 pin DIN connectors). Many will write to one or another kind of SD card (some only to original SD, not SDHC, some to micro SD, etc.), but all of them I've encountered require Windows software to extract data and get reports.

Have I mentioned how much I hate Windows? I have an old media PC I bought from someone at Amazon that I run the software on. It's old and crappy and never connects to a network, and only comes out to run this software, but to do so, I have to keep a monitor around and move my keyboard and mouse while I set the machine up somewhere, and it's just a pain.

So I thought, I'll buy myself a cheap old Windows laptop, maybe even with a serial port, running Windows 7 or 8, and it'll be cheap and easy to move around and I can reclaim the cubic yard of office that the current device and monitor and keyboard and mouse occupies. And I did. I went to the local neighborhood computer repair place and bought a used ASUS laptop for $150, and it's just what I needed even if it doesn't have a serial port and runs Windows 10.

I need to install two applications on it. One for each brand of CPAP. And it takes hours. The first app is on CD, and it doesn't have a disk player, so I move one over from my Mac and it reads it but it won't install the software because the software uses a library that isn't included in Windows 10 and won't install off the CD in Windows 10 and I have to research it and find the newer 4.0 version that includes the older 3.5 and 2.0 versions and install it and see if the installer will recognize it and I try to install that software four times before it works. The second piece of software isn't nearly so bad so I only need to install it twice before it works. And then it takes 40 minutes for the Windows 10 system to recognize the USB to serial adapter and find a driver for it, and another 30 minutes to update the Windows 10 system files.

And finally it works. And I have a portable system that I can use to access my own medical data and program my own medical devices.

And this morning when I turn it on to suck data out of my CPAP, it takes 20 minutes to update Windows 10 again. Two days after I last updated it.

Now I remember why I didn't do this sooner...

Cross Posted from Mischievous Ramblings II

Communique from the Resistance: Day One

2017-01-20T19:50:00.000-08:00

Photoillustration by Evan Robinson. Original images

stolen from the inter-tubes as fair use.

(note: this communique was received through illicit and untraceable channels. I do not know who wrote it, nor their location. They requested that I fill in MY location for the C-Store, and in order to receive additional communiques, I have complied.
-- Evan)

On the first day of Trump, within minutes of his inauguration, anti-anxiety medications (e.g. chicken tenders and Fritos) spiked in price. At a C-Store on Whidbey Island, WA, a checker attempted to charge me triple for the chicken tenders and an additional dollar for the Fritos.

Negotiations ensued. An accommodation was reached. I'm the best deal-maker.

Further communications as warranted and safe.

Maggie Jochild, 8/5/1955 — 1/6/2017

2017-01-06T23:50:00.002-08:00

Goodbye Maggie: Beloved, Brilliant Writer, Colleague, Friend

Maggie Jochild changed my life.

Maggie Jochild, 1980
Bean Hollow Beach, near Pescadero, Ca

Maggie was a brilliant writer — of blog posts, of poetry, of fiction. She was a fierce advocate for women, children, the disabled, dykes, people of color, for the underprivileged.

Maggie's novel Ginny Bates is an amazing exploration of life lived intentionally by women, as free of the patriarchy as possible. It addresses issues of class, sexism, racism, and anti-semitism, all inside the family-by-choice lives of lesbians and their families. It is appropriately called "The Great American Lesbian Novel."

I hope whomever now holds artistic control of Maggie's writings, facilities the novel's publishing as soon as feasible. Ginny Bates deserves a permanent spot in the pantheon of great genuinely American novels. More importantly, its publication to a wide audience would be an enormous contribution to schools and young people.

A serialization of GB is on Meta Watershed. Her other (all amazing) novels are also serialized and posted there.

Maggie in 7th Grade

Maggie came to write at Group News Blog in 2007-2008 during the first Obama presidential campaign. She made an immediate difference.

Her writing helped GNB in ways public and private. It is fair to say Maggie's writing was core to the respect and fierce devotion our readers gave GNB at its peak. In addition to her public contributions Maggie as a person, as a force of nature, caused numerous behind the scenes changes at GNB which made us better writers, better advocates for our readers and mission (which mission she helped redefine), and better with each other. She made us better people.

Personally, Maggie's writings and friendship were instrumental in revealing to myself my own automatic investments: in class privilege, male privilege, white privilege, straight privilege, in revealing privilege. I was not the only one. She also gave of herself unstintingly. Weeks of her time were spent helping myself and others learn to deal powerfully with our disabilities.

Even with (or more accurately, because of) her radical and courageous feminism, Maggie was kind, compassionate, willing to hear, understand and forgive the sins of childhood and upbringing. She was a good friend, someone whom it is a lifelong badge of honor to be able to say that I too was privileged to know Maggie, to live and fight by her side.

Maggie Jochild, 1999, Austin Tx
Photo by Harper Vinkemulder

We were colleagues, collaborators, and for some years, close friends. For the decade I knew her, even after our lives drew apart, she remained dear to my heart.

Maggie's medical condition has been serious to dangerous the past decade, including hospitalizations and surgeries. Recently, she was placed on palliative care at the University Medical Center Brackenridge in Austin, Tx.

Maggie Jochild died Friday morning, January 6, 2017, at the age of 61. She was predeceased by her family, including her mother Mary Jo and her younger brother Bill. She is survived by her beloved Margot Williams, and a vast network of loving friends, cyber and tofu, in Austin and around the world.

Bill and Maggie, Summer 1964
Houma, La

All week long friends and loved ones of Maggie's have been saying goodbye — in person at her hospital bedside, on Facebook, through blog posts, emails, messages and texts, in conversations with each other, and in our hearts. The enormous outpouring of support has been appropriate to the life Maggie lived and the contribution she made.

She really was that great.

I am grateful for the gift Maggie's writing was to our readers, and the greater gift her friendship and gentle (and sometimes not so gentle) corrections and coaching provided.

Today I am a different and better person because of conversations with Maggie: more gentle, more honest, more human, more able to love and care for others.

I will miss her. As will everyone privileged to have known her.

Tat Tavm Asi.

Further Information
Many additional poems and writings are inside the following sites.

Maggie Jochild — Facebook
Margo Williams — Facebook

Maggie's blog — Meta Watershed
Maggie's earlier blog — Maoist Orange Cake

Maggie's posts — Group News Blog
Maggie's tweets — Twitter

Search on: Maggie Jochild — Google

Me and Michigan

Chasing the Second Wave in San Fran
The White Night Riot

Partial List of Poetry — I Fight Like a Girl
Two Poems

Columbia: The Road Trip

2016-04-11T03:06:00.000-07:00

I was cleaning off my hard drive and I found this. I have modified it very little. I believe I wrote it in about 2001.

Thirty-five years ago, six of us set out from Lake Geneva, WI, in two cars. We had told our bosses that we were taking a few days off to see Columbia’s first launch. Lawrence, his wife Josie, and Jeff were in Lawrence & Josie’s car. Erol, Paul, and I were in mine.

Disclaimer

I’ll say, right from the beginning, that many of the routine details of the trip are hazy now. I couldn't consult photos, because they're all in storage. I don’t remember the route we drove, although I suspect that we went from Lake Geneva through Indianapolis, Louisville, Chattanooga, Atlanta, Gainesville, Orlando to somewhere near Cocoa, just inland from Cape Canaveral, following I-65 and I-75. It’s likely that some of the sharp memories of the trip are just as hazy as well. But everything here is as I remember it, with some support from Google.

The Plan

Columbia was scheduled to launch in the early morning of Friday, 10 April 1981 as STS-1. With nearly 1300 miles to drive (and without Google Maps or GPS to help us) we figured on leaving Wednesday evening after work and driving straight through, arriving in Florida Thursday night. Lawrence had contacted a D&D fan in the area of Cape Canaveral, who’d convinced his parents to let us crash at his place. In return, we agreed to run at least one game for them fanboy and his friends while we were there.

Once the launch was over on Friday, we thought we’d visit the beach during the afternoon and run the game in the evening. Then we’d cross Florida to visit Disney World on Saturday before starting back on Saturday night, thus missing only two days of work.

The Drive Down

Putting three 20-year-old boys into a car together for more than 20 straight hours of driving is guaranteed to generate bizarre behaviour, even if the three aren’t all avid D&D players. We had our fair share. Someone in the car drew up a sign for the passenger side saying “we kill XXX for fun and profit”, where XXX was the common name for a specific religious minority in the US. I remember the sign, but not the context. Somewhere in Florida, one of my passengers was hanging out of the right side window asking a cute girl in the next lane “are you bisexual?”. At 75 miles per hour. At night. Without alcohol to blame it on. In 1981.

We didn’t stop to sleep, just rotated drivers when necessary. Since this was before cell phones, we had to stay right with each other and use limited signals to indicate the need for a stop.

Crashing with a fanboy

I don’t know exactly how Lawrence had made contact with our host fanboy. It almost has to have been by fan letter. I certainly don’t remember other details about him, like name, hometown, or pretty much anything else. I think he was maybe fifteen.

In any case, Lawrence had this contact, and got a phone number, and arrangements were made. We had a place to crash (six of us -- his parents were clearly very tolerant). The “price” was very reasonable -- run a game, or maybe two. Since that was essentially what we all did for a living, and in our free time for fun, it wouldn’t be much of a hardship.

The Scrub

Alarm clocks went off at four or five am. After way too little sleep, we piled into a van provided by our hosts (I’m not positive about that, but I don’t think we drove our two vehicles -- it’s possible we squeezed the six of us into one car) and headed for the Cape.

Traffic was atrocious. It seemed that they had not anticipated the interest in Columbia’s launch. It wasn’t just bumper-to-bumper, it was (mostly) stop and (seldom) go. We had the radio on, and as launch time approached, we were happier and happier about holds.

Eventually we parked at a viewing area. It was plush, with vendors selling souvenirs, bleachers, trailer-offices, media, talking heads, and bunkers. It was clearly not where we belonged. Somehow in the mess of getting people into the Cape, we’d ended up at the VIP viewing area.

The view wasn’t great, actually. It seemed to be all over land, with brush and low trees between us and the launch site. But from the bleachers you could see pretty well. And there were lots of big cameras here, both TV and film.

We made the most of our good fortune. We ate the food, oogled the souvenirs (most of us barely made minimum wage), clambered around the bleachers, goggled at the celebrities (mostly news-type celebrities, it must be said), and generally made a nuisance of ourselves. At least we weren’t the only ones doing it. Or the only ones who didn’t belong there.

Friday's launch was scrubbed due to computer malfunction. Fortunately, the APs managing traffic had learned something since the morning, and we were all off the Cape within an hour or so.

The Atlantic Ocean

Since we had the rest of the day to ourselves, we thought we’d go and show Jeff what an ocean looked like. Even though the Great Lakes are wide enough to have no visible farther shore, they don’t look like an ocean.

The beach was covered, absolutely covered, in jellyfish. Which were immediately dubbed “Man o’ War Jellyfish” (whether they were actually capable of stinging was never tested). We walked along the beach covering them with sand and smashing them with large flat rocks. One of my friends approached an attractive young lady and explained that she should not swim. Her response was devastating in tone, if simple in words: "I know" :-)

Since we obviously couldn’t swim in Man o’ War infested ocean waters, we used our host’s pool. There is a picture somewhere of several of us, pasty white from the Wisconsin winter, standing by the pool with our arms outstretched, our eyes closed, turning to get the most possible sunlight.

I slept through Lawrence’s game. I don’t know about anyone else. I vaguely recall a slice of pizza landing in a large glass of milk at dinner, though.

The Mouse

Because NASA could not cycle Columbia in less than about 48 hours, we had to decide what to do. We had always planned to go to Disney World on Saturday. If we left as planned, we’d driven 1300 miles and back again for no particular reason except to visit Disney World. If we stayed another 18 hours, we’d be driving home for 20 plus hours and going straight into work on Monday morning.

Four of us were 21 or under, so of course we decided to stay and see the launch if it happened Sunday morning! It seemed unlikely that they’d fire us all, since we represented about 1/2 of the design group, 1/3 of the development group, and 1/4 of the artists. And they weren’t paying us that well anyway.

Saturday morning we up and drove across Florida to Disney World. We did all the things that you’d expect us to. And by the end of the day, we were so exhausted that we all crashed out on the railroad that circles the park, singing Kliban. You know, the cat guy? We were finding out how many stylistic variations we could do of:

Love them little mousies

Mousies what I love to eat

Bite they little heads off

Nibble on they tiny feet.

I recall that we did pop and country versions, but the one I liked best was the Gregorian chant. Surprisingly, security did not even comment, much less remove us from the park as undesirables.

The Launch

As it happened, Columbia had been re-scheduled for launch on the morning of 12 April 1981, exactly 20 years after Yuri Gagarin flew in Vostok 1. Without having Wikipedia handy, we were of course unaware of the timing :-).

Unlike Friday morning driving to the Cape, Sunday morning went very smoothly. As a result, we were not in the VIP area :-(. Instead, we were on the first of a series of causeways across ponds and wetlands. Because we had planned to take as long to get onto the Cape as it had taken Friday, we were early, and roughly in the middle of the first causeway. Several other causeways behind us gradually filled with other visitors. Every causeway had its own set of speakers, which resulted in a maddening echo effect being applied to every word Mission Control said. “Holding” became “HOLDING ... Holding ... holding ... hldng” as we got the word from successive sets of speakers behind us.

Since we’d left a couple of extra hours early, we got there before dawn. Even though we were used to Wisconsin winter weather, it was cold sitting for hours just a few inches above the water. Sunrise was at about six. The launch was scheduled for seven.

As it got close to seven, you could feel the tension rise. I don’t know how many people there were, but we had hundreds of vehicles on our causeway alone (we’d brought both our cars because we were leaving immediately after the launch). Since few if any of the vehicles were single drivers, we must have had thousands of people on the causeways. Cameras were set up. They ranged from high-end systems with lenses that looked feet long down to Jeff’s Instamatic. Which he was holding up to a pair of binoculars.

The boom box we’d been using for a radio had a cassette recorder in it. We plopped a blank tape in it and started recording as the final seconds ticked away, each number coming from the rows of speakers over and over and over again.

Crowd noise rose as the countdown dropped. Individual words disappeared and were replaced with squeals and screams and shouts. At ‘ignition’ there was a greater shout -- a single word cast across the water: ‘Yeah!’. I think, in our secret hearts, we’d all been sure that this was going to be Friday all over again. Now it was really going to happen.

Smoke spilled from the solid rocket boosters. Shutters began snapping frantically. The crowd noise continued to rise. As the count hit zero and began to climb, we could see the shockwave from the shuttle engines moving across the water at us. It was a wave front of distortion charging through the shallow water, and as it lapped at our causeway, it carried the booster noise.

Crowd noise, which had been loud enough to make me think about covering my ears, just vanished in a vast thrumming. You could see that other people’s mouths were open, but whatever noise we were making was inconsequential when compared with the voice of Columbia.

The April 12 launch at Pad 39A of STS-1, just seconds past 7 a.m.,

carries astronauts John Young and Robert Crippen into an

Earth orbital mission scheduled to last for 54 hours, ending with

unpowered landing at Edwards Air Force Base in California.

Photo: NASA

And she rose. She rose from that flat piece of lowland across the water, trailing booster smoke and riding flame. She made, for the first time, that distinctive roll that bent toward the east, to protect us in case of disaster. The sun caught her, and the crowd noise came back. It was as if everybody’s favorite team has just won the Super Bowl and the World Series and the Stanley Cup, all at once, and then Peace Had Been Declared.

And she raced toward orbit.

Before I knew it, she was gone. Her voice, which had been so commanding at launch, was replaced with hundreds of hoarse human voices, and the mechanical voice of Mission Control, reporting facts that fell upon our no-longer deaf ears again and again.

My camera was out of film. I had no real recollection of images I’d tried to take. Those prints and negatives are probably somewhere in storage, among the ten or twelve bankers boxes I have of family photos.

Driving Back

We left the Cape right after launch and started back to Wisconsin. The recording went right into the car’s tape player, and we discovered the meaning of “clipping”. We could hear people shouting and screaming until the roar of Columbia’s engines hit. The recording became a brown noise hum. It wasn’t even particularly loud (the recorder probably had some sort of automatic volume control, or we overloaded the dynamic range of the device). After a while, the human voices just faded back in.

It wasn’t nearly as dramatic as the actual event had been.

When we crossed I-10 near Lake City, our car had a serious discussion: should we turn left and try to watch the landing? We decided that it would almost certainly cost us our jobs, and we’d still have to drive back to Wisconsin to get our stuff, and we might not even make it in time, since Columbia was going to land in two days.

Unlike the trip down, where we’d almost always had one driver, one awake, and one sleeping, the trip back was almost always one driver and two sleeping. Whenever a driver couldn’t go any further, we’d stop for food. That seemed like it turned out to be every two or three hours, and we were punchy. We actually got asked to leave a restaurant when Erol carefully ate his burger into the shape of a pyramid and left it on his plate. They accidentally locked us in the airlock before letting us out.

I think we got back to Lake Geneva about 10am Monday morning, and went right to work, where we did fuck-all that day.

Twenty-one Years Later

I saw Columbia fly one other time. She was refitted by NASA for the last time between July 1999 and March 2002. She launched 1 March 2002 (the third anniversary of my mother’s death) as STS-109 to service the Hubble Space Telescope. Sara and I had made a trip to Florida for other reasons and took the morning off to drive to Cocoa and watch from a parking lot.

We were a lot farther away. I’m not even sure they allowed people onto the Cape for launches after 9/11. We couldn’t see Columbia very well on the ground. The crowd was a lot smaller, and there was no SRB noise. But she jumped off the pad and made that roll to the east, and the sun caught her, and the crowd cheered her.

And she raced toward orbit.

It was her penultimate flight.

Eleven months later, Columbia broke up on re-entry of STS-107. A piece of insulation from the main fuel tank had damaged the protective tiles on the left wing during launch. The tiles failed catastrophically on re-entry. All seven aboard were killed.

Barriers for a Third-Party Run in 2016

2016-03-30T11:36:00.000-07:00

There's a lot of talk this year about third party runs for the presidency. Will Trump run as a third party candidate if he doesn't get the nomination? Will Sanders? How about Bloomberg if Trump gets the nomination? (OK, not Bloomberg)

There's a lot of angst.

To dispel that angst, let's talk about what a "third party run" means. Technically America has a multi-party election, but realistically, universal ballot access is limited to the designated nominees of the Democratic and Republican Parties. The barriers against other parties, independent candidates, and write-in candidates are significant.

Let's look at those three options:

Parties other than the Republican and Democratic Parties

There are minor parties in the US electoral system. The most significant are probably the Libertarian Party and the Green Party. Aside from Ross Perot's 1996 run at the head of his Reform Party, the only other minor party to field a presidential candidate since Strom Thurmond (States' Rights Democratic aka Dixiecrat) and Henry Wallace (Progressive) in 1948 has been the American Independent party. No minor party candidate since 1968 has won a single electoral vote (EV) and the best percentage a minor party has garnered since 1968 is Ross Perot at 8.6% in 1996.

This year, the Libertarian Party claims they will be on the ballot for 342 (about 63%) of EVs. Technically enough to win, but they would need to win just under 80% of the EVs they are on the ballot for.

The Green Party says they have ballot access in about 20 states totaling 304 (about 56%) of EVs, which means they would need to win just under 89% of those EVs to elect a president. They do say that about another 179 EVs are "potentially in play", which at this date I interpret as "we pray we might get on the ballot".

For those of you watching the far-right, the Constitution Party hasn't managed to get on the ballot in over 41 states and in 2012 was on the ballot in only 26. They have never won a single EV and their high-water mark in votes was less than two-tenths of one percent (about 183,000 votes in 1996).

Since 1900, the best a third party has done is Teddy Roosevelt's Progressive Party in 1912, which gathered over 27% of the popular vote nationwide and 88 (16.5% of the then 531) EVs for a second place finish ahead of the rump Republican incumbent William Howard Taft (8 EVs) and far behind Democratic Party nominee Woodrow Wilson (435 EVs and 42% of the popular vote). This was the last election in which a non-Republican Party, non-Democratic Party candidate came second in EVs or the popular vote. Wilson won 40 of 48 states, Roosevelt 6, and Taft 2 (VT and UT, if you're counting). The popular vote was much closer, with Wilson gathering about 6.3 million, Roosevelt about 4.1 million, and Taft about 3.5 million.

Write-in Candidates

Technically, Write-in candidates have access to 43 states and 494 (just under 92%) EVs. Thirty-five of those states require some sort of paperwork.

However, I can find no evidence that a Write-in candidate has ever made a respectable showing in a national presidential election. There are some notable primary wins, especially Henry Cabot Lodge in 1964 who won Republican Party primaries in New Hampshire, New Jersey, and Massachusetts.

And then there's the success that fails: in 1968 incumbent Lyndon Johnson did not file for the New Hampshire Democratic Party primary, gaining 50% of votes cast as a Write-in. However, Eugene McCarthy was on the ballot and received 41% of the vote. Johnson withdrew from the 1968 election, leaving McCarthy to lose massively to Republican Party candidate Richard Nixon.

Independent Candidates

Since 1912 the most popular "third party" candidate has actually been independent, running outside of the party system. In 1992 independent candidate Ross Perot gathered 18.9% of the popular vote while winning 0 EVs. In 1980 independent candidate John Anderson got 6.6% of the popular vote while winning 0 EVs.

To get on the ballot for November as an Independent, you have to deliver signatures to every state (except for Louisiana and Colorado, where you can just pay them). A grand total of about 875,000 signatures in 48 states plus DC, with 49 different requirements and 25 different deadlines.

The Bottom Line: non-major Candidates are spoilers

While minor party, write-in, and independent candidates have garnered significant popular vote numbers in the last century, none have been viable national candidates as measured by the only metric that matters: EVs. Even Teddy Roosevelt didn't come close, and he was closer to a true Republican Party candidate than a true minor party candidate.

Any "third party" candidacy must be seen nearly exclusively in the role of spoiler. Yes, this is a weird year, with Trumpers and Berners showing great enthusiasm among polities that mostly seem unwilling to vote. "Likely voter" models are out the window, or at least deeply in question. Something wild could happen. But the last 100+ years (only 25 or so presidential elections, really, so the sample size is small) says it won't. The most recent President of the US who wasn't either a Republican or a Democrat was ... Millard Filmore (1850-1853), our 13th President who was a Whig.

The Republican Party and Democratic Party have dominated four of the six "party systems" covering US presidential election history, starting in 1854. There is no particular reason to think this is going to change. The Republican Party is likely to have to re-invent itself, as both of the two major parties have done periodically since the 1850s, when the Republican Party was the northern anti-slavery big government party and the Democratic Party was the party of Redeemers and Copperheads as well as the lower economic class rural workers now seen as the voting backbone of the modern Republican Party.

Could someone run?

It's quite clear that the idea of a third party run is in the air. But the mechanics of such a run (other than a futile Write-in campaign) are difficult, and probably out of reach at this point, especially for a pseudo-Republican Party candidate like Trump.

The best route would probably be taking over one of the existing minor parties, like the Libertarians or the Greens. The downside of that is that you are immediately giving up huge swaths of the country and would have to win 80+% of the EVs where you are on the ballot.

Failing that, or desiring access to all the EVs, an Independent run is the only option. And there's a giant steaming pile of Texas* in your way. If you want to be on the November ballot as a independent in Texas, you have to deliver nearly 80K valid signatures. According to Politico, all of those signatures must come from voters who did not vote in the March 1st primary (taking more than 4 million likely voters out of the signature pool). By the 9th of May (39 days). About 2K valid signatures per day.

According to BallotPedia, the average cost per required signature is just over $4, so that's about $320K just in Texas. An average of $3.5 million nationwide. Some campaigns cost three times that, or about $10 million nationwide.

* The last Democratic Party candidate to win Texas was Jimmy Carter in 1976. The last Republican Party candidate to win the Presidency while losing Texas was Richard Nixon in 1968. It's hard to see a Republican Party (or pseudo-Republican Party) candidate winning the Presidency without Texas.

So if there are not Trumpers out gathering signatures to put Trump on the ballot in Texas, Trump is not running as an Independent.

Oh, and there's one other problem. Texas is one of two states with "sore loser" laws that apply to presidential elections. No one who has run in a presidential primary in Texas may be on the ballot as an Independent.

There is possibly some wiggle room. A court challenge might defeat the May 9th deadline (every non-presidential candidate in Texas has until June) and 42 out of 45 states with sore loser laws have established precedents that they do not apply to presidential primaries, so Texas may just be next on that list (the other state, BTW, is South Dakota, whose 3 EVs may or may not be worth the trouble). John Anderson ran as an Independent in 1980 despite participating in seven early caucuses and primaries, but had withdrawn well before the Texas primary.

Will someone run?

Here's how you know whether it's going to happen.

It's not.

At least not unless there is some very interesting activity going on at a relatively frantic pace. Now, or if not now, soon.

Look for news reports of signature gathering in Texas (deadline 5/9), North Carolina (deadline 6/9), and Illinois (deadline 6/27). If you don't see it, court challenges or taking over a third party are the only options, and I don't believe that taking over a third party is anything but a spoiler move.

Berners and Trumpers may stay home, or not. Clintonistas and Cruzers may hold their noses, or not. But the odds of a successful third party or independent run are tiny and the barriers are huge.

I think it comes down to one question:

If he doesn't get the nomination, is Trump crazy enough to spend millions just to defeat Ted Cruz?

Anybody who waits until after the conventions is giving up any chance to get access to more EVs than the Libertarian and Green Parties are already signed up for, so the secondary question is:

If he doesn't get the nomination, could Trump subvert either the Libertarian or Green Party and become their nominee?

I have no idea.

(updated: spelling corrections)

Three Little Not-Piggies...

2016-02-13T10:46:00.000-08:00

At the Arizona Sonora Desert Museum

Mass v2

2015-05-28T15:12:00.000-07:00

Seven and a half months ago, in the lead up to Halloween and both Canadian and American Thanksgiving, I wrote about a new eating schedule and how it was helping me reduce my mass. Of course the holiday season immediately followed that post -- a notoriously difficult time of year to maintain weight, much less lose it. In addition, right after Christmas Sara and I joined friends for a trip to England* and spend two weeks on the road -- another notoriously difficult thing regarding eating and weight.

*insert obligatory joke about how English food is awful and therefore traveling to England must be a good way to lose weight. In fact, I had the best steak of my life while we were in London and ate quite well the entire trip, thank you very much.

In fact, I ended the holidays weighing slightly less than I entered them -- a pound or three -- nothing spectacular, but I consider that a significant victory.

This morning I passed another milestone. I'm now 10 pounds under my black belt testing weight and have lost approximately 40 pounds*. That's approaching losing 15% of my maximum body weight. More importantly, my BP (on medication) has dropped this week into the very low end of normal.

*Disclaimer: any particular days mass reading is temporary. I have spent more than a month bouncing around my last plateau, moving up and down (mostly) in about a three pound range in the high 250s. I note edge cases for the very reason that they are extremes and thus rewarding.

As my mass decreases, my ability and inclination to exercise increases. I still have a back problem, but I have added bicycling (using an electrically assisted bicycle). I got my first 10 mile ride in this week and am trying (not yet managing) to get a short ride in every day I'm not at the gym. The Faraday Porteur makes hills much less scary but can be ridden up and down easy grades and on the flat without draining the battery. It makes it easy to carry a grocery bag (or two) and I have panniers coming that should make bigger trips possible. If my gaming didn't end late at night I'd seriously consider riding it over to Card Kingdom for PFS.

My antipathy for calories in, calories out is probably better documented than it warrants. Tl;Dr is that it's a decent heuristic and a terrible plan. What you eat is important because it affects how your body processes food and releases energy, and because it affects how much (and what) your body _wants_ to eat. But the general goal of dieting or eating healthy is to encourage your body to eat less (and better) stuff and have more energy and inclination to expend that energy.

Six small meals* (I don't know a formal name for it but that's descriptive) -- eating a small amount (think custard cup, small muffin, or half banana sized) every three hours through the day -- seems to work for us. We rarely get more than five in, for me one is often somewhat larger, but th basic idea is working.

*Honest to Goddess, we did this under medical supervision for the last 7-8 months. Including monthly meetings with a nutritionist/dietician and a fitness counselor and periodic meetings with an MD and a psychologist. They were not messing around. I don't know how much that support mattered, but we definitely benefited from it.

Given that 90+% of dieters in the U.S. fail to lose weight long-term, any dieting discussion must begin with the thought that we don't really know what we're talking about around food and that this works for me. And that whatever works for you is good.

This is working for us.

Thoughts on the Apple Watch after less than 24 hours

2015-05-02T11:15:00.000-07:00

1) it's a little strange to be wearing a watch again.

2) the apps screen gets full really really fast

3) I want to write complications for it. Complications are the elements that can be configured in watch faces. A quick google search has not turned up any information on creating them.

4) It was obvious that the watch was going to be a relatively simple i/o device attached to my phone. Brief experience bears that out -- with the exception of the watch face and complications (some of which DO depend upon the iPhone -- Weather, for instance) -- it's a new interface into existing apps on your iPhone.

As such, it creates a new category of interactions which used to be folded into your phone -- extremely brief ones for which you might have carried your phone in your hand (e.g., moving to the next song or changing the volume on your music -- exactly what buttons on your headphones or cable were intended to do) -- like incessantly checking the time, or a countdown timer you have in place.

So I'm not quite sure that I like the idea of games on the watch. If you are sufficiently engaged in something to interact with it constantly, why not use your phone, which has a bigger screen and better UX? The only game type I can see working on the watch is something where you make a very simple decision every few minutes or so. Definitely NOT highly interactive systems.

5) Oddly, the watch is more intrusive than the phone for interacting, because it absolutely requires two hands. There are a lot of things I can do on the iPhone with a single hand (the previously mentioned music manipulations, simple short texts or typing with one thumb, swiping, etc.) but I have to have my phone out and in one hand to do it. The watch, which doesn't need to be taken out or put away, must be manipulated with the opposite hand. It sounds small but it it weighing heavily right now -- partly because in each case the primary use hand is my right hand. If i'm holding the phone to do one handed manipulations, it's in the right hand. If I'm manipulating the watch in any way other than just flipping my wrist to the see currently displayed glance or app, I'm doing it with the right hand. I assume that lefties will act correspondingly using the left hand.

Anyway, those are the first thoughts. More later, I imagine.

Cross posted to Mischievous Ramblings II

But There's No Such Thing as Climate Change....

2014-12-10T03:00:00.000-08:00

Image from below linked story.

From How Much More Rain Would California Need To End The Drought?:

Short answer: a whole lot.

...the winter we need to escape drought conditions ... would have 150 percent of the average rainfall, or a storm like we've been getting every three to five days through spring. That, unfortunately, isn't very likely.

Additional coverage of the California drought on SFist.

Much of the US is in an historic drought. Drought leads to changes in food prices (almost always upward), increases costs of disposing of waste (due to cost of water and need for clean water when supplies diminish), and can literally make portions of the country uninhabitable without substantial efforts. Any number of Southern California and Sun Belt cities are in locations that are incapable of supporting their population without massive influxes of foreign water, including the possibility of moving water from Canada.

The idea of "water wars" is nothing new, but with increasing drought throughout the US ("from Delaware to California" is a money quote from one story) the problem of who has water and who's willing to give up water is going to get nothing but more serious and contentious.

Who owns your water supply?