Rants, Raves, and Rhetoric v4

Tag: election

  • End the political ads

    Got a canvasser who thanked me for having already voted. The visit was to ask if other members of the household have voted and if not, then do they have a plan? What was interesting to me was the campaign knew I had already voted. I did last week on my day off. And I…

  • Trump’s best shot at reelection is false-consensus effect

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    Thinking back to Obama’s campaign for reelection, I recall much talk about how incompetent, evil, and terrible a president he was from his opposition. Not Romney directly but the his likely voters on social media. To the point of Romney feeling moral obligation to defend Obama as not that bad of a person to his…

  • How can he help me?

    Got an email subject of “How can I help you?” from my U.S. Senator. This is a first in the over 3 years of emails I have from his office. Most communicate his party’s stance on an issue. Some are advisory like “Preparing For Hurricane Irma”. The closest to this seemingly change in approach is…

  • Gotcha Jerks Part II

    If you have not read Gotcha Jerks, then please do first. I recently ran across The “Other Side” Is Not Dumb which goes further. Here is my favorite quote from it. Sharing links that mock a caricature of the Other Side isn’t signaling that we’re somehow more informed. It signals that we’d rather be smug…

  • Quasi-Mandatory Voting

    Yesterday, in Mandatory Voting I wrote: In the end, I think finding ways to lower the costs of voting is the best approach. A low participation rate suggests there are problems. Solving those problems would be better than simply punishing people for not overcoming those costs. Additionally I mentioned: Certainly, I am in favor of things…

  • Mandatory Voting

    Given the closeness of the recent election, the inevitable complaint about how few people voted are swirling in the national conversation from the losing side. Part of the conversation is the winning party does not have a mandate. The more interesting claim is that if everyone had to vote, then Hillary could have won. The rationale is that…

  • In the time of Hamilton

    So, the social media sphere is abuzz over our President-elect tweeting about a member of the cast of the Hamilton play reading a statement to the VP-elect. The P-elect seemed upset about it all. The VP-elect seemed amused people are buzzing about a non-issue and people should expect the P-elect to be the kind of person they…

  • RNC Convention Mishaps

    Saw a probably clickbait title “Mishaps overshadow message at the Republican National Convention.” It got me thinking that this is probably another case of media attention hyperbole. The media fixation story I recall was several years ago about child kidnappings. Every week it made national headlines about a child who disappeared or was taken by…

  • Collected Quotes 2016-06-30

    Just some more collected quotes. See the quotes tag for more. This one seems particularly applicable during this presidential election year. “History is moving pretty quickly these days, and the heroes and villains keep on changing parts.” ― Ian Fleming Miscellaneous others Introverts are collectors of thoughts, and solitude is where the collection is curated and…