They Are Hoping To Shoot Someone

 

A Slow Moving Coup

Bill Maher is hoping that his latest editorial scares the shit out of more people. I'm just hoping that it wakes the Democrats up and they start arresting the people that are trying to take over our country. 

We are already in a civil war. We know who the bad guys are. We saw them on January 6th. We see them here. They are attempting to turn our country into an authoritarian regime by accusing the rest of us of doing the same thing. 

This was done quite successfully in Germany in the 1930s. People like Kevin Baker have fully embraced Goebbels-like tactics out of pure fear and hatred. They continually LIE about the left and, quite frankly, anyone who doesn't agree with them. 

They are very dangerous and must be stopped within the law that we are barely holding on to...

Pro Life

Pro life would be 20 Sandy Hook students starting high school this week.

Dedicated To Kevin Baker

 Take a look at this image.

These are American heroes. They are the policemen who put their lives on the line when Trump supporters engaged in a terrorist attack on our nation's capitol. This act of insurrection was based on the lie that the election was stolen from Donald Trump.

A big proponent of this lie is my old nemesis, Kevin Baker, who is still acting in sedition to the nation he claims to love. His recent post, "Despair and Utter Hopelessness," is a shining example of just how far CULT Kevin has gone. 

Kevin lives in a world where Twitter posts are the same things as facts. His anger towards any information that contradicts his scientology like beliefs has so overwhelmed any logic that he had left that it's disgusting. 

He and his followers have embraced the role of traitor completely. Listening to the testimony yesterday, I can only imagine Kevin either cheering on the crowds as they called the police traitors and beat them. Or denying it all, saying it's liberal media propaganda, not a big deal, and oh, weren't the BLM protest so much worse? 

We know exactly who you are, Kevin Baker. You are the modern day version of a Nazi. You accuse your perceived enemies of doing the very things you do and demonize them for it. (copyright: Josef Goebbels). You want an authoritarian state where there is only one ideology in power: YOURS. And that's not even the sad part.

The true tragedy in your long post of lies is that the very decay that's eroding our country is caused entirely by folks like you. You adolescently blame everyone else for COVID-19, gun violence, civic unrest, climate issues, and economic disaster. Yet it's YOUR FUCKING IDEOLOGY that's causing all of it. You supported an incompetent buffoon and Russian asset over the most capable person to be president because of adolescent feelings about liberals. 

Half the people dead from COVID-19 would alive right now if Hillary was president. Their blood is on your hands. You refuse any new gun laws that could actually help bring down gun violence. You scoff at any discussion of race or culture. You think climate change is a liberal plot. And even after economic stimulation of aggregate demand staved off another depression, you still stomped your feet at government interference in the economy.

And why?

Because you never grew out of your issues with authority. Every view you have comes from the lens of a 12 year old boy. 

The rest of the country, and there are far more of us than of you people, are sick and tired of your nonsense holding us back. We are going to force you to submit to reality and the harm you are doing to our country. You may think you know what "force" means but you likely don't. 

Every day we see more and more young people getting into "good trouble"..."necessary trouble." Some of them are my former students. Some are ex-Republicans who left the party when you and the crazies took it over. The overwhelming majority are liberals and moderates who are doing the necessary work to make sure you and your ilk are going to be quickly relegated to the ash heap of irrelevance. 

The photo above is one of heroes, Kevin. Heroes. There was a time when you might have seen them the same way. Now you aren't fit to lick their boots. 

The Nazis Keep Marching On

I used to have a tag on here called "Secret Authoritarians." They aren't really being that secret about it anymore, are they? The January 6th domestic terrorist attack and insurrection has now been more clearly documented. Check it out.

Just imagine the hay that would be made if these were liberals. Instead, it's a lot of denial and propaganda about what is quite plainly conservatives being EXACTLY what I said they were all along. 

They are Nazis in every sense of the word. 

Manipulation

 

The Dragon Level Hypocrisy of the Right

 

Me Vs. We

The biggest impediment in our society right now is this. 

People in our society don't care about others. More importantly, they have an adolescent loathing to systemic structures like government which create spaces for group-level support. 

We will continue to decay as a country until this horse shit attitude changes. 

Leave Naomi Osaka Alone

The sports world is upset over Naomi Osaka pulling out of the French Open. How dare she not attend press conferences! Fining her thousands of dollars wasn't enough -- they had to embarrass her and force her out of the tournament, and then threaten to drive her out of tennis completely.

I don't watch much sports -- basically just volleyball. But I always cringe when it comes to the interviews. The same questions are asked and the same cliches are repeated every time. It's usually just embarrassing to everyone.

And what's the point? The only thing that matters is what happens on the court. Why do we need to hear excuses or humble-bragging in the aftermath of a tennis match?

The play-by-play and color announcers generally do a fine job of informing us when the players screw up, and why they screwed up, how many times they screwed up in the past, and the statistics of their screwups. Why put the players on the spot in front of a world-wide audience, especially after they lose a match?

I mean, who really cares what athletes have to say? They're not there to talk to us, they're there to play the game. They're not generally all that insightful, especially the "naturals" who are just good at their sport and don't really know why they are.

Plus, one of the best ways to improve your performance is to learn from your mistakes, and then immediately forget them and focus on the next thing. If you need to talk to someone, talk to the coach -- they're the one who's responsible for the analysis and training anyway.

I can see why tournament organizers and the press want a photo-op with the winner. But why torment the loser with questions after a hard-fought match? Nothing is gained by humiliating these athletes.

I grant that the tennis organizations are within their rights to ask the people they pay millions to play games the rest of us play just for fun to show up for a post-match celebration that the press is invited to.

But just the winners.

If the loser wants to make an appearance, fine. But if they don't, it makes no sense to bother them with stupid questions that embarrass the reporters and audience as much as the players.

Remember Benghazi?

Think back with me to those days of yore when conservatives blew 89 bowels about the Benghazi attack. Remember all those investigations that found nothing? They were so angry about an attack on a makeshift consulate/CIA base that they were beside themselves. So you would think they would want an investigation into what happened on January 6th, right?

Wrong. 

Take your hypocrisy and shove it up your ass. We are coming for you. And we won't rest until you are in prison. 

Is Test Prep for Standardized Testing Cheating?

There's a great example of disingenuity in today's Washington Post, penned by arch-conservative George F. Will:

Thomas Jefferson High School (TJ), a selective STEM magnet school with a national reputation for excellence, has what the school board in suburban Fairfax County, Va., considers a problem: Too many Asian American students excel on the admission test. The current TJ student body is 73 percent Asian American, 17.7 percent White, 3.3 percent Hispanic or Latino, 1 percent Black and 6 percent other. So, the board has decided to eliminate the test. Admissions will be based on a “holistic” assessment of applicants, meaning whatever admissions officials want it to mean.

 

Will, long a champion of white privilege, wants to roll back any form of "diversity" in admissions. In the guise of protesting anti-Asian discrimination he blasts people who question the validity of standardized testing. And he can't resist large numbers of "scare quotes" to make his point:

 

The TJ parents’ complaint notes that in 2018, a retired county middle school teacher ominously told Virginia’s General Assembly that Asian American parents are “ravenous” for opportunities for their children. In 2020, a member of the state legislature spoke of, but did not specify, “unethical ways” Asian American parents “push their kids into [TJ].” Presumably, they push their children to do well on standardized tests. At a 2020 town hall meeting, Fairfax County’s schools superintendent stigmatized TJ’s student body majority by complaining that Asian American parents spend “thousands upon thousands” on test preparation. Virginia’s secretary of education later denounced such studying as comparable to “performance enhancement drugs” in sports: cheating. 

The fact is, George, spending thousands of dollars to push your kids to do well on standardized tests is the very essence of cheating.

Here's how it works: parents hire tutors who have taken the test in previous years. Each year these tutors quiz test takers to regurgitate the questions that appeared on the test. They prepare "study guides" (note the scare quotes!) that have the questions and the answers. Students memorize the answers, not necessarily understanding the questions.

Now, creating a good standardized test is an expensive proposition. I used to work at a company that did computerized standardized testing worldwide. Writing a good test isn't just a matter of jotting down random questions. It involves creating a large bank of items (questions), then having a large number of people answer those items, including people who know the subject well. The results are then analyzed and statistics are generated. Bad items (ones that don't predict true ability) are tossed.

 

Items are added and removed each year, but banks of standardized items generally remain stable over time because they're expensive to create.

 

This is why many people consider study guides and tutors to be unethical. They literally give the kids the answers to the test. Yeah, they don't know exactly which questions will be on each year's test, and they can't be sure they've got the official answer, but they make the kids memorize everything.

The problem is, memorizing answers to canned questions is not the same as acquiring critical problem solving abilities. But it does give the advantage to children of parents who can afford to throw money at it.

When I worked for that testing company we delivered the written certification tests for pilots on computers, getting rid of the paper-and-pencil tests, which took forever to grade. Pilot trainees at flight schools wanted instant results so they could get into the cockpit that day and do their practical exams. 

 

Over time we computerized airline mechanic testing as well. One of the airlines wanted to move its service operations to China (this was in the Nineties, back when companies started selling out American workers big time). So the FAA had us set up a testing center in China to accommodate the airline.

The FAA's written mechanics test consisted of, as I recall, 25 or 50 multiple-choice questions. The paper version of the test had several uniquely-numbered standard "forms," each drawing the prescribed number of random items from the larger item bank.

I was at work one day when the sales guy called me from China. "The tests are wrong," he said.

 

 "What? I don't think so. They're just like the paper ones. They're very simple, straightforward tests. Nothing fancy."

He paused. "But they're in the wrong order."

"Huh? There is no 'order.' We randomized the item delivery order at the FAA's request."

"Well, we have a problem. These guys don't speak English."

"But..." And then it hit me. The Chinese mechanics had memorized the order of the items and the answers for every numbered form of the test. But when we computerized the test the order was determined randomly on delivery, making it impossible for the Chinese-speaking mechanics to cheat.

 

When it came to the written test, the question with pilots and mechanics was always, Does this really matter? The test is just a formality, everyone said. The practical exam will sort at the bad ones. 

But in this case, it really would matter. All the manuals for these planes were written in English. All the markings on the engines and wings were in English. If the mechanics can't read English, they can't read the manuals. And they can't properly service the planes.

Now, I'm not saying that all Chinese people cheat on tests. Clearly, Americans cheat too (I mean, how else did Donald Trump get through high school and college?). 

But there are definitely cultural attitudes about cheating: in some places, like the Soviet Union, cheating was a way of life. In college in the late Seventies I had friends from Russia and Ukraine, smart guys, who would openly cheat on every test even though they did not need to, just because they could. I didn't know any Americans who cheated because they wouldn't even talk about it, must less admit to it.

The testing company I worked for regularly ran statistics on pass rates for students at all our testing centers to look for cheating. Many of the centers were at schools that provided training for the subject material (we did a lot of certification for computer network technicians and the like).

Some centers, in China and India in particular, had much higher pass rates than others. So we sent in "secret shoppers" and discovered that some of these testing centers offered an extra service: they would stand behind you and tell you the answers to the questions.

Protecting the integrity of the item banks is one of the biggest problems in testing. Some of these testing centers took photos of the questions as they appeared on the screen so they could develop "study guides." 

 

That was almost 30 years ago -- it's worse now with a cell phone in every pocket and even glasses that have built-in cameras. There's a long history of schemes to steal questions for tests like the SAT (like this and this and this).

I'm sure that Will and many Asian families do not consider spending thousands of dollars on tutors and study guides on standardized test prep to be cheating. But it is because of the ubiquity of item theft.

But there is a larger point here. We require that doctors and nurses and lawyers pass rigorous written examinations before they practice medicine and law. Pilots have to pass tests before they can fly. Real estate agents have to be certified.

That makes sense. People should be qualified before they can do work that can affect people's lives.

But should that rationale apply to kids getting into a high school? How are they ever going to learn this stuff if they're never even given a chance? I mean, these kids aren't doing brain surgery there. They're going there to learn basic science and math.

The admissions process for a school like Thomas Jefferson should determine whether kids can benefit from going to that school -- can they absorb the material and earn a passing grade?

 

By their very nature standardized multiple choice exams do not test a student's ability to learn and solve real problems -- they test the ability to regurgitate memorized data. Learning and memorization are not the same thing.

 

Schools like this historically only want the "best" students. Why? Why shouldn't every student have an equal shot at going to a good school?

I suspect that the real purpose of standardized tests is to puff up the egos of school administrators and keep their pass rates high with a minimum of effort. And, sadly, to keep out poor kids, who have historically been ethnic minorities. 

 

But that's being turned on it's head with the success of many Asian Americans. Will does have a point that white parents are being hypocritical complaining about Asian Americans using the same scam white folks came up with to keep themselves on top.

 

To a large degree the ability to learn something depends more on motivation and persistence than previous accomplishments. 

 

Why should a student motivated by a fear of disappointing their wealthy parents get into a good school while a student motivated by inherent curiosity and an actual love of science and technology is rejected because their poor parents can't afford to buy study guides and pay tutors?

Lost In Translation (AKA Lies Conservatives Spew)

 

Republicans: "No wait!"

 

The Altar of Lies

 

About those Pronouns...

I'm taking a linguistics class at the local university, delivered via Zoom. At the start of the semester many of the students included their "pronouns" in their display name ("Betsy Ross: she/her/hers"), but those all got wiped when the U implemented a security protocol that required the displayed name match the internal name. 

The school felt the need to apologize profusely. But, honestly, the whole pronoun thing is problematic and most likely unworkable, as this advice columnist question illustrates.

It's unworkable because it is the height of arrogance to think that everyone should know your first, middle and last names, your unknown form of address (sir, ma'am, ?), the title you prefer (Mr., Ms., Mrs., ?), whether you have some kind of title (Dr., Esq., PhD, captain, lieutenant, etc.), and three different personal pronouns (he/him/his, she/her/hers, they/them/theirs, zee/zer/zers, or whatever fanciful creation people may come up for themselves).

That's at least nine different labels that can apply to you. And many people who might refer to you won't know you, and will therefore not know what labels to apply, constantly sending you into a tizzy with microaggressions.

To implement this, people would have to walk around wearing labels stating their pronouns, or dress or groom themselves in a culturally agreed-upon fashion linked to their preferences. Sort of like making everyone wear a personal Star of David.

The motivation for this is some notion of everyone receiving equal treatment, by giving everyone special treatment.

And the thing is, it won't alleviate sexism, or gay prejudice, or trans phobia, or any of those things. 

Most European languages are heavily into grammatical gender: English has gender in pronouns only, French has two genders (masculine and feminine) that apply to all nouns, even inanimate objects: books are masculine, waltzes are feminine. German has three genders (masculine, feminine and neuter),  Russian has three and half genders (animate masculine, inanimate masculine, feminine and neuter). In those languages adjectives have different endings depending on gender, different articles based on gender, and Russian even conjugates verbs in the past tense (only!) based on gender.

Despite being heavily into grammatical gender, pronoun usage in German is confounding to English speakers: it doesn't actually depend on physical gender. The diminutive suffixes -chen and -lein change the gender of the word they modify to neuter. The words for girl and young woman, Mädchen (from Mädel) and Fräulein (from Frau), are both grammatically neuter, so the neuter pronoun es — it — would be used for them. Yes, a German man would call a hot young Fräulein "it."

But the majority of world languages have no grammatical gender, not for pronouns, not for nouns, not for anything.

The Japanese language historically avoids pronouns completely. In polite conversation people are typically referred to in the third person by their name, rather than a pronoun. You and I are usually omitted and understood from context. The same honorific — san or sensei — is used for males and females. 

But Japan (like nearly all human societies) is historically very sexist. And even though basic Japanese grammar lacks the gender markings of French and German, there is a huge difference between the speech of males and females in Japanese. Men and women utilize a completely different set of pronouns (when used) and verbs, with females using the "polite" forms and males using the "rough" forms. Which is, of course, not at all surprising.

The upshot is: even in languages with grammars that have no gender at all, gender bias and sexism still exist. The idea that the language people use will confine their thoughts and make them behave or think a certain way is pure BS.

There's this idea out there that some languages have a way of saying something that no other language can express, or that the language you speak somehow constrains your thoughts. This is nonsense: every natural language can express every notion that every other natural language can express. It may take more or fewer words to get the point across, but all languages (perhaps excepting pidgins constructed for trade or similar purposes, and ignoring discussions of quantum mechanics in every language) are essentially equal.

Now, it is totally reasonable for everyone to expect to be treated equally, with respect and dignity. But that can't happen if every person expects to have their every little whim catered to -- it's impossible for everyone you meet to know how you want to be coddled. Treating everyone differently is simply impractical, and more to the point, is the opposite of what we should really want.

Therefore, I would make the following proposals:

• Address people by their names when you know their names, or you.
  
• Dispense with sex-based titles such as Mr./Mrs./Ms. completely. Especially that outrageously sexist and antiquated practice of addressing envelopes to women with their husbands' names, e.g., Mrs. William J. Clinton for Hillary Rodham Clinton (my wife still gets letters like that!).
  
• Likewise, toss out sir and ma'am. It is stilted and antiquated, and most people don't use them anyway. If you need to address an unfamiliar person directly, we already have a word for that: you. Feel free to add a "hey" if you really need their attention.
  
• Address people with titles (doctors, military ranks, and specific jobs) with those titles, and their name if known: Dr. Strangelove, Nurse Ratched, Captain Spaulding, President Underwood, but not "Mr. President."
• Refer to people in the third person by their names. This can also help clarify sentences -- it's not always clear which person he refers to when you're talking about the interaction between two males.
  
• As a last resort, use "they/them/theirs" when referring to an indefinite person or one of unknown name or status. People may bicker with this, saying that it's grammatically incorrect to refer to a single person with a third-person plural they as in, "They were the first person in line." But English speakers have been doing this literally for centuries. If you're still not convinced, think of it this way: we use you are for both the singular and plural second person (thou art was the singular form before we started addressing single persons in the plural). It's perfectly reasonable to treat the indefinite third person the same way. And everyone already does it.
  

This way you could talk about Caitlyn Jenner all day long and never once worry whether Jenner's a she, he, they or zee.

Adopting these standards at a university would ameliorate problems like the one that came up in Ohio:

A Christian professor of philosophy who was reprimanded for refusing to refer to a trans student as a woman can pursue his lawsuit against Shawnee State University in Ohio, a federal appeals court said Friday.

Shawnee State “punished a professor for his speech on a hotly contested issue,” the appeals court said. “And it did so despite the constitutional protections afforded by the First Amendment.”

The case stemmed from a 2018 political philosophy class in which the professor, Nicholas Meriwether, called a trans woman “sir.” Meriwether said it happened accidentally, as no one informed him of the student’s preferred pronoun. After class, the student “demanded” to be called “Ms.,” like other female students, and threatened to have him fired if he didn’t, according to Meriwether’s lawsuit.

It is simply unrealistic for a professor just looking at someone sitting in class of, say, 200 students to know how each student wants to be addressed. If you get rid of sir and Ms., replacing them with the student's actual name, or hey, you, the problem just goes way: the professor can't possibly defend using sir or Mr. when the standard of discourse at the university is to use you or the student's actual name. Similarly, the student can't bitch if the professor calls them by their name or you every time he talks to them (see how natural them is?).

That wouldn't infringe on the professor's "right to free speech" or tick the student off for being misidentified. And if one or the other insists on being a dick about it, given that there's a completely neutral option that offends no one, the university could take action against either party if they persist in their obnoxious behavior/demands.

Now, I'm not fooling myself here: I know everyone is still going to assign some kind of gender to every person they meet. But no one can get away with saying that using people's names and addressing them as you is a horrendous burden and a violation of their core beliefs.

Screwing with the language, adding new pronouns, making everyone learn nine forms of address for every person they meet — none of this will change how people think or feel. It will just piss off the sticks in the mud, giving them yet one more thing to claim they're a victim of, and it will make non-binary folks feel bad every time someone accidentally uses the wrong term for them.

Gun Care and Health Care Control

 

Things White People Don't Have To Think About

I need to drive my two-year-old to daycare tomorrow morning. To ensure we arrive alive, we won't take public transit (Oscar Grant). I removed all air fresheners from the vehicle and double-checked my registration status (Daunte Wright), and ensured my license plates were visible (Lt. Caron Nazario). 

I will be careful to follow all traffic rules (Philando Castille), signal every turn (Sandra Bland), keep the radio volume low (Jordan Davis), and won't stop at a fast food chain for a meal (Rayshard Brooks). I'm too afraid to pray (Rev. Clementa C. Pickney) so I just hope the car won't break down (Corey Jones). 

When my wife picks him up at the end of the day, I'll remind her not to dance (Elijah McClain), stop to play in a park (Tamir Rice), patronize the local convenience store for snacks (Trayvon Martin), or walk around the neighborhood (Mike Brown). 

Once they are home, we won't stand in our backyard (Stephon Clark), eat ice cream on the couch (Botham Jean), or play any video games (Atatiana Jefferson). After my wife and I tuck him into bed around 7:30pm, neither of us will leave the house to go to Walmart (John Crawford) or to the gym (Tshyrand Oates) or on a jog (Ahmaud Arbery). 

We won't even walk to see the birds (Christian Cooper). We'll just sit and try not to breathe (George Floyd) and not to sleep (Breonna Taylor). 

These are things white people simply do not have to think about. 

 –DAVID GRAY

The Straw Man Argument Known as The Narrative

The subject of "The Narrative" has come up recently in the news and it's way past time to address it. According to conservatives, "The Narrative" is liberal propaganda that asserts that all right-wingers are racists who prey upon people of color. Conservatives believe that they are being unfairly targeted by the left and gleefully point out when people of color attack each other as proof that "The Narrative" is a lie. 

 In reality, the concept of "The Narrative" is a straw man argument employed as a "gotcha" tactic that muddies the waters, gaslights, and conveniently avoids the facts about conservatives today. 

Those facts are: 

-74,000,000 people voted for a guy who used the racist terms "China Flu" and "Kung Flu" in describing the coronavirus. 

-White supremacists groups coordinated the attack on the Capitol on January 6th. 

-98% of mass shooters are white and male. 

If you are a conservative whining about "The Narrative," step one would be to STFU about liberals and deal with the large number of racist assholes in your party. Stop blaming everyone else for your problems and avoiding the elephant in the room. 

Being a nonracist isn't enough anymore. You have to be an antiracist. Get over your adolescent issues with someone telling you what to do and just fucking do it because it's the right thing to do. You aren't being victimized here and your attempt to pull a Goebels is pathetic. 

In short, stop making shit up

Hey, Lindsey

To show his NRA bona fides, Lindsey O. Graham went on Fox News to issue the standard blather the gun industry has bought and paid for:

“I own an AR-15,” Graham told Fox News host Chris Wallace. “If there’s a natural disaster in South Carolina where the cops can’t protect my neighborhood, my house will be the last one that the gang will come to, because I can defend myself.”

 

Seriously? Lindsey, this is South Carolina we're talking about. Everyone in the gang that comes to your door is gonna have their own AR-15, some of them modified for autofire. And they'll all have Glock 17s -- no, they'll probably have two apiece. And a Bowie knife. And maybe a couple of grenades. Plus a laser sight. And a silencer. And half of them will be wearing body armor. All courtesy of you and the other Republican gun-industry shills in Congress.

Come on, Lindsey! Was it really the smartest move to advertise to the entire world that you have a stockpile of AR-15 ammo? You just made your house the gang's first stop after the natural disaster exacerbated by the climate change you pretend doesn't exist.

All these Republican gun lovers imagine that they're all Rick Grimes. But it's a fantasy: they're all Negan.

Less Regulated Than Vaginas