Category Archives: Random Blogging

Disturbing…

When the candidate they supported loses, some percentage of that candidate’s most avid supporters will suspect–or even allege–a conspiracy to “steal” the election. Before Trump, those allegations used to be limited to fringe folks and sore losers. (They’re still voiced by sore losers…Trump being a prime example.) Most of us properly consider these recurring accusations of electoral impropriety as one common type of conspiracy theory. Eminently dismissable.

So I was stunned to read about a lawsuit in New York, where “electoral impropriety” would be a kind word, at least if the facts are as the local news media have reported.

A seminal case questioning the accuracy of the 2024 Presidential and Senate election results in Rockland County, New York, is moving forward. In open court last Thursday, Judge Rachel Tanguay of the New York Supreme Court, ruled that discovery must proceed, pushing the lawsuit brought by SMART Legislation into the evidence-gathering stage. The lawsuit seeks a full hand recount of the Presidential and U.S. Senate races in Rockland County.

The Court has now ordered that hand count, in an effort to explain the statistical anomalies.

As stated in the complaint, more voters have sworn they voted for independent U.S. Senate candidate Diane Sare than the Rockland County Board of Elections counted and certified, directly contradicting those results. Additionally, the presidential election results exhibit numerous statistical anomalies. The anomalies in the presidential race include multiple districts where hundreds of voters chose the Democratic candidate Kirsten Gillibrand for Senate, but where zero voters selected the Democratic Presidential candidate Kamala Harris.

Additionally, a statistician determined that the 2024 presidential election results were statistically highly unlikely in four of the five towns in Rockland County when compared with 2020 results.

It certainly appears that Rockland County experienced “irregularities,. Granted, it is highly improbable that those same irregularities were widespread enough to throw the national election to Trump (although a finding that he did, in fact, “steal” the election would certainly improve my opinion of the electorate…) While it might be technically possible to interfere with a presidential election, successfully altering the national outcome would require the thief to overcome overwhelming legal, logistical, and security barriers. The states, after all, are in charge of administering these elections–the decentralized nature of the nation’s federal elections would make large-scale manipulation incredibly difficult.

Would it be impossible?

At risk of descending into a Pillow Man degree of insanity, I keep thinking about Elon Musk’s complaint that Trump is insufficiently grateful to him for Musk’s help in getting him elected. The media (undoubtedly correctly) attributed that help to the many millions of dollars Musk donated to Trump’s campaign. But what if Musk’s techie bros figured out a way to overcome those legal, logistical and security barriers?

What if some proportion of that huge number of “no shows”–the millions of missing voters– actually did cast ballots, but those ballots disappeared?

What if it turned out that the madman currently desecrating the Oval Office stole the election?

Let me be clear: much as I’d like to believe that, I don’t. But just by indulging in that bit of conspiratorial daydreaming, we can see how much damage such suspicions can do to the civic trust that democracy demands. Trump’s accusations–and his cult’s acceptance of them–didn’t just trigger the insurrection on January 6th. It poisoned large parts of the body politic, sowing a distrust that has affected and damaged virtually every aspect of American political life.

If and when the U.S. emerges from its current downward spiral, restoring that trust–in democracy, in science, in education, in accurate history–should be the first order of business. But restoration of trust won’t come from the sorts of people who currently occupy America’s public offices. And while I’d love to believe that We the People didn’t really elect some of these sleazy lunatics, we probably did.

Just not, apparently, in Rockland County…

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That “Big Beautiful Bill”

Ever since Trump’s abominable “Big Beautiful Bill” emerged from the House, we’ve been buried in analyses of what it will do–essentially, rob the poor to further enrich the obscenely wealthy. But I continue to think about the initial reaction of Paul Krugman. What did this Nobel-prize-winning economist think in the immediate aftermath of the House passage?

Krugman began by noting that he’d expected House Republicans to pass this “surpassingly cruel, utterly irresponsible budget” in the dead of night, in an effort to escape notice. And as he said, “they tried! Debate began at 1 A.M., and if you think that bizarre timing reflected real urgency, I have some $Melania coins you might want to buy.”

The House has now passed what must surely be the worst piece of legislation in modern U.S. history. Millions of Americans are about to see crucial government support snatched away. A significant number will die prematurely due to lack of adequate medical care or nutrition. Yet all this suffering won’t come close to offsetting the giant hole in the budget created by huge tax cuts for the rich. Long-term interest rates have already soared as America loses the last vestiges of its former reputation for fiscal responsibility.

What struck me most about Krugman’s reaction to this massively irresponsible–indeed, evil–budget was his enumeration of what that budget ought to look like. Krugman isn’t one of the “fiscal scolds” who want to eliminate all deficit spending, but he is worried that the U.S. is on an unsustainable fiscal path–a path that this horrific bill will worsen. He acknowledges that the path to fiscal sanity will require some hard choices and tradeoffs. But he also insists that we could immensely improve our current situation with a series of easy choices, “actions that would mainly spare the middle class and only hurt people most Americans probably believe deserve to feel a bit of pain.” He proceeds to list four of them.

First, get Americans — mainly wealthy Americans — to pay the taxes they owe. The net tax gap — taxes Americans are legally obliged to pay but don’t — is simply huge, on the order of $600 billion a year. We can never get all of that money back, but giving the IRS enough resources to crack down on wealthy tax cheats would be both fiscally and morally responsible, since letting people get away with cheating on their taxes rewards bad behavior and makes law-abiding taxpayers look and feel like chumps.

As he notes, Republicans are doing the opposite, by starving the IRS of resources and trying to make tax evasion great again.

Second, we could crack down on Medicare Advantage overpayments. The insurance companies running Medicare Advantage game the system and get overpaid; one recent estimate found that Medicare is at risk of overpaying Medicare Advantage plans between $1.3 trillion and $2 trillion over the next decade.

Third, Krugman advises going after corporate tax avoidance, especially by multinational firms using strategies to make profits that are earned in the United States look as though they were earned in low-tax nations like Ireland. “Such maneuvers cost the Treasury around $70 billion annually.

And finally,

We should just get rid of Donald Trump’s 2017 tax cut. That tax cut wasn’t a response to any economic needs, and there’s not a shred of evidence that it did the economy any good. All it did was transfer a lot of money to corporations and the wealthy. Let’s end those giveaways.

Would doing all these things be enough to put America on a sustainable fiscal path? Honestly, I don’t know. But they would make a good start toward putting our fiscal house in order. And none of them would involve the “hard choices” fiscal scolds tell us we need to make.

As Krugman concludes, the politicians who aren’t even willing to do these things have no business lecturing anyone about fiscal responsibility.

Krugman doesn’t speculate about why we don’t do the “easy” things, but I will. We don’t do them because we have elected people who don’t consider themselves representatives of the people who voted for them, but obedient servants of the plutocrats who funded them. And nothing will change until enough of those voters send an unmistakable message to the cowards and quislings that “time’s up.”

I’ve previously quoted a scholar whose research suggests that peaceful protests by 3% of a population are enough to send that message. That translates to something like ten million people. Our next chance to achieve that goal is No Kings Day, tomorrow.

Please participate. Time is running out to save the America we thought we inhabited….

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Things That Make Me Crazy

Can those who read this blog indulge me for three very personal rants?

We face so many major problems in this country right now (can we spell LA?) that it seems terribly self-indulgent to focus on a few annoying aspects of civic debate. On the other hand, I think at least a couple of the behaviors I find so exasperating are symptoms of the inability of We the People to productively address the bigger issues. (Anyway, that’s my justification and I’m sticking to it!)

#1. I recently posted about an emerging argument over regulation. Proponents of taking a closer look at our regulatory processes aren’t the knee-jerk GOP scolds who define “free market” as “free” from any government rules; the concern (as I said in that post) is to guard against over-kill. But I immediately got an email from an acquaintance saying, essentially, “finally, people are realizing that we need to get government out of the way!”

Now, I’ve known this particular correspondent for a long time, and he’s not stupid. But he drank the Kool-Aid back when the GOP’s plutocrats were insisting that government just needed to get out of the way and let good-hearted business-people run their enterprises as they see fit.

We’re beginning to see what that would look like, as planes fall from the sky.  Do we really want to get rid of FDA inspections to ensure that supermarket chickens are safe to eat?  Do we want to turn a blind eye to that factory discharging toxic waste into the local river? Stop requiring clinical trials before approving the sale of medications and vaccines?

Bottom line:  We’re not in Kansas anymore, Toto! We don’t grow our own fruits and vegetables and go into the backyard to kill one of our own chickens for dinner. In a modern society, government regulations are essential.  As I said in my post, it isn’t an “either/or” proposition; policymakers need to determine what regulations are needed, and how much is too much. That’s a lot harder, of course, than spouting ideological idiocies.

#2. This platform, like so many others, is a place where people with different perspectives but generally similar civic goals come to argue about THE question: what should we do? What actions can citizens take in the face of an existential threat to the America we thought we inhabited? 

Those discussions may or may not be experienced as valuable, but one (probably inevitable) response drives me up the wall. It is the comment–in a lecturing tone–to the effect that such-and-such will clearly be ineffective, that it is simply “virtue-signaling” and unlikely to make any difference. It would be one thing if the person pouring cold water on a proposed activity ever followed up with a helpful, do-able suggestion–if the put-down was ever followed by a thoughtful “here’s what we should be doing instead,” but it never is.

One of the defects of Internet conversations is the absence of tone and body-language. Perhaps if we could see and hear the individuals who post these put-downs, they wouldn’t seem so sneering and self-important–but that is certainly what these “I know better than you and what you propose is stupid” comments convey.

#3.  I am OVER the Democrats who keep wallowing in “what went wrong” and “who was to blame” and “why the approach of those of you on the (insert ideological position) is dooming our chances in the future.” I am especially over the focus on Joe Biden, and the utterly stupid accusations of a “cover up”–as Robert Hubbell has pointed out, a “cover up” of the cognitive state of a man who was appearing daily at campaign events, delivering addresses to Congress where he outwitted the entire Republican caucus, providing interviews to major media outlets, and guiding America through a period of stable foreign relations and successful domestic policy. Biden aged in office –and we all saw that–but he was a transformational and incredibly effective President. Should he have withdrawn sooner? Probably. But for goodness sake, GIVE IT A REST. 

Meanwhile, we have a President whose election was at least partially due to the refusal of the mainstream press to give anything close to equal time to his embarrassing stupidity, his obvious mental illness (not to mention his age-related decline from what wasn’t a high bar to begin with). Even the aspects of his “character” (note quotation marks) that do receive coverage–his racism, his felonies, his rapes, his constant lies (are his lips moving?), his “out and proud” corruption –are still being normalized and sane-washed. WHY?

Okay. I’m done. Thanks for indulging me. I think I feel better.

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AI Talks To Trump

I wish this had been my idea, but it was my brilliant sister who–on a whim–asked Chatgpt what Thomas Jefferson might say to Donald Trump.

This was the response:

If Thomas Jefferson were to speak to Donald Trump, the conversation would likely reflect Jefferson’s Enlightenment-era values—particularly around democracy, individual rights, limited government, and civic virtue. Here’s a speculative interpretation of what Jefferson might say, based on his writings and beliefs:

“Mr. Trump, I have always believed that government exists to serve the people, not to enrich those in power. Our republic depends on an informed citizenry, a free press, and leaders who value the public good over personal gain.

While strong leadership can be necessary, it must be tempered by respect for the Constitution, the rule of law, and the separation of powers. These are not mere formalities—they are safeguards against tyranny.

Beware the temptation to sow division for political gain. A nation cannot be both ignorant and free. True greatness lies not in spectacle, but in the quiet, steady work of preserving liberty and justice for all.”

The AI then asked her if she would prefer a more confrontational, supportive or humorous version, or one tailored to a specific topic like free speech or executive power. (That question suggested endless possibilities. The fact that she didn’t pursue them shouldn’t keep the rest of us from playing with our own AIs…)

After she received the response to her question about Thomas Jefferson, she decided to ask what Jesus might say to Trump. Once again, AI responded by mining the relevant documentation–in this case, the Gospels.

That’s a powerful and complex question, and the answer depends on how one interprets Jesus’ teachings and values. Based on the messages in the Gospels—love, humility, justice, mercy, repentance, and truth—here’s a thoughtful, nonpartisan imagining of what Jesus might say to Donald Trump (or any political leader):

1. On Power and Leadership:
“Whoever wants to be first must be last of all and servant of all.” (Mark 9:35)
Jesus might challenge Trump to reflect on whether his leadership serves the vulnerable and promotes justice and peace.

2. On Truth and Integrity:
“Let your ‘Yes’ be ‘Yes,’ and your ‘No,’ ‘No.’ Anything more comes from evil.” (Matthew 5:37)
Jesus often called out hypocrisy and might urge Trump to speak truthfully and act with consistency.

3. On Wealth and Responsibility:
“To whom much is given, much will be required.” (Luke 12:48)
Jesus might challenge Trump on how he uses his wealth and influence for the common good.

4. On Enemies and Rhetoric:
“Love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you.” (Matthew 5:44)
Jesus might caution against divisive language and encourage reconciliation and empathy.

5. On Repentance and Grace:
Jesus welcomed sinners and called them to repentance. He might say to Trump—as he would to anyone—“Come, follow me.” (Matthew 4:19), offering grace but also calling for transformation.

Would you like a version written more like a direct conversation or modern interpretation?

When my sister shared this exercise, I asked my own Chatgpt what Ronald Reagan would say to Trump.

While we can only speculate, a thoughtful, historically grounded analysis of what Ronald Reagan might say to Donald Trump would likely reflect stark contrasts in style, tone, and certain core values—especially regarding democratic norms, civility, and America’s global role. Here’s a reasoned approximation of what Reagan might express, based on his public speeches, writings, and actions.

1. On Civility and American Ideals:

“Mr. Trump, words matter. The presidency is not only a position of power, but a moral pulpit. We must be a shining city on a hill—not a fortress of grievance and division. Insulting adversaries, attacking the press, and stoking anger may win applause, but it dims the light of that city.”

Context: Reagan often emphasized optimism, unity, and a dignified tone—even when disagreeing. He viewed America as a beacon of hope and saw the president as a steward of national character.

2. On Immigration and American Identity:

“You speak of immigrants as threats, but I saw them as assets to the American experiment. We are a nation of immigrants. We weaken our greatness when we shut the golden door to those yearning to be free.”

Context: Reagan signed the Immigration Reform and Control Act of 1986, which granted legal status to nearly 3 million undocumented immigrants. He spoke of immigrants with admiration, not suspicion.

3. On NATO and Global Alliances:

“You undermine alliances I spent a presidency building. America leads not by bullying partners or admiring strongmen, but by championing freedom and standing firm with our allies.”

Context: Reagan was staunchly pro-NATO and took a hard line against authoritarian regimes, particularly the Soviet Union. Trump’s praise of autocrats and criticism of NATO would likely alarm him.

4. On Conservatism and Responsibility:

“Conservatism is not chaos. It is a belief in limited government, personal responsibility, and respect for institutions. When we tear down the guardrails of democracy, we no longer conserve—we destroy.”

Context: Reagan valued conservative principles but respected democratic processes. He would likely object to Trump’s rejection of election results and attacks on the judiciary.

5. On Political Legacy:

“We do not inherit America’s greatness from one election to the next—we preserve it by upholding the values that bind us: liberty, respect, and the rule of law. History will judge not only what we build, but what we choose not to break.”

Context: Reagan was deeply concerned with legacy, often invoking America’s historical promise. He might warn Trump that personal power is fleeting—but democratic norms endure if preserved.

AI just confirmed it: Trump and the MAGA cult dishonor America, Christianity, and the once-Grand Old Party.

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The Brain Drain

Yesterday, I warned about the ferocity of the administration’s war on knowledge, and the incredible damage Trump and MAGA are doing to America’s long dominance in science and technology.

Lest you think I was over-reacting, allow me to share some recent headlines.

Foreign universities hope to lure scientists from the US after Trump research cuts | AP News
The World Is Wooing U.S. Researchers Shunned by Trump – The New York Times
International students see fewer pathways to US careers under Trump
“‘A fear campaign.’ Students around the world are shocked, scared and saddened by US visa pause” — CNN
“America’s Coming Brain Drain: Trump’s War on Universities Could Kill U.S. Innovation” — Foreign Affairs
‘Major brain drain’: Researchers eye exit from Trump’s America; “In the halls of US universities and research labs, one question has become increasingly common as President Donald Trump tightens his grip on the field: whether to move abroad.” — AFP
“US brain drain: the scientists seeking jobs abroad amid Trump’s assault on research: Five US-based researchers tell Nature why they are exploring career opportunities overseas.” — Nature
The Economist warns: “America is in danger of experiencing an academic brain drain”.

(Links to each of these reports is available at the primary link.)

According to the Economist,

Springer Nature publishes Nature, the world’s most prestigious scientific journal. It also runs a much-used jobs board for academics. In the first three months of the year applications by researchers based in America for jobs in other countries were up by 32% compared with the same period in 2024.

In March Nature itself conducted a poll of more than 1,200 researchers at American institutions, of whom 75% said they were thinking of leaving (though disgruntled academics were probably more likely to respond to the poll than satisfied ones).

And just as American researchers eye the exit, foreigners are becoming more reluctant to move in. Springer Nature’s data suggests applications by non-American candidates for American research jobs have fallen by around 25% compared with the same period last year.

As any sentient observer might have predicted, MAGA’s war on knowledge is a win for China, which is offering big salaries to entice disaffected knowledge-workers to relocate there.

According to an essay in the Washington Post, the administration’s inability to understand the consequences of its actions is based in large part on its lack of historical knowledge.  In “Houston, J.D. Vance has a problem,” Mark Lasswell reports that Vance “barely grasps the history of the U.S. space program.”

Last week, Newsmax interviewer Greg Kelly took a break from slathering Vance with praise to delicately broach the possibility of a “brain drain” from American universities if researchers decamp for more hospitable institutions overseas. The White House, as you might have heard, is working energetically to dissolve arrangements between several research universities and the government that for the past century helped make the United States the most powerful and innovative country in the world.

“I’ve heard a lot of the criticisms, the fear, that we’re going to have a brain drain,” the voluble vice president told Kelly. “If you go back to the ’50s and ’60s, the American space program, the program that was the first to put a human being on the surface of the moon, was built by American citizens, some German and Jewish scientists who had come over during World War II, but mostly by American citizens who had built an incredible space program with American talent. This idea that American citizens don’t have the talent to do great things, that you have to import a foreign class of servants and professors to do these things, I just reject that.”

As Lasswell sardonically notes, “Vance seems to think a defunded brainiac who happens to be an American citizen is going to tell a recruiter from Aix-Marseille University, “You can keep Provence. I’d rather work on nanotechnology in my garage. U-S-A!”

The actual history of America’s space program–and scientific dominance–is rather different from Vance’s version. After the war, both the United States and the Soviet Union recruited German and Austrian scientists, engineers and technicians. (Without, as the essay notes, being too picky about their Nazi connections. I enthusiastically recommend Tom Lehrer’s “take” on Von Braun...) In the mid-1950s, they created the U.S. space program. “Von Braun and his many, many colleagues were instrumental to U.S. space supremacy — and, according to the Smithsonian’s National Air and Space Museum, most of them became naturalized citizens in 1954 or 1955.” 

We may not have been picky about their politics, but we did understand–once upon a time–that a nation’s health and wealth depend upon its respect–and support– for empirical knowledge. 

MAGA=Morons Are Gutting America….. 

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