Election 2012 Postmortem: Fun With Numbers

In 2011, for the first time since white people helped themselves to this continent, minority births outnumbered white births. Looking ahead, projections have America's white population falling below 50 percent before the year 2040.

Why does this matter? You're not a racist. I'm not a racist. We are practically color blind, you and I! We are  both very awesome humans.

The stats matter because of how this year's voting breaks down by ethnicity. Look:

Latinos chose Obama 71-27 over Romney;
Among African Americans, Obama won 93-5;
Asians: 73-24 for Obama;
Three quarters of other nonwhites chose Obama.

If we set up the U.S. demographics for the 2036 election using these parameters:

White: 50 percent
Latino: 26 percent
African American: 12 percent
Asian: 4 percent
Other nonwhite: 8 percent

And we simply extrapolate 2012 preferences to that new population, we get the following scores:

White: Republican 29, Democrat 21
Latino: R 7, D 19
Black: R 1, D 11
Asian: R 1, D 3
Other: R 2, D 6

Add everything up: D 60, R 40.

Let me restate, without giggling: the Democrat wins 60 percent of the vote in an entirely theoretical but unfarfetched election.

Granted, I'm not accounting for a rogue asteroid strike, or nuclear annihilation, or alien invasion, or even a spectacular zombie apocalypse. But come on: the poplar vote hasn't been that unbalanced since Nixon cleaned house in '72. In fact, only four presidential candidates ever have crossed the 60 percent threshold: the aforementioned Dick, plus LBJ in 1964, FDR in 1936, and some guy named Harding in 1920.

Even Reagan, when he won the Electoral College 525-13 (he really did that), didn't crack 60 percent of the vote.

It's been said that in American politics, demographics is destiny. Well, in that case, for the foreseeable future, if white men and evangelicals remain the base of the Republican Party, and everyone else forms the base of the Democrats, my money's on the D's.

P.S. -- Each week, I'll rehash one aspect of the election we just endured / produced / witnessed. Coming soon: SSM, legalization of pot, immigration, racism, Senate Shake-up, and others. Tune in for our next episode. Sometime.

The 1:30 a.m. Phone Call

In a sign that absolutely nothing has changed since Monday, Nov. 5, Republican congressional leaders refused to take the President's phone call immediately following his victory speech Tuesday night.

On account of they were asleep.

What, did the top dogs of the House and the Senate not bother to stay up and watch returns on the biggest political evening of the year? Did they not listen to Romney's concession speech minutes earlier? Did they fall sleep like carefree naifs just moments after suffering crushing losses in two of the three branches of government? (Losses that cost their side billions of dollars.) Did they lie in their beds pretending to be asleep, like so many eight-year-olds before them. Did they fake snore? Did they drink themselves to sleep? People want to know.

And if Boehner and McConnell were asleep (they weren't), do they make it a habit to empower their staff to tell the President of the United States to call back later, when it's more convenient?

/ring ring
/ring ring
Staffer: "John Boehner's office."
Voice: "Please hold for the President."
Staffer: "The who now? Is this a prank?"
Voice:
Voice:
Voice: "I said, please hold for the President. Of the United States."
Staffer:
Voice: "This is the White House. Please hold for t--"
Staffer: "Let me check."
Voice: "Let what"
Staffer: "Can you hold?"
Voice:
Voice:
Voice: "I'm sorry. Please hold fo--"
Staffer: "I checked, and he looks sort of asleep. Do you mind trying again in the morning? Maybe between 10:30 and 11?"
Voice:
Voice: "Hi John, this is President Obama."
Staffer: oh crap "Uh... Ah... Hey..."
POTUS: "Mr. Speaker? Are you all right?"
Staffer: "Mr., um, President, this is Deputy Deputy Communications Director McFrothy. How, how's it, how's it going?"
POTUS:
POTUS: "Pretty good. Had a good day, so far. If a bit long. Look, your boss, McFrothy. I'd like to speak to him."
McFrothy: "Mr. President, sir, he's not available."
POTUS: "Say again?"
McFrothy: "He's not awake, sir. I don't know if I should..."
POTUS: "Look -- ah, never mind."
/dial tone
McFrothy: "Hello?"

I get that the phone calls were made in the dead of night, at 1:30 a.m. I was asleep at that time myself! (Sleeping like a baby, I might add. I did add!) But it's the freakin' President of the United States of America on the line. That means something.

That used to mean something.

The total lack of respect shown for the office of the President is stunning. Classless, too. Sadly, the behavior was predictable. Get ready for more of the same, I guess, from the spoiled children that "run" the Republican Party.

Happy (Re)Election Day

A friend turned that phrase this morning. I took it. Now you have it!

Three points before they start counting the votes.

A) What I WANT to happen

Dream scenario? It's not even close. Every battleground state goes blue. No recounts. FL and VA both go for the President early. NC is too close to call. Obama coasts in PA.

In fact, how large the margins is in Pennsylvania and how close things along the mid-Atlantic seaboard will tell us a lot before we get other results. I want an early blowout -- an 11-point victory -- in PA, for the sake of my blood pressure.

As a bonus, unpopular Senate candidates in MO and IN could sink Romney by association. Both those states were competitive in '08. It's possible.

Again, it requires a great deal of wishful thinking, but if all of the above occur, you get this map. It looks a lot like 2008. The polls don't suggest this scenario, but they also don't suggest a Romney win. So if the polls are UNDERestimating the President's numbers, that map is in play.

B) What I FEAR will happen

In a word: Chicanery. Voter suppression efforts are one thing. Like a baseball team trying to steal signs, I expect Republican officials to use every single sleazy, despicable, and undemocratic trick in the book to discourage or prevent proper voting in Democratic strongholds. It's not right, but it's how the game is played, and to not expect some gamesmanship is to be naive to a fault.

I won't stoop to the level of some of my fellow shrieking liberals and outright accuse Republicans of stealing votes. Or of tampering with election machines. Not without proof, at least.

But I fear the possibility that desperate R party leaders, after watching their base fritter away nationwide, after realizing they are on the verge of becoming a regional force with little sway left in the upper Midwest or either coast, after witnessing NM, NV and CO turn blue, with demographics working against them -- I fear that they might cross a line and resort to treasonous acts of deception.

If those crimes are committed AND the challenger outperforms his polls, then you get something like this: Ugh, this map. And a new President swoops in to office, armed with a 52-48 popular vote victory and a 92-point Electoral College cushion.

Much like the dream scenario, I don't think this nightmare will be visited upon us. But I worry.

Moving on.

C) What I BELIEVE will happen.

My prognosticating skills are... pretty much the worst in the blogging business. Four years ago, I foresaw a giant economic recovery, a landslide election, and the Mariners winning the 2011 World Series. I didn't think Mitt Romney would win the R nomination. I thought that Obamacare would be overturned by the Supreme Court.

What I'm saying is, don't send me your tea leaves. I will only mash them up and brew them and throw them out before any actual reading of them takes place.

But.

I do think the President will win tonight. I do think it will be settled before midnight Eastern Time. (Or as they call it in the Oval Office, Nairobi Time -11.)

I do think he'll carry Virginia, for two main reasons: he performed well there in 2008 and there is a third-party candidate (the libertarian-leaning Virgil Goode) polling at about 1 percent, siphoning votes from Romney.

I do think he'll carry Ohio. Voter suppression will keep the race close, but Obama has such a commanding lead in the polls there... it's hard to assume that ALL the polling is off in that state. One poll, two could lean too far to the left or the right. But when you consider the totality of the data, when you don't cherry-pick a gorgeous Romney +2 poll and then shut your eyes, you see a clear lead for the President. A clear enough lead to hold off any potential tomfoolery. Or shenanigans.

Once you turn OH and VA blue, Romney is toast. He could somehow pick off WI, NH, hold on to FL, surprise us by winning CO and IA both... and still lose 274-264. (See this map.)

He could inexplicably win PA, adding CO and NH... and still lose 270-268 (Another map!)

I couldn't possibly tell you what will happen across the board. But VA and OH seem like Obama's best bets among true battleground states. And they're practically game-clinchers.

Only a few more hours. Vote!

Don We Now Our Gay Approval

Fa-la-la, la-la-la, LA LA LA

Come on. Get into the Christmas spirit. Forget about the election tomorrow. What election? PREcisely.

Fine. Election chatter it is. Look! History has a chance to be made tomorrow.

Vision 1: A Mormon President

no caption needed

With Mormons considered part of mainstream Christianity by so many Americans, electing an LDS President may not be a very big deal. Mormons have been governors, Senate Majority Leaders, and are not disqualified from holding the presidency in the same way that women are. Kidding! Oh my God I am so kidding it's not even funny. Except maybe the kidding is completely the opposite of kidding, because there seems to be little to no pushback against a fringe Christian / polytheist holding the office of President, and at the same time, we have yet to see a woman nominated by a major political party. Why is that? (The question is rhetorical.)

Vision 2: Another split in the popular vote winner and the Electoral College winner

You'll remember that Albert Gore won the popular vote in 2000 but not exactly the presidency. (Don't mention the Florida "recount." I don't want to talk about that. Ever again. Maybe.) Anyway: if Willard Romney wins the popular vote this year while the President takes the Electoral College, we Americans who are interested in democracy have a chance to use the ensuing controversy for good.

Twice in twelve years, the popular vote winner will have been denied the Oval Office. Each party will have been victimized once. Everyone on each side of the aisle will hate the system, and with just cause.

MAYBE FINALLY enough pressure will be put on Congress to enact a constitutional amendment that abolishes the Electoral College altogether. Failing that (and you should always assume a certain degree of failure from Congress), more legislatures may enact a law that gives that state's electoral votes to the popular vote winner regardless of individual state results.

(Read.)

MAYBE. If we strike while the iron is hot, maybe even sick-of-political-ads Ohioans and Coloradonites and Virginians and Floridians will climb on board.

But this can only happen if Mitt Romney, the most inept, secretive, dishonest and duplicitous presidential candidate in the history of the universe, inexplicably wins 50.01 percent of the vote tomorrow. Go America!

(i have got to do something about my broken caps lock key, it's flaring up again.)

Vision 3: Gay marriage is approved at the ballot box for the first time in U.S. history

again, a caption would be overkill

Measures legalizing SSM are up for voter approval in three navy blue states: MD, MN and WA (woot woot). Wherever gay marriage (also known as "marriage") has been implemented, it has always been as a judicial action. It has never crested 50 percent approval. Until tomorrow, when it might. Or might not.

While I would be especially proud to see my home state be the first to

 -- WE INTERRUPT THIS CLAUSE WITH EMERGENCY POLL NUMBERS --

Washington State Referendum 74: Poll numbers, averaged
Summer: 50.5 for, 42.5 against
September: 54.0 for, 38.3 against
October: 53.7 for, 40.4 against
November: 52.0 for, 42.0 against
Those are admirably consistent.

-- WE RETURN YOU TO WHATEVER THE H --

pass SSM by a vote of the people, I also am confident that should it fail, it won't fail repeatedly. Achieving marriage equality is a foregone conclusion. Whether it happens in 2012 or 2014 or 2016 is the only question at this point. With nationwide polls showing quick movement toward acceptance of SSM (look at these numbers! they're almost too good to be true), the war is won. The battles remain to be fought, and traditionalists will shriek for a time, but the eventual outcome is certain. Gays will marry, and it will be soon. Not soon enough. Just plain soon. Which is not good enough. But still just plain good.

Please vote.

Poll Dance, 10/29 Edition

In last month's polling update, I coined something I like to call the Rule of Fifty. (Scroll down to the previous post if you have extra time coming out of your ears. Ew. On the other hand, yay, extra time!)

According to the Rule, a candidate's 50-47 lead in the polls is worth measurably more than a 44-38 advantage, even though the latter lead is twice as big. People change their minds less easily these days and the undecided tend to break pretty evenly. Even getting to 49 is a good sign. But 50 is a nice round number.

But a single score in the 50's is hardly significant. Polling companies are biased, imperfect, and subject to statistical variation. It takes multiple 50's showing up in a candidate's polling portfolio before you should consider it a good sign that the electorate has settled on its guy. In that state, at least. National surveys are nigh useless in our arch-undemocratic system.

So, it is with plenty of confidence and a healthy amount of angst that I bring you the most pertinent polling figures I could find. All are recent: the oldest survey dates from three weeks ago, and most of the results are from within the last week. (I get the numbers from here.)

Look at some digits from Virginia, with the President's number listed first:

51-47. 51-46. 50-43. 51-46.

But, at the same time, one notices:

50-48. 50-47. 51-44. All for Romney. The state is not settled at all, and may in fact come down to third-party votes or Hurricane Sandy's yet-to-be-determined impact.

Then, Ohio, where Romney hasn't posted a single 50, EVER, so all of these are Obama leads:

51-47. 50-49. 50-45. 51-46. 50-46. 50-46.

Of course, the Rule cuts both ways. Florida is on its way to choosing Romney:

51-46. 50-49. 51-44. 51-47. And nine more 48's and 49's. All those numbers come from right-leaning pollsters, but the left-leaning ones have yet to hand Obama a single score of 50 or higher this fall.

With that in mind, I prepared a little electoral map. For each swing state, I applied the Rule of Fifty, granting the state to the candidate who crossed that threshold the most often in the past three weeks. Then I gave NH and VA to Romney, granting the tie to the challenger in both cases. Why not? His people are very enthused about removing the President from office. Maybe you've noticed. (Sometimes there's frothing involved.)

The resulting map:

Link to 270-to-win.com

Obama 277, Romney 261.

That map isn't my official prediction. (I do think CO and NH will go blue, and VA will be too close to call on election night.) No, it's just what the polls say, today, with a merciful 198 hours left until polls close on the West Coast.

P.S. -- My experience in manic poll-watching has taught me one thing, which forms the backbone of the Rule. Any single poll is insignificant. Aggregating the surveys is the key to reading them well. This is in stark conflict to over-reaction and sensationalism, which happens to be the key to TV ratings. A Gallup survey that shows Romney up by 6 or 7 is much more advertising-dollar-friendly. A single score in the 50's is interesting, but not meaningful. Several 50's: now we're talking.

Poll Dance, 9/23 Edition

I'll probably want to do a poll-watching post every so often as the presidential election nears. Here you go!

This time, there's a myth that needs dispelling.

The race for the White House is often described as "neck-and-neck" or too close to call. On its face, that looks accurate. Gallup offers us this chart, titled "Obama 48, Romney 46 in Swing States."

Real Clear Politics informs us that there are still 100 electoral votes up for grabs, with Obama securely holding on to 247 and Romney clinging to 191. It takes 270 to win, and neither man has that many sewn up.

Fivethirtyeight.com tells us that the President carried a 60-70 percent chance of re-election through the summer, and right now wins three-quarters of its program's simulations. It gives Obama a 3.3 percent lead in the popular vote.

Close race, right? Just a couple points here or there, sometimes three, sometimes four. It'll come down to the wire, right? Maybe we'll be up all night on Election Day, holding our breath as votes trickle in from Ohio, or maybe we'll even get treated to another recount in Florida? Stay tuned! Right?

Hogwash. The race isn't anywhere near as competitive as it sounds.

To support my point, I'd like to invoke something called the "Rule of Fifty." (Please don't google it, because I just made it up. And it just sends you to some chess thingy. You're not even playing chess right now, are you? Didn't think so.)

Premise of Fraley's Rule of Fifty: We live in hyper-partisan times. When a voter chooses his or her preferred candidate, it's very difficult to change his or her mind. The voter may take his time making his choice; she may remain undecided for a long time, through the primaries, while mini-scandals erupt, all summer long.

But when that voters settles on a candidate, he's actually settled on that candidate in a permanent way, and it would take a great deal of upheaval to change his mind.

My argument: A 44-38 lead for the Democrat in June means nothing. A 50-47 lead in late September means everything. The race is actually closer in the first scenario, when minds are changeable and the pool of undecided voters is large. Even though the Democrat has a lead twice as large in June, the three-point lead in September is far more significant. There is no pool of undecided voters in the second scenario -- just a puddle.

The late three-point lead is more powerful because people's minds are made up. If yours is, think about what it would take to change it.

Now, some numbers. If numbers creep you out, skip ahead to the wordy wordthings later on. All numbers are recent reputable poll results with Obama's "score" listed first.

Florida: 48-47. 49-44. 49-46.

Ohio: 48-44. 49-42. 51-46.


Virginia: 50-46. 50-43. 52-44.


(I left out unreliable polls who have shown an unreasonable partisan bent one way or the other.)

If Obama wins even one of these states, the electoral math becomes impossible for Romney. Not only must the Republican win all three, but he probably has to steal another pretty blue state like Colorado, Iowa, Nevada, Wisconsin, or New Hampshire, and even then it might not be enough to dethrone the President.

And, oh, by the way, Obama polls better in the five states just listed. Far more fifties than forties.

As Romney offers to the public gaffe upon gaffe upon gaffe upon piss-poor convention, Obama's starting to scrape 50, or reaching it, or crossing it, everywhere that matters.

(Visit this awesome place called 538 for more data. Blogger Nate Silver is a numbers guru, who dispassionately gathers polls to make political predictions. He is the best.)

The Rule of Fifty receives confirmation in job approval polls. Say you're the President. (Don't actually say that. You sounds foolish when you say those words!) You might slog your way through your first term with job approval ratings in the forties. If you're a terrible Chief Executive, you might flirt with the thirties. If you're truly an abysmal farce of a president, you might dip into the twenties. (Like him. Or him.)

But if you're in the fifties, people aren't going to vote you out of office, unless the challenger's charisma is so overwhelming that his positive ratings outshine yours by a large margin.

President Barack Hussein Obama (I still stifle a giggle when I type that sequence of words) has seen his job approval settle at 50 percent, just in time.

[ You don't have to trust me on that. Just check out the chart at Real Clear Politics with the numbers. Click on it. It is pretty.]

Meanwhile, presidential wannabe Willard Mitt Romney (Esquire) logs more approval numbers in the 30's than the 50's. There is a gap there too. So many gaps.

Enough stats. Barring a Mayan Apocalypse, we're going to get four more years of President Obama. If that causes your head to explode, sorry.*

* apology is insincere.

It's Like What Jesus Said About Gays

.

No, Screw You, Mitt Romney

Screw you, Mitt Rommey.

(All profanity has been edited out of this post. But you can add it back in, mentally. All right. Here we go.)

"There are 47 percent who are with him [President Obama], who are dependent upon government, who believe they are victims, who believe the government has a responsibility to care for them, who believe they are entitled to health care, to food, to housing, to you name it... [My job] is not to worry about those people. I'll never convince them that they should take personal responsibility and care for their lives."

Well, screw you, Mitt Romney. I run a business that I started from scratch nine years ago. I work 50 hours a week to support a family.

Screw you hard, Mitt Romney, I pay my fair share in taxes every year. My taxation rate is higher than yours.

Screw you, Mitt Romney. Fifteen percent of my income goes toward health care costs, and I'm a moocher?

Screw you once again, but not for the last time, Willard Romney. I stayed home part-time with my first child when he was an infant, even though I couldn't really afford it, to give him the kind of nurturing he deserved.

Screw you even more, Romney. I am no victim. I make my own choices, and I choose to ridicule you for being a douchebag.

Screw you even harder, Mitt Romney. We are all dependent on government to an extent. Veterans, students, the elderly, the sick, teachers, cops, firefighters, single moms with deadbeat ex-husbands, the disabled, and everyone who buys food. Oh, and everyone who enjoys the protection of our awesome military. So, all of us, in other words. Yeah, screw you. From all of us who rely on the government in one or more aspects of our lives.

Screw you, Mitt Romney, for declaring your intent to become president in one breath, then in the next one, dismissing half the population as people you don't need to worry about if elected.

And if you produced that quote because you were at a fund-raiser and that's what you thought your donors wanted to hear, then screw you one final time. You just forfeited all benefit of the doubt I would otherwise have granted you.

Now go lose this election, because screw you.

Hell Is No People

(That's a play on Jean-Paul Sartre's famous line. Free culture!)

It's easy to populate hell, at first.

Stir in one cup of Hitler, a few tablespoons of Pol Pot, add a dash of fresh Manson, sprinkle some Osama on top, and cook over brimstone for, well, eternity.

The world has seen no shortage of evil perpetrated by selfish humans. I could easily add more "ingredients." They wouldn't even have to be mass murderers or serial killers. Plenty of people have produced plenty of evil actions. It happens every day.

But I'd like to suggest that not a single person deserves hell, at least not if it's defined as everlasting torment. Not bin Laden, not Adolf. Not the misguided Crusader who raped and pillaged his way through the Holy Land. Not the Soviet leader who sent millions to their death in labor camps. Not the serial kidnapper-murderer.

Only a warped sense of justice allows for another being's lifetime of maliciousness to be punished with an eternity of pain. Any punishment that becomes everlasting... have you even really considered it?

And I don't mean "considered it" as in, "imagined what it would be like to burn forever." Nobody but the most myopic literalist would argue that an actual lake of fire burns bad people, always. That's just silly and brainless. But even hell as a place at all, or as a state of mind, breaks down pretty quickly no matter what shape the punishment takes. Un-ending, un-endable pain, of any type, is not a just consequence commensurate with the crime.

No matter the crime.

I'll even take this one step farther. If there is a Satan, even it doesn't deserve hell. I don't care what it did to "earn" hell. It didn't deserve it. Eternal punishment isn't just something you mete out, if you're the one doing the meting. It's cruel. It's actually worse than the original crime.

One step farther still. Yes, that means I believe God's worse than Hitler, if hell is Adolf's final destination.

The last stop on this theological rabbit hole is to conclude that if God sends souls to hell, then God is more evil than Satan.


(I suppose this explains why I have to tune the Bible out when it promises hell for certain individuals.)

It's entirely possible that I suffer from a lack of perspective. I have the enviable luxury of talking about hell in purely philosophical terms, with the fortunate detachment that comes from never having to deal with the murder of a loved one. I don't have the life experience of someone whose son, whose sister, whose parent was killed. I never survived a genocide; I don't have a pastful of trauma to sort through. Nobody has ever hurt me very badly, and I'm lucky that way.

But is there a way for a person to perform enough evil to deserve an eternity of torment? I can't think of one. I welcome all enlightened answers to that very real question.


P.S. As I eliminate hell, my vision of heaven takes a hit as well. That's the next post in this series, I guess.

Now or Never? Yabetcha

In the Republican leadership's dream scenario, the run-up to the 2012 election goes something like this:

/dream sequence music plays/

/picture goes fuzzy, then sharpens again/

Economy still in doldrums. Growth is slow and fitful.

Unemployment stubbornly remains above 8 percent.

The housing market has not recovered.

Unlimited corporate money flows into the party's coffers because of the Citizens United ruling.

Voter suppression programs are signed into law in key swing states.

The President's health care legislation remains unpopular.

No dream sequence music or fuzzy-unfuzzy effects necessary! Close those slash-marks! We are living in the Republican dream scenario! Conservatives could hardly have asked for better circumstances to retake the Oval Office!

And yet.

The Romney-Ryan ticket trails in the polls, with the numbers worsening by the day, with time running out. (47 days until November 6.) The President enjoys an 80 percent chance of re-election, according to forecasts by the mathematically rigorous and very non-partisan projections at fivethirtyeight.com. (Look there for more details, it's a great place.) 

If a Republican can't win the White House in this climate, when can he?

He'll have to do it soon, if he wants to at all. The demographics aren't getting any better for R's. Just one race of humans gives more than half its votes to the conservative candidate, and that specific race is losing population share in dramatic fashion. By 2030, less than half of all Americans will be white.

Some numbers. Specifically, some percentages.

Blacks broke 91-3 for Obama.
Latinos made it 66-23 in support of Barack.
For Asians, it was 58-29 in favor of the President.

But that was 2008, you say. A valid criticism! Let us fetch some 2004 numbers.

Blacks: 88-11 for Kerry
Latinos: 53-44 for Kerry
Asians: 43-36 for Kerry.

You might want me to average out those figures. I might want that too. Since we agree, let's travel down that route as well. Averaging the last two election cycles:

Blacks: 90-7 for Democrats
Latinos: 60-34 for Democrats
Asians: 51-33 for Democrats

Those three ethnic groups, plus the ever-expanding racial category "other," will soon make up 50 percent of the population. Already, 44 percent of us are nonwhite.

But demographics don't even tell the whole story.

The economic climate won't be this bad in 2016. All indicators suggest that the worst is over, or ending.

The ruling that allows unlimited corporate cash to influence elections can't last forever.

The hot-button issues aren't trending toward R's. Gay marriage (or as I like to call it, "marriage") is supported by more than half the electorate, with that number climbing quickly. Two out of three Americans support the idea of a separate tax bracket for millionaires, quite the opposite of what R's are suggesting, which is another well-deserved tax cut for those downtrodden yachters.

Republicans really need a win now, or failing that, a victory in 2016, against presumptive nominee Hillary Clinton. (Oh yes. It's happening.) Because if this cycle or the next one passes them by, the changes they'll need to court minority voters without losing their base along the way... it's hard to see that happening.

So... good luck* with that!

* ed. note: sarcasm!

Did You Hear About the Thing With the Thing?

The things in question: a certain health care law, and how the Supreme Court ruled earlier today.

Many observers of the SCOTUS had predicted a 6-3 decision upholding the law, or a 5-4 decision for it, or a 5-4 ruling that declared it unconstitutional. Also in the cards early this morning: partial invalidation of the Affordable Care Act, such as striking the individual mandate but keeping other provisions intact.

But in most cases, Chief Justice John Roberts and occasional swing vote Anthony Kennedy were seen to be voting in the same way. It's practically impossible to find anyone who foresaw the conservative Roberts affirming the law while the moderate Kennedy tried to kill it.

That's because most observers, including me, were working from the assumption that the Justices would NOT consider whether the law was constitutional, but would rather just exercise their usual political hackery and rule one way or another according to their political leanings.

Well, a funny thing happened on the way to the final decision -- one of the key players on the right decided to not be an activist judge. Instead, he decided to be a judge judge. Instead of subverting the Constitution of the United States with the Personal Opinion of My Own Prodigious Intellect, he dared to judge the law on its merits. (!!!) Then, he had the audacity to issue a ruling that explained that the legislation was unsavory to his political taste buds, but constitutionally sound. (double !!! !!!)

Listen to the language from the decision, written by the Briefly Esteemed John Roberts:

"The Framers created a Federal Government of limited powers, and assigned to this Court the duty of enforcing those limits. The Court does so today." Already, Roberts' lack of enthusiasm for the law is apparent. As in: I wouldn't support this piece of crap legislation, except that I sort of have to, dagnabbit. "But the Court does not express an opinion on the wisdom of the Affordable Care Act. Under the Constitution, that judgment is reserved to the people."

Roberts doesn't even believe the federal government has a right to force people to buy health insurance. He doesn't read the Commerce Clause in that manner. The individual mandate survives only because he agrees that the government can penalize the uninsured. "The Federal Government does have the power to impose a tax on those without health insurance. Section 5000A [the individual mandate] is therefore constitutional, because it can reasonably be read as a tax."

(I can easily see him saying "tax" in the same tone you and I might use for "f*ck." Easily.)

(Bonus parenthetical comment: Roberts' characterization of the penalty as a "tax" means the Chief Justice is handing Mitt Romney, R-Windup Doll, another billion or so rounds of ammo for the presidential campaign. Goody.)

So it's plain that Congressman John Roberts would have stridently opposed Obamacare. It's plain that Chief Justice John Roberts dislikes the policy preferences that drove Democrats to craft the law. But it's also plain that the man has enough respect for American representative democracy to be content with playing his part, and no more. The intelligent design of checks and balances is not lost on the Chief Justice. Hallelujah, I guess.

I didn't expect to be praising Roberts today. This is the same guy who, when nominated for the SCOTUS position in the first place, conveniently "forgot," under oath, that he ever belonged to the Federalist Society, a group farther to the right than the American Socialist Party is to the left. This is the same guy who lent his approval to Citizens United, the most anti-democratic Court decision of the millennium. Roberts is going to continue to do his best to make life harder for disadvantaged and poorly-connected Americans, for many years probably. He's still, on the whole, a force for corporate interests over the general well-being of the nation. He's still responsible for making sure the health care law didn't compel states to expand Medicaid -- that section DID get stripped -- so at least the right wing's war on the poor continues to go well.

He's still probably guilty of perjury, probably.

But forget all that for another fifteen seconds. Today, Roberts placed his ego beneath the U.S. Constitution.


And sadly, America was surprised.

Scatological, Theological, Same Difference

An anecdote that has the power to make you believe way more, or way less, in heaven and hell. Like everything else in life, the secret is perspective. Time for you to find out what yours is.

SYNOPSIS

A parent overhears his two boys, "Bobby" and "Dave," in the prime of their poop-joke-making days, discussing the afterlife.

CHAPTER ONE (frankly, it's the only chapter)

9:30 on a lazy summer night: bedtime. Bobby, age nine and full of the evening's desperate energy, seized his toothbrush and began to carelessly coat it in toothpaste. Swirls of magenta, white and teal trickled down the bristles at an impossibly slow speed, like a family of mismatched neon slugs.
Bobby's younger brother, Dave, stood at the toilet, giggling while relieving himself. Not an uncommon multitasking activity for the wiggly and precocious six-year-old.
"I used to think that when we died," Bobby said, "if we were bad, we went to a place that was all poop."
Dave giggled, flushed, and started on his own teeth-brushing mission. "And all pee!" he added.
Bobby paused his tooth-brushing long enough to chuckle, then disagree with the younger boy. "No, just everything was made of poop, even the houses."
"Even the food!" Dave chimed in.
"Well, maybe you had to drink pee."
"And the rain could be pee."
"Ewwwwww. Gross." Laughter.
"Ewwwwww." Snickers.
More toothbrushing ensued. Bobby finished first, which allowed him to expound on his earlier point:
"And if we were good, we went to a place where everything was made of gold." 
Dave, not terribly interested in the living conditions of a golden paradise, spit and circled back to the scatological portion of the story.
"And you would drive around in poop cars..."
"It would be so stinky all the time," said Bobby, and the treatise on an afterlife replete with bodily functions would no doubt have gone on for a while, had the boys' father, Jon, not stepped in.
"Finish up guys if you want a chance to read before lights out. And keep the poop talk confined to the bathroom."

THE END (curtain)

You don't need me to spell out the reasons why that anecdote's capable of reinforcing OR threatening the concepts of heaven and hell. And I won't. I'll just say that fire and brimstone no longer sounds like the worst  everlasting punishment ever devised.

The story, obviously, is zero percent fictional. In fact, it's barely an hour old. The names haven't even been adequately changed to protect the guilty parties. Sorry for all the poop.

It's the Numbers Who Are Omnipotent

I believe in Random.

This occurred to me while taking a recent survey. During the questionnaire, I was asked at three points to identify with a religious group or tradition. The first time, I chose "Christian." I didn't hesitate much. That's how I was raised, I philosophically agree with the Golden Rule and that cheek-turning bizness, and thus far, I'm a much better Christian than a Taoist. At least if I get to define the terms.

The second time, I answered "Agnostic." Just to even things out.

The third time, I clicked "Other."

Problem is, the Yellow Pages -- if they even still exist -- are conspicuously unfull of Other Agnostic Christian churches. It's not even a category!

Naturally, long after the survey was complete, the questions poked at me. What am I? Where do I fit? In what do I believe, besides avoiding sentence-ending prepositions? Those are the three big faith-y questions. And they are tough to answer definitively.

Well, I'm pretty sure I believe in Random. Let's steal a phrase from Frankie Baum. I believe in The Great and Powerful Random. Maybe even The Great and Powerful Randomizer.

Probability is omnipotent. A certain percentage of us will:

Get cancer
Win the lottery
Sign divorce papers
Miss our next credit card payment
Wake up with a hangover
Die tomorrow morning
Give birth
Eat Grape-Nuts for breakfast

And with enough research, I can tell you how many people in this country, on July 6, 2012, will meet the eight outcomes listed above. Pick any random date in the immediate future, and I can tell you how Random will act on that date. I can't tell you who Random will choose, who the Great Randomizer has predestined for a happy occasion or a tragic twist of fate.

Ah, but I can tell you that in 2012, x Americans will die in car crashes. I can tell you for certain that the number will be between 20,000 and 40,000. There is a zero-point-zero percent chance that the actual result will fall outside those numbers. Look.

2005: 43,510
2006: 42,708
2007: 41,259
2008: 37,423
2009: 33,883
2010: 32,885
2011: 32,310 (estimate)

(Source: here you go)

I could even make a $1000 bet with you that the 2012 number will fall between 27,000 and 35,000. Not that you would take that bet. You are not stupid. Why would I ever insult you? You are reading my blog! You are one of my favorite people in the world!

Okay. Point: If there is powerful celestial being, it is not as powerful as the numbers that explain probability. Or it has set itself up to be less potent than those numbers. A slave to those numbers, even.

But before you complete the process of burning me at the stake, let me say a couple more things.

You can not prove God exists; you can prove probability exists.

You cannot disprove God choosing to intervene in someone's personal life; you cannot disprove the force of random chance in a population of 300 million.

Taken as a whole, the past two paragraphs lead me to believe first in the supreme power of probability, and to begin crafting a theology around that. Do I have to reject a Judeo-Christian God-figure, as a result? Of course not. I just have to place that god's power one notch below the might of numbers.

Same-Sex Marriage, Take Three

Last take for a while on the SSM front.

American society doesn't often change very quickly. Well, sure, transformative changes like the Louisiana Purchase or WWII or state-sponsored genocide or the invention of the Internet can have a sudden impact on any nation. But attitudes don't shift overnight. If this country's population heavily endorses one side of an issue, its mind stays made up for a long time.

This was true regarding the women's right to vote, of interracial marriage, of Sunday liquor laws. Those restrictions on freedom took a long time to eradicate. Decades, generations, lifetimes. (In the case of booze regulation, the fight rages on in several parts of the country, somehow. The mind boggles, as it often does during post-making. What's so special about Sunday that state governments should step in and curb whiskey sales during those hours?)

Focus! The same national resistance to change remains true, to this day, on issues like capital punishment. For decades now, Americans have agreed that the death penalty ought to remain in place, to be applied in certain murder cases. Some national soul-searching in the 1960s notwithstanding, the numbers say we historically do not mind a good-n-bloody execution once in a while:

Thanks to gallup.com for that nugget, which can be found here. But like I was saying, social mores don't abruptly do a 180-degree turn. It takes generations to accomplish great things like abolition, restoration of civil rights, anti-discrimination laws. Sometimes the battle can't be won, and the government gets to keep killing people. Mostly guilty people. Mostly.

But this post isn't actually about the happy subject of capital punishment. Focus!

You know what's bucking the trend, and changing faster than a really really fast-changing thing? Americans' attitudes toward same-sex marriage. And it's moving the right direction, steamrolling the opposition like a really really strong fast thing, one equipped with steamrolling capabilities. (Help me, Simile Metaphor People.)

Before the pretty graph, some pretty numbers, culled from my online sojourns:

Americans endorsing interracial marriage (Gallup poll)
1973 ---- 29 percent
1978 ---- 36
1983 ---- 43
1988 ---- 48
1993 ---- 48

Americans endorsing same-sex marriage (Gallup-Pew Research composite figures, wikipedia link)
2004 ---- 33 percent
2006 ---- 41
2008 ---- 39
2010 ---- 43
2012 ---- 49

What's different? Yeah, the increments.

Here, a graph that illustrates what I'm saying.

Fivethirtyeight.com made this one for me. Thanks, Nate Silver. As the trendlines indicate, this whole SSM hullabaloo could be solved in a short time. How short? Well, interracial marriage numbers make a good model -- once approval crested 50 percent in 1997, it began to skyrocket. Just two increments later, it passed 70; today, approval sits at 86 percent.

Let's project out a similar polling trend for gay marriage, only instead of five years at a time, let's keep using two. Try this on:
2014 ---- 53
2016 ---- 60
2018 ---- 71
2020 ---- 82

Confession -- that looks way too optimistic. Let's tone the numbers down a bit, and say that the increase will be roughly half of what interracial marriage accomplished. Perhaps, instead:
2014 ---- 52
2016 ---- 56
2018 ---- 61
2020 ---- 67

You know who's jumping ship in 2018? Just about all the SSM opponents left in office. You know what's a non-issue in 2020? Yeah, this thing that has us all in a tizzy today.

Victory over the foes of equality is attainable, and quickly. Good thing. The kids I know in households with two moms probably won't mind.

The Mormon Thorn

Preface: I like Mormons.

I have Mormon clients, Mormon acquaintances, and I wish LDS missionaries well when they knock on my door and hand me yet another Book of Mormon. I like the Mormons I've met. Why shouldn't I? They're usually nice people.

I mean, the kids on my front steps, in the ties, stammering about Jesus, they're just kids, doing the best they can. And their parents are usually just parents, doing the best they can, usually.

So why do I feel like Mitt Romney's Mormonism is a ticking political time bomb?

whoa

Well, to be perfectly blunt, it's probably because his church has a history of responding to persecution by turning in on itself, looking out too dearly for its financial health, and setting up a cultish-looking hierarchy. It's also probably because his church's theology is very nontraditional... all right, I won't mince words. LDS beliefs are routinely offensive to other Christians. (Not offensive to me, because if someone wants to believe something, they should go ahead and do that. I might disagree, even raise my eyebrows a little, but I do that to Muslims, Calvinists, Jews, Catholics, and witch doctors. Nobody should feel special if I politely scoff at the most preposterous sections of their dogma.)

Tangential Paragraph Alert: I'd like to someday delve into the issues people encounter when they decide to abandon the Mormon faith, but that will have to wait for its own post. Going to invoke the term "someday" here again. In other words, please don't wait up for it. That post requires some responsible wading on my part through various personal horror stories of family bonds irrevocably broken, allegations of brainwashing, and the like, and I'll have to do it with an eye out for veracity and believability. I've started that research already (this website is pretty cool as a jumping off point), but no promises, ok?

What we know for sure right now is that unlike me, many Protestants and Catholics (these are the people who vote!) are intolerant of Mormonism's significant theological quirks. Those quirks include:

a) placement of the Book of Mormon on equal footing with the Bible
b) rejection of the doctrine of the Trinity, replaced with the almost-polytheistic belief that God, Jesus and the Holy Spirit are three different beings
c) a widespread belief, endorsed by church leaders, that humans can become like gods or actual gods in the afterlife, and that in fact, that's what our God is -- a former man himself
d) posthumous baptism of non-believers to ensure their salvation; the recipient of the baptism is said to possess, beyond the grave, the choice between accepting and rejecting the ceremony.

Those are four big ones. Other idiosyncrasies include:

a) a past embrace of polygamy (officially denounced in 1890)
b) eternal marriage -- i.e., your spouse is your spouse in the afterlife too
c) a racially problematic past. Church founder Joseph Smith admitted African Americans to the priesthood, but then, the church refused to ordain African-Americans from 1852 to 1978, and taught that if blacks so fortunate as to reach heaven, they would function there merely as servants.
d) the so-called "magic underwear" prescriptions (wiki leak here if you're interested)
e) a graduated view of heaven, in which the celestial afterlife is divided into differently attainable levels of bliss
f) a hierarchy that puts one man atop the church, based on seniority, and endows him with the ability to receive revelation directly from God. (Women are not permitted to become priests, bishops, or apostles; ascending to the title of Prophet is not a realistic career goal for a young Mormon girl.)
g) the incontrovertible fact that the church makes a lot of money. A lot. A few Google searches turn up that the Mormon church owns multiple large businesses, with revenue in the billions of dollars, while also taking in at least $5 billion in tithes annually.

"So what do you guys want to hear this election cycle?"

What's fascinating is how much those quirks -- which cause many well-meaning Christians to slap the "cult" label on the LDS branch of the Christian family tree -- will matter on a political level for Mr. Romney this fall. Or how little they'll matter, I guess. They didn't matter much when he successfully ran for governor of Massachusetts in 2003. They didn't matter much in the recently completed primary season, at least not enough to deny him the nomination. And Mormon beliefs didn't prevent Democratic Senator Harry Reid from rising to the post of Senate Majority Leader.

So, to recap, voters seem to agree with me: We like Mormons. They have some unique articles of faith, and most certainly a less-than-perfect history, but hell, Catholics have all that too, and in spades.

And Mitt's political positions can't hurt him with the Republican base. Look, the man is pro-life, anti-gay marriage (anti-civil unions, even!), unapologetically pro-business, and wants us all to be taxed at a minus-38 percent rate while we ramp up for nuclear war with Iran, just for fun. There's a lot for conservatives to like about Romney. The 2012 edition, anyway.

Also, he's not named Barack Obama. I hear these days that's a very endearing trait to Republicans.

Still... is the other stuff, the quirk stuff, is that going to matter? And if it doesn't end up mattering, and by some awful practical joke perpetrated on us by the political gods, Willard Romney becomes our 44th President, does it mean that there really exists no religious test a presidential candidate has to pass? You have to admit that if the LDS church is in the American mainstream, it's at the very fringes. Beyond it lies organizations like the Jehovah's Witnesses and the like. If we elect a biracial secret Muslim named Hussein, then a future god in magic underwear, does that mean we've finally broken the mold, and we can focus more on the person's vision for the country and less on his/her nifty ideas for the afterlife?

So yeah, a Mormon president, I would like that very much. In theory. Anything that leads to a confirmed atheist becoming President, I'm cool with. Or a Muslim, or a Hindu. No religious test, just like it says in Article VI of the Constitution Thingy, right? I'll take a Mormon, sure. As long as it's not Mitt Romney. Or any Republican.

Same-Sex Marriage, Take Two

When it comes to the confluence of homosexuality, love, marriage and what the Bible has to say, we all think we know better than God.

(By "we all," I don't mean my fellow liberals and me. I mean all of us. Like all the humans. All, like "everyone." Meaning people. Peoples everywhere.)

We all think we're so smart, we all think that God should just shut up already and let us talk about what love is, and what it isn't. We human beings are the experts, after all.

It's clear, by our behavior, that we all think God hasn't put enough mental energy into this whole love business. And let's not even get started on marriage. God's pretty clueless in that aspect too.

Exhibit One: Literalists who aren't literalists. A literalist's arguments against gay marriage go something like, "the Bible forbids it," "Leviticus is clear on this topic," "Even the New Testament says being gay is sinful," "God ordained marriage to be between one man and one woman."

Then that same person goes ahead and reads the exact opposite meaning into a neighboring verse. Or he dismisses it out of hand. Translation: I may pretend to believe every word in the Bible, but I reserve the right to change my mind on a whim. God didn't REALLY mean we should stone anyone. Silly God.

The main four arguments a fundamentalist Christian makes are easy to annihilate, one by one. The Bible forbids lots of things, like any sort of work from Friday sundown to Saturday sundown, upon penalty of death. Leviticus is also clear that we should stone people for minor offenses, like jaywalking. The New Testament also calls debate, jesting and foolishness sins, which don't appear to count, ever. And God ordained marriage to be between one man and *at least* one woman, as evidenced by a cursory jaunt through the book of Genesis.

So God knows best, literalists say, except when it's inconvenient. Biblical arguments against same-sex marriage rely on an assertion, spoken or not, that I Know Better Than God.

Exhibit Two: Agnostics and atheists who dismiss the Bible out of hand. When they agree to meet believers on their terms, atheists will often say the Bible is ambiguous or inconsistent on the topic of homosexuality, which is only possible if you willfully ignore scriptures that condemn man-on-man love. (In their defense, Jesus didn't address homosexuality at all, so there's nothing there to ignore in the first place.) But their theological choices are basically one giant I Know Better Than God, If God Even Exists statement. Same difference, in the end.

Recap: Religious extremists have decided that God's not serious about curtailing, for example, divorce, but is simultaneously very serious about stomping out homosexuality. Silly God, they're saying. Agnostics and atheists, by definition, don't care much what God thinks or is purported to think. Silly God, they've concluded.

Where does that leave the rest of us -- those of us who care about what and who God is, but are not willing to read the Bible ungullibly? What about those of us who like to examine scripture (all scriptures) with an eye out for what the text, rather than what it says? Those of us who like to witness love, to respect love, to enjoy  love in as many non-abusive forms as possible?

(Are there even that many of that kind of "us" out there?)

I believe it leaves us with only one option: removing the Bible from the discussion altogether, and practicing a deference to law. Deference to the law of man, that is, not the law of God. If a person can make a convincing constitutional case against SSM, without once invoking divine authority, then they should go ahead and decide to believe that way. If another person can succeed in re-defining marriage in legal terms as a covenant between two consenting adults, then they should try and implement their idea of marriage, through legal and political means.

But in the meantime, society would be better off if we stopped pretending we know better than God.

Same-Sex Marriage, Take One

Maybe you've heard.

President Obama expressed his support for same-sex marriage yesterday afternoon. He is, as one deduces pretty quickly, the first sitting president to do so.

Barack's Big Decision, revealed in a television interview and confirmed in an e-mail sent to supporters, is no doubt News with a capital N, and is no doubt worth celebrating.. (My favorite line: "Even at my own dinner table, when I look at Sasha and Malia, who have friends whose parents are same-sex couples, I know it wouldn't dawn on them that their friends' parents should be treated differently.") 

Who knew: a Christian chief of state is capable of finding his moral compass from time to time, after all.

Still, the miracle here is not that a President "courageously" came down on the side of compassion and equal rights for all citizens. It's that a middle-aged outspoken Christian role model can no longer be legitimately defined by his homophobic attitudes.

I'm not exaggerating. According to a study done by the Barna Group (an evangelical polling company), the first word or phrase that unchurched 18-to-29 year-olds use to describe Christians is "anti-gay."

Not "Christlike"; not "compassionate." Not "exclusive"; not "hypocritical". Not "loving"; not "religious."

Just anti-gay.

It's not like the final numbers are all that close, either -- that's the first thing mentioned by 91 percent of respondents. The first thing! By nine in ten young adults! Hating gays is the defining characteristic of Christianity, by a long shot, from the outside looking in. Remember, this poll was conducted by a company run by evangelicals.

(While that sinks in, here's an advertisement. If your interest is piqued, this is the book in which the study appears. It's an exploration of young people's attitudes toward the Church and its members.)

Commercial break over. There's a not-too-ancient spiritual song that you'll recognize if you grew up in the church. The opening line goes, "They will know we are Christians by our ..." Well, by our what? According to the song, the next lyric is "love." 

Pshaw. Fantasylandtalk. The people have spoken, and the way they plan on knowing someone is a Christian is by detecting disdain for gays.

Congratulations everyone. Turn to your neighbor in the pew, and give him a well-earned pat on the back. Not the lower back, though. TOOO GAAYYY

In Which I Defend Individual Gun Rights, Sort Of

It took a while, but I finally figured out why the gun rights debate in this country bothers me so.

It's not because the Second Amendment is so very malleable. Those seeking greater regulation quote the second clause, which begins with the words "a well-regulated militia." Those seeking less regulation point to the final words, "the right of the people to keep and bear arms shall not be infringed." The Second Amendment is beautifully vague -- it supports, at least on the surface, both arguments. (The authors of the Bill of Rights were most excellent in their foresight, in ensuring that the wording they chose would keep debate perpetually alive. Slow clap for those guys.)

Don't blink

It's not because I look down on hunting for sport. I do shake my head at senseless killing, but that's a matter of personal preference, not constitutional law. Hunt, if you want. Fill out the right forms, get a license, then go ahead, shoot some Bambis dead this weekend. My disdain is showing again. Have this helping of honesty to balance it out: truthfully, it's not the actual death of the hunted animal that bothers me. I like meat. There's something that feels right about executing our food chain responsibilities. Something feels natural and orderly about it.

Going on, the gun debate is so maddening NOT because I sympathize with activists who dedicate their lives to curtailing individual gun rights. I admire their work, but I could never do it, it'd be way too depressing. The culture and history of this country make any effort to curb handgun availability an exercise in futility. You might as well try and convince believers that there is no God. Ever tried that? Don't try it. Try other things first. Try every other thing first!

No, it's because whenever one of the "sides" scores a temporary victory, the balance of rights and responsibilities is upset once again. Witness:

When gun rights advocates get their way and win another round of legislative Russian Roulette against evil regulations, the end result is that more people die. Period.

Less regulation means more accidents happen, more disturbed people get their hands on more guns more easily, more kids blow their brother's or neighbor's head off. Did you know that the District of Columbia, immediately after enacting its citywide handgun ban, suddenly had the lowest rate of teen suicide in the nation?

Did you know that a gun in the home is 43 times (43 times!) more likely to kill a friend or family member than an intruder? (43 times.)

Guns make it easier!

Did you know that the firearm-related death rate is 12 times higher for American children than for kids in 25 other rich countries -- combined? You read that right. Twelve times higher than the sum of the all the rates in 25 other countries. Go team USA!

Those folks fighting for fewer gun restrictions can couch all their arguments as deep as they want in the language of rights, but the corporate irresponsibility they display is reprehensible.

"Your nephew died in an accidental shooting? Your cousin got shot at work? Your brother-in-law took his own life? Not my problem. Get your filthy paws off my guns."

But enough picking on people who don't care if the defense of their rights costs us lives we didn't have to lose. Flip the coin with me for a second, so we can pick on other people. I don't want to live in a country where constitutionally guaranteed rights are endangered. Do you? I might not be crazy about guns, but I sure as hell want the option of choosing my own religious beliefs, and I'd like to have a responsible, aggressive free press someday again, not just in theory, but even in practice. Items in the Bill of Rights should be pretty well untouchable. (Including habeas corpus, but NOT NOW JOHN STAY ON TOPIC)

So no thank you to those who would strike the Second Amendment from the constitutional record. No thank you to those of us whose reading comprehension fails miserably somewhere in between "a well-regulated militia" and "shall not be infringed." No thank you to who can not see the trees (individual rights) but for the forest (corporate responsibility). How is that at all in keeping with the spirit of freedom that makes this country so great?

Then what about a compromise? What about a happy ending? A happy medium, where citizens debate back and forth, working together to smartly craft gun laws that protect rights and encourage responsibility at the same time?

What about I stop asking question and admit a sad truth: The happy medium doesn't exist, not that we have the people in place to get us there anyway. Have you even been paying attention to our politics, like, ever?

No worries. Like many other instances, a reasonable answer comes not from addressing the problem of gun rights on a collective scale, but on an individual one. When I exercise my right to be disgusted by the NRA, I'm actually confirming someone's right to join it. Good thing, too.

So by allowing folks to stash guns unsafely in their homes, I'm actually preserving my right to tell my kids that guns are dangerous. I'm protecting my right to forbid them from playing in homes that contain guns. I'm free to keep instilling in them that for reasons of corporate responsibility, we don't do guns. If others like to collect death toys, well, that's the world we live in, be on your toes, they have that choice.

Conclusion: if others weren't allowed to make the wrong choice, we wouldn't be allowed to make the right one, nor would we be allowed to point out the violent, ridiculous legacy of the past 250 years of "debate" on this topic. And I'm not ready to lose my right to make good choices, or my right to assign ridicule and blame where ridicule are blame are due.

Hey look, this post is done. Whew. Just shoot me now.

A Bumpy Ride

Welcome to the new blog, which is like the old blog, but in a new place, with a new name.

It's still my place to vent about presidential politics, pretend that I know how to properly critique what passes for American culture, and sometimes pontificate on some obscure sports topic.

And yes, we'll talk about God. Much like small children might go on about romantic love, or much like cavemen might discuss portable cloud storage. Or maybe how dolphins might go on and on about modern art. Honest myopia interrupted by accidental brilliance, is how I'd describe the inevitable God posts in this place. At least I'll be doing the heavy lifting myself.

Like a taxi, but bikier

That's where the rickshaw comes in. It's an unassuming contraption, powered by the sweat of a single person, designed for brief sojourns through congested urban areas. It's not a very serious mode of transportation, and it doesn't get you very far, and the ride can get bumpy at times, but at least it's environmentally friendly. If I had to pick my three favorite rickshawian adjectives, they would be "social," "intimate," "self-powered"; those will do just fine.

Green transportation

Social: I write because it's a way of interacting with you, dear reader.

Intimate: I like to share my fears, my doubts, my mistakes, my visions, my epiphanies.

Self-powered: I don't like to parrot other people's views -- not on purpose, I should say. If I write something that's been conjectured a thousand thousand times before, it's not because I stole it from a brighter mind; it's because I just failed to be the first one to come up with it.

So please, hop aboard this little rickshaw, maybe for the first time, maybe for the hundredth. Climb in, watch your head, put your feet up, munch on a little snack if you like, and let me spin us a tale while I take you a short philosophical distance to a nearby intellectual location.

Put your wallet away, silly. No charge.