Monkinetic Weblog

I took a step today I've never taken before: I called the offices of my 3 Republican representatives in Congress (John McCain and Jeff Flake in the Senate and Representative Matt Salmon in the House) and asked them to speak out against the appointment of known white nationalists to the Whitehouse staff and Cabinet.

I was nervous - I've generally been a lackadaisical citizen (to my shame) and this was a first step at real engagement. I used Who Is My Representative (kudos to the creators for a dead-simple single-purpose site) to find the names and contact information for each.

I also wrote a quick script for myself to help with nerves. I didn't use it verbatim but writing it out really helped:

> Hi, my name is Steve Ivy and I live in the [district, state].

> I'm calling to ask [member] to speak out against the President-Elect's appointment of white-nationalists like Steve Bannon to his staff and cabinet. This is not what our country should be about. I believe [member] has our [district, state]'s best interest at heart, and silence on this issue sends the wrong message to residents and members of marginalized groups here that he isn't watching out for their best interests.

I made sure to "click-through" to a staff member (the three I talked to sounded pretty harried) rather than leave messages. Senator Flake's staff person was clear that the Senator has received significant feedback on this issue from his constituents, so - go AZ.

RT @DabAggin: FYI: Here are the men responsible for killing 9 cops this past month. I think it's past time for their community to denounce…

My state, y'all:

> Phoenix’s Maricopa County, the largest in the state, reduced the number of polling places by 70 percent from 2012 to 2016, from 200 to just 60—one polling place per every 21,000 voters.

> Reducing the number of polling places in Phoenix had catastrophic consequences in the March 22 primary.

From There Were 5-Hour Lines to Vote in Arizona Because the Supreme Court Gutted the Voting Rights Act (emphasis mine).

The Voting Rights Act of 1965 was created during the Civil Rights movement in response to southern states passing laws that kept huge swaths of African-Americans from voting, through a variety of techniques. The VRA required certain states with a history of these practices to submit any voting law changes to federal oversight.

(NPR's piece on the Act gives a good history and the real problems with disenfranchisement it was intended to address: Block The Vote: A Journalist Discusses Voting Rights And Restrictions)

This year, election officials made a bunch of changes to processes and polling stations that (for whatever reasons were given at the time) resulted in voting difficulties that disproportionately affected non-white voters. From the Center for American Progress (CAP), Preventing Problems at the Polls: Arizona:

> In Phoenix -- which is a majority-minority city and the largest metropolitan area in the state -- there was only one polling site per 108,000 residents, whereas some predominantly non-Latino white communities had one polling site for as few as 8,500 residents.

CAP goes on:

> A 2014 Center for American Progress report found that in Arizona and 15 other states in 2012, counties with the most voters of color used the most provisional ballots.47 Arizona State University’s Cronkite News stated that voters "in precincts with higher percentages of minorities had a greater chance of casting provisional ballots."

I love living in Arizona, but this kind of behavior from our elected officials is criminal, and I'm wondering how to help our state get back on track.

Donald J. Trump is having a rotten impact on relationships in my life.

That's a sentence (among many) I never thought I'd be saying[^1].

A while back my wife and I had taken to occasionally asking each other questions from the Ungame at night before bed. It was a nice slow-down from the day, often interesting and often funny. We're doing it almost very night now because it gives us something to talk about that isn't Trump or politics, topics which get us both steaming and frustrated.

My in-laws are in town and I know they voted for Trump. I love them dearly and know why they voted the way they did. It doesn't take away the sting of knowing I can't really talk about or process the election with them without causing more harm than good. I may yet get to where I can be civil about it, but that's not yet.

I'm mostly off Facebook these days. Seeing family, church friends, and people in my wider network sharing pro-Trump posts - I've even seen Breitbart links - just discourages me to no end. It literally saps my will to even engage on the platform. I haven't deleted FB yet from my phone but I've thought about it.

I'm conflicted. My inner demons are hassling me about being a rich white whiner, but I'm also just depressed and I'm having a hard time figuring out how to get through this.

[^1]: I would have assumed that if I were ever discussing any impact Trump had on my life, it would be a negative impact, but not for the reasons we're now discussing.

I've had a few ideas for posts recently that were more light-hearted, movies I've seen, etc.

But this election thing has killed me. Every time I think about writing about the fun stuff I just can't. I'm all funned-out.

Sullivan on Trump

Via Dave Winer: Andrew Sullivan writes in New York Magazine, The Republic Repeals Itself:

> This is now Trump’s America. He controls everything from here on forward. He has won this campaign in such a decisive fashion that he owes no one anything. He has destroyed the GOP and remade it in his image. He has humiliated the elites and the elite media. He has embarrassed every pollster and naysayer. He has avenged Obama. And in the coming weeks, Trump will not likely be content to bask in vindication.

Don't expect a power-seeking narcissist to embrace reason after a victory.

> They will not let [the levers of power] go easily. They will likely build a propaganda machine more powerful than Fox and Breitbart — and generate pseudo-stories and big lies that, absent any authoritative or trusted media, will dominate the new centers of information, Facebook or its successors.

Don't forget that Stephen Bannon, head of the "Alt-Right" (far-right racists, misogynists) publisher Breitbart, was Trump's most recent campaign "CEO".

Andrew points out, rightly, that Trump's promises to the far- and alt-right cannot all realistically be kept. But rather than face backlash, he and his supporters will be ready with a host of "others" and "outside forces" to blame:

> The only sliver of hope is that his promises cannot be kept... But hope fades in turn when you realize how absolute and total his support clearly is. His support is not like that of a democratic leader but of a cult leader fused with the idea of the nation. If he fails, as he will, he will blame others, as he always does.

> so there will have to be scapegoats — media institutions, the Fed, the "global conspiracy" of bankers and Davos muckety-mucks he previewed in his rankly anti-Semitic closing ad, rival politicians whom he will demolish by new names of abuse, foreign countries and leaders who do not cooperate, and doubtless civilians who will be targeted by his ranks of followers and demonized from the bully pulpit itself.

As with all these links, take the time to read Andrew's piece -- it's dark, but paints a not-unrealistic picture of what may come.

Winer on Sullivan

Dave goes on to share some notes responding to Andrew's piece. In particular, he outlines a few ways that Trump can actually build on, and take credit for, Obama's successes in healthcare and immigration -- all while convincing his supporters that he's fulfilling promises to tear down and dismantle. This is a man adept at taking credit for others' work.

> He can repeal ObamaCare by getting rid of the worst parts (so he will say) and replace it with TrumpCare which contains just the good parts. He'll present it as something all new. What he'll care about is putting his name on it...

> People don't know that Obama is deporting illegals. Trump won't tell them. He'll just provide the numbers that he's deporting and say they're the worst ones, real rapists and murderers, and call it progress, and that "issue" will fade away too.

I made it clear that I was voting for Hillary, and why, in a post earlier this year. I was skeptical of the huge lead most of the polls projected, but I still thought she'd beat the foolish candidate of racism and misogyny.

Boy did we screw that up.

I've been grieving for the last 36 hours, and am just now starting to come to terms with the new reality, and what I'm going to do about it. Right now everything in my head is a mess, but I need to process it, and writing is as good a way as any. So, the following is a very-loosely-connected set of links and thoughts.

Liberal White Shock

Courtney Parker West wrote a piece on Medium about the shock and dismay that liberal white voters are expressing at the "racism revealed" by the election. I have to count myself among them (perhaps more independent than liberal, but that just means I had an even more rosy view of the state of racism in our culture) and Courtney's article kinda broke my brain.

On “Woke” White People Advertising their Shock that Racism just won a Presidency

> But the real trigger has been the shock. The absolute unpreparedness. The need to proclaim this astonishment and all but out yourself as having been blind and truly unbelieving of what we already done-told you was our reality — all whilst being down for the cause.

(Emphasis mine) Courtney is spelling out that those of us who are out-and-out clutching our pearls over the racism unleashed in public during this campaign and in the aftermath has always been there, and people of color have been telling us about it since before there was a nation here.

> Don’t tell me you “just can’t imagine” because some of us — my little black and Indigenous ass — have a real big imagination when it comes to the racism and bigotry that has ruled our country for hundreds of years.

There's more I'm still digesting, in particular the bits on institutionalized racism. Read it.

Scalzi on Racism

So... I did not personally vote for our President-Elect, but I have family and friends who did, and had a few things gone differently in my life, I might have as well.

John Scalzi (science fiction author of the Old Man's War series and others, and general good thinker) came up with a metaphor to help us understand how we can't separate our intentions/personal reasons for making a choice from the result of that choice.

The Cinemax Theory of Racism

> Pop quiz: In this scenario, did you just subscribe to Cinemax?

You can guess where it goes from there:

> And you say, no I’m not, I hate racism.

> And others say to you, but apparently you like these other things more than you hate racism, because you agreed to the racism in order to get these other things.

I know the exact reasons that some people did vote, and I would have voted in the past, for Trump. But there are disastrous consequences to not hating the evil enough to give up some hoped-for modicum of good.

Going Independent in Arizona

On a side-note, I've been a registered Republican for as long as I've been a voter. This year I marked a bunch of Ds on my ballot (but not all) and today, I re-registered as an independent in Arizona ("No Party Preference"). Arizona has open primaries, and you can bet I'll be taking part in the future. To my shame, I stayed home for the primaries this year, not believing in the slightest that Trump had a chance.


Elizabeth Bonesteel tweeted about Star Trek: Into Darkness, to which I will not link, nor which will I discuss right now:

Y’all got me thinking again about ST: INTO DARKNESS, & I realize I went into that one already annoyed.

— Elizabeth Bonesteel (@liz_monster) November 7, 2016

But it got me thinking about why Star Trek: The Wrath of Khan was so epically fantastic for me. I'm having Real Feels right now just thinking about it.

I was 11 when Khan came out, so I didn't see it in theaters. I had watched much of the original series in syndication with my family, and I was in my late teens when I finally saw Wrath of Khan.

I don't have the time or skill for a proper exposition right now, but some bullet points on why WoK still inspires some deep emotion for me:

• Khan is charismatic, cut like a boss, and leads a Mad-Max-style horde of 80s bad-asses. What's not to love?
• For the love of God, Ceti eels. I'm cringing in terror right now.
• THIS IS Ceti Alpha V!!
• The movie exposes many of Kirk's character flaws, the real pain he causes, and does not excuse them by the end. That's bold film-making right there, especially in the 80s when everything had a happy ending.
• Kirk's consummate self-assurance that he's done the Right Thing, without ever looking in life's Rear View Mirror, is cuttingly White Male thinking.
• And he more or less doesn't get away with it. His thoughtless hubris costs him friends and subordinates, and by the end, costs him his deepest relationship.
• Spock's real death. I know that the ending was tweaked to show the torpedo tube intact, but as a teen in the 80s who did not yet know the Ways of Hollywood, that was pretty f'ing permanent.

Sorry I need to go have a cry.


Because I'm easily amused and have [an image editor](http://www.flyingmeat.com/acorn[#slacks](http://monkinetic.blog/tag/slacks)

(Thanks Trent Walton for the inspiration)

Jay Rosen, journalism professor at NYU and blogger for PressThink, wrote a fantastic piece about the rise of "make our own reality" politics (starting in the W. Bush White House and largely but not exclusively on the Right) and the war on objective reality as represented by Facts, devoid of spin.

This is what set the stage for the Trump candidacy and explains why he is dismissive - no, derisive - of reportable, objective facts. His intent is to replace reality with a consistent, constructed story that rings the bells for his supporters:

> Stanley made the point that fact checking Trump in a way missed the point. Trump was not trying to make reference to reality in what he said to win votes. He was trying to substitute “his” reality for the one depicted in news reports.

Jay explains that Trump's (and other totalitarian leaders) communication style is all about power: the power to define reality for his supporters (and by extension, everyone else, by simply refusing to acknowledge any facts outside the preferred narrative):

> The goal of totalitarian propaganda is to sketch out a consistent system that is simple to grasp, one that both constructs and simultaneously provides an explanation for grievances against various out-groups. It is openly intended to distort reality, partly as an expression of the leader’s power.

He goes on:

> Trump’s campaign was “openly intended to distort reality” because that is a show of power. Power over his followers. Over the other candidates he humiliated and drove from the race. Over party officials who tried to bring him to heel. And over the journalists who tried to “check” and question him.

This is the closest I've ever been authoritarianism and totalitarianism in my lifetime, and it's terrifying.

> "I don't want everybody to vote. Elections are not won by a majority of the people. They never have been from the beginning of our country and they are not now. As a matter of fact, our leverage in the elections quite candidly goes up as the voting populace goes down."

The New Face of Jim Crow: Voter Suppression in America -- People For The American Way

Working to discourage one's political opponents' supporters has a long history, but the machinations on display in the last decade, and this election in particular, are offensive.

Election committees are moving polls to difficult-to-reach areas in youth and minority populations, as Jonathan Katz tweets:

North Carolina. In 2012, Duke students could vote early on the main campus. This year, the polls were moved to a little-known spot. Result: pic.twitter.com/GPWZuUfQNL

— Jonathan M. Katz (@KatzOnEarth) November 3, 2016

Donald Trump is encouraging his supporters to:

> "...go down to certain areas and watch and study, and make sure other people don't come in and vote five times"

Trump Is Recruiting an Army of Poll Watchers. It's Even Worse Than It Sounds. [Emphasis mine.]

Pro-Trump trolls are buying fake Clinton ads on Twitter targeting minorities, telling them they can text in their votes (you can't):

>The recent social media ads target Clinton supporters with the hashtag #ImWithHer and give instructions to "Vote Early" by texting “Hillary” to the number

Some other tactics being deployed, mostly derived from the aforementioned PFAW study:

Burdensome of ID Laws

From my own home state of Arizona:

> In November of 2004, Arizona voters passed Proposition 200, which implemented harsh voter identification requirements (as well as proof-of-citizenship requirements—discussed in the next section of this report). The law requires voters who cast a ballot at a polling place on Election Day to present photo identification deemed “acceptable” by Arizona’s Secretary of State, such as a driver’s license, or two alternate forms of ID that include the name or address of the voter such as a utility bill or a bank statement. Such requirements can disenfranchise voters without photo ID by making it hard for them to cast ballots if they live at a residence where someone else, such as a spouse, parent, or roommate pays the bills, or if they are uninformed about the rules. Students, the poor, and senior citizens are among the groups that are most likely to be adversely affected.

Proof-Of-Eligibility as Voter Intimidation

> In this corner of rural Georgia, African-Americans are arrested at a rate far higher than that of whites.

> But the deputy had not come to arrest Mr. Flournoy. Rather, he had come to challenge Mr. Flournoy’s right to vote.

Critics See Efforts by Counties and Towns to Purge Minority Voters from Rolls

Fear-Mongering and Voter Registration

>Such proof-of-citizenship requirements are often rationalized through fear tactics—namely the claim that non-citizens (especially “illegal immigrants”) are attempting to register to vote. But no evidence exists to indicate that this is a problem.

The New Face of Jim Crow: Voter Suppression in America -- People For The American Way

Reduced Polling Resources and Lines

In communities where the number of polling places and hours of operation are reduced, resulting long lines impact voter turnout.

> While long lines can suppress the vote in any precinct, evidence indicates that such lines often form at polling places that are frequented by students, people of color, and low-income voters who often do not have the time or the resources to wait many hours.

The New Face of Jim Crow: Voter Suppression in America -- People For The American Way

In North Carolina, as one example, Republicans lobbied to limit the hours during which minorities tended to vote:

>Emails uncovered by Reuters through a public records request revealed that local Republican leaders lobbied at least 17 county election boards to limit the hours that voting sites could stay open — particularly to cut down on weekends and evenings, when Democratic voter turnout tends to be higher

North Carolina Republicans conspired to limit early voting to keep African-Americans from the polls

Squeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee eeeeeeeeeee EEEEEEEEeeeeeeeee!!!... EEeeeeeeee!

I stood in line for two hours this morning and cast my vote in the 2016 general election. As promised, I voted for Hillary Clinton and Tim Kaine for President and Vice-President.

Down-Ticket

Down-ticket I voted a mix of Democrats and Republicans depending on local issues.

(I voted Republican in one race specifically because the other candidate was Libertarian, and that ship sailed a LONG time ago for me. Peter Thiel's dystopian interpretation and realization of that philosophy hasn't helped their cause.)

Embarrassingly, this was the first time I sat down and read all the election prep documents that Arizona and Gilbert sent out, and Googled and researched various candidates for the local "non-partisan" elections. It's amazing what you learn, and it made me sign up for permanent early voting, even before I realized it would allow me to skip the two-hour wait at the early voting stations.

Vote!

The polls are going to be nuts on election day, if (as I hope) voter turnout is good. If you are a legal voter in the United States (even if living out of the country) I hope you have made provisions to cast your ballot this year - our franchise is not something to give up lightly.

I've had family members and friends half-joke about whether their vote is going to "count" -- if their vote is not the same as mine, or if their preferred candidate does not win -- as if one's vote is only worth casting if it's a "deciding vote". Your vote absolutely counts, as David Walbert explains:

> ...every vote does count; it just counts in a more complicated way. When you vote for president, remember that you're voting in a state election, not a national election.

(Read that whole article, it's interesting)

No matter, what, the fact that we can vote and participate in this democracy is crucial. Get out and do it. The only way your vote stops counting is if:

1. You throw it away by not voting
2. Candidates start deciding they're not going to honor the results.

The AuthaGraph World Map projection is winning awards for its design and superior area mapping, better showing the relative sizes of land masses and oceans.

via MeFi

Also:

The very cool TrueSize map

512 Pixels:

>However, the startup chime is ingrained into the experience of having a Mac, I’m sad to see it go. A Mac without the chime feels broken, even if I know it isn’t. I don’t power down my machines often, but I liked hearing the chime when I power them back up.

I'll feel the startup chime's absence more than any missing port or spec (cries). The Mac is changing - as it must. The startup chime connected today's Macs to the whole history, the red thread of user-friendliness that marked the Mac as something that "Just Worked".

Sorry, I'm just a bit choked up.

Andy Baio, one of my blog heroes, redesigned his blog, Waxy.org this week. In addition to being a lovely design, it's now responsive and a bit more modern.

What really stands out to me is Andy's comments on the state of blogging these days, why he blogs still, and why he is still investing in a platform that is all his. He expresses very eloquently why his blog - and this one - is still going, despite periods of neglect: it's a labor of the heart that connects people in long-form.

Update Nov 1, 2016: I first posted this series of tweets as a Storify but the embed UI was so bad I couldn't leave it here. I'm going to rewrite this as a blog post once I have time to digest it some more. In the meantime you can read An accounting of The Acountant on Storify.

You know, the one where they slowly get their memories back, and drag some poor nearly helpless sidekick around while killing bad guys and making things right?

Yeah, it was the best!

No, not that one. Not that one either, or that one.

No, THIS ONE, the Long Kiss Goodnight. Greatest amnesiac assassin move ever. Geena F'ing Davis is the one-time assassin, and Samuel L. Jackson the nearly helpless (but not completely hopeless) private eye getting dragged all over, getting shot at and screaming a lot.

Watch it. Now watch it again. You'll thank me.

I've been raving a bit on Twitter and here on the blog about John Scalzi's new audio novella, The Dispatcher. It's a very engaging listen - and part of that is because it was envisioned and written as an audio book first and only.

That being said, this interview on Audiblerange with the narrator - Zachary Quinto (of audio book The Dispatcher fame[^1]) - gets into some of the recording process as well as why The Dispatcher is so good, and you should read it.

[^1]: You may also know Zach from one of his lesser-known roles, Sylar in Tim Kring's Heroes teleplay, and Spock from J.J. Abram's derivative motion picture work, Star Trek.