Last Day of November Forum
Steven L. Taylor
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Wednesday, November 30, 2022
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76 comments
About Steven L. Taylor
Steven L. Taylor is a Professor of Political Science and a College of Arts and Sciences Dean. His main areas of expertise include parties, elections, and the institutional design of democracies. His most recent book is the co-authored
A Different Democracy: American Government in a 31-Country Perspective. He earned his Ph.D. from the University of Texas and his BA from the University of California, Irvine. He has been blogging since 2003 (originally at the now defunct Poliblog).
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I see Stewart Rhodes is getting his comeuppance. Let’s me start my day with a smile.
Quick update on Google Ad Services inability to locate me on a map. I am still being GASlighted.
I am now getting local ads for Denver. For a day and a half it was for Eau Claire, Wisconsin, a relatively tiny local market. Apparently Eau Claire has two ads available. I saw them both 30 times at least. I have been to and through Eau Claire many times, but the last time was probably 30 years ago. Driving I-94 to Chicago doesn’t count, you barely clip the southern suburbs.
I have never physically ever been in Denver proper. I’ve been at the new airport several times, but that is way out of town. I might have transfered through the old airport decades ago. Zero clue where that was geographically.
I have never been in Denver proper. I have visited Colorado many times for camping and outdoor activities. I have visited many towns in Colorado. Stayed overnight. Denver, no.
Okay, last 5 years Google Ad Services (aka GASlight) has never once served me an ad that is locally correct. In order it has been, Minneaoplis/St. Paul, Omaha (when they thought that Spanish was my first/preferred language), Minneapolis again (in English), Chicago, Minneapolis, Eau Claire, Minneaoplis, Denver.
Yes, I lived in both St. Paul and in Minneapolis, but many years ago now. I have never lived in any of the other cities, but visited all of them but Denver.
I have lived in Des Moines for almost two decades. I have two phones both with a 515 area code. I own a home here and have owned property in town for more than 15 years. That’s a public record data vendors scoop up like Skittles. A verifiable physical address in the public record solidly linked to two phone numbers and a SSN is gold standard geolocation. My IP address is local and I do not use a VPN.
I remain baffled as to how badly they fucked up the geolocation of my profile. It is so simple, it is so easy. My location is child’s play. I own no other propert except my house.
When I open Google Maps, it locates me to the square meter including which direction my phone is pointed at currently. If I turn around Maps updates the orientation in seconds on the map overlay/interface. That’s pretty fucking spooky! Sometimes helpful, but damned unsettling!
During election season it – malocation – is preferable. It is way less annoying to see election ads for people you can’t legally vote for. You are not invested at all.
Did you know when you own a condo you own the paint but not the wall?
Did you know if Google thinks you live in Omaha and speak Spanish as your first language you get served endless ads begging you to sign up for a nonunion job as a roofer or a lawn care specialist? Roofing pays better, btw.
The GOP, snatching defeat from the jaws of victory:
You go, guys. I’ll enjoy this perp walk.
Some people shouldn’t have children.
The other day, Trevor Noah stole my joke.
Over at Political Wire, in a thread about Mike Pence’s statement on the Trump-Fuentes meeting, I posted this comment.
A few hours later, I watched the Daily Show segment on the incident, which included this (you don’t have to watch the whole thing, the link skips to the point in the video where he says the line).
Does this mean Trevor Noah and his writers spend their time scouring comments sections of random political blogs for material? Or is this joke just so obvious it practically writes itself?
@Kylopod:
Great minds…
@de stijl: Inquiring minds must know….what happened to the squirrel? Did the unidentified predatory bird get him?
@OzarkHillbilly:
That recount law is unrealistic 0.5% margin – the machine counts are way more accurate than that. One race is a nearly 9,000 vote margin, 0.4%, that will not change. Attorney General is a 510 vote margin which is still pretty safe. The last statewide recount changed a 161 vote margin to 167 votes.
@OzarkHillbilly:
The statewide certification would just ignore any county that did not certify, The net effect would just flip a Congressional district (R) to (D), but God or Karma or whatever does not love us that much.
On Trump:
http://www.thebulwark.com/if-only-someone-could-have-warned-them/
This is a really, really withering assessment of Donald’s Dinner Party.
@Kylopod: Plagiarism is the sincerest form of flattery.
I’ve have had the opportunity to drive two electric vehicles: a Tesla 3 and my BIL’s Kia EV6. No comparison, the Tesla 3 seems primitive to the Kia. And much more expensive. What surprised me most was the acceleration on the electric cars. 0-60 under 4 sec. Driving the Kia, we went to a mostly deserted road and BIL said to punch it. Wow! That was fun. In the market for a new vehicle in the next year. Will definitely be looking at the electrics.
@CSK:
They sold their souls with the Southern Strategy. I’m pretty sure that after more than 50 years they are well past the “buy back” date.
Some Iranians are celebrating the loss of their national team to the US.
Curioser and curioser.
@charon: At least locally, I’m told the scanners have reached the point that during a recount they give exactly the same numbers they did in the original count. The (literal) handful of changes are in ballots that the machines kicked out as unreadable, and different pairs of election workers make an occasional different subjective decision than the original workers as to whether voter intent can be determined.
@OzarkHillbilly:
By inference, the piece is asserting the GOP has a Trump problem, so no more Trump, problem solved.
Which is bullshit – no more Trump, the GOP base is still about white herrenvolk and Christian Nationalist herrenvolk, the party would still have base that prefers fascism to democracy.
Hoocudanode the Bible Belt would come complete with anti-evolution anti-science anti-intellectual Fundamentalists.
@OzarkHillbilly:
From the article:
No, one side is trying to save the child’s life and the other is actively preventing that by believing in lies. The parent’s are NOT acting the best interests of the child but in their own belief set. There is no reason to accept they are acting in good faith either since they are clearly aware of the dangers of waiting and yet still insist on this nonsense. Change “vaccination” to “minority blood” or “blood with gay gene” and their request would sound exactly as stupid as it is.
@Michael Cain:
This will be used as evidence that the fix is in.
US economy grew faster in third quarter than first estimated:
Dark Brandon rises.
@DK: Biden did that. (with a little help from a DEM congress).
@Scott:
While Tesla has updated the operating system of their vehicles including features and the batteries have been updated, the structure and design of the car hasn’t changed. This is where Tesla is going to be kicked in the teeth. As more EV’s enter the market they will be of contemporary styling and the suspension and body structure will have benefited from engineering advances. Tesla is stuck in ~2015, for the 3 and ~2010 for the S. Those cars badly need to be replaced, but Musk would rather spend development time on self-driving.
Now let’s discuss Tesla build quality…
@de stijl: I pay no attention to what ads the internet sends me at all. I suppose that if I’d worked in computer programming like you did, I might have more curiosity, but for me, ads are just those things I scroll over as I read whatever I reading.
@de stijl: Are you using a VPN? Or do you have your GPS set to not use precise location? I get ads from 200 miles away because I have the precise GPS turned off except for certain apps.
@Michael Cain:
It would be like “regrading” scantron tests. The only way for there to be a fixable error is if eraser marks or some errant piece of debris made the machine misread. Otherwise, you get the same result every time.
@OzarkHillbilly:
He did. Although I’m furious with him and Democrats today over their adject failure to stand up for railroad workers seeking a measly six days of paid leave. Since when do Democrats force a union to bend to greedy corporations, in a standoff over paid leave no less?
Embarassing.
Christine McVie, Fleetwood Mac singer-songwriter, reportedly dead today at age 79.
@Scott:
More than one publication has already dubbed the EV6 and the KIA Ionic as “Tesla Killers”. BOTH are far superior to any Tesla, and cost less.
@Sleeping Dog:
I have two friends who work for Tesla. One drives a KIA Niro EV. The other drives a VW ID.4. Both say they’d never drive a Tesla due to the build quality. Simply put, they’re not well built. And service is a nightmare.
I ended up going with an inexpensive one-seat electric car. I’ve had it for a month, have driven 984 miles so far, and have spent a total of $3.14 charging it thanks to the free chargers at my gym. Today I drove it 74 miles one way, from the Valley to Lancaster. It’s charging for free now at a Volta charging station, while I do my work here, and by 2pm will be charged enough to go home, even though I won’t finish working until 5pm. The total cost for me for driving 148 miles round trip will be….ZERO.
Have I mentioned how much I love my tiny, little electric car.
https://www.emvauto.com/
As a resident/fellow I took care of pediatric heart pts. Incredibly intense. A number of the pediatric ICU docs had done 9 years of training, post medical school. Very intensive training for the nurses and other staff. There is zero evidence that the transfused blood from vaccinated people would harm the kid. The people who have devoted so many years to learning that care have no incentive to want to harm the kid. However, the parents have spent a few hours on some conspiracy sites so they now consider themselves experts. I hope the hospital does not give in. Let the parents find some place that will honor their demands, probably somewhere in the southern US. Even there they may have some problems. One of my old trainees is a full professor at Texas Children’s and have had opportunity to talk with him during covid. His staff would be totally opposed to this. Hospital admin might cave but people would be pissed. If accommodated this likely spreads and transfusing is already gotten to be more complicated, especially with EMRs which make transfusing very complicated.
Steve
In Europe (Dave Keating)
More at the Guardian.
I wonder if Rod Dreher may soon be pining for what might have been?.
@OzarkHillbilly:
@steve:
It’s gotten to be like superstition.
Well, not like. It’s pure superstition. Such as if a woman during her period eats cheese made from the local cattle, the cow will die or at least get very sick. How?
I could go on a detailed explanation of what’s in blood, and how no remnant of any vaccine ingredients can possibly hang around more than a few weeks at most. Instead, look at the facts:
Most people have received multiple vaccines during their lifetime, from childhood shots to COVID boosters. This includes blood donors as well. If vaccines had any adverse effects on blood transfusions, it would be so obvious we’d learn about it in school.
@JohnSF:
When I think of extreme radicalization, two names come to mind for me:
Lara Logan and Rod Dreher. Lara Logan was, not too long ago, a sane, rational, smart, internationally respected foreign correspondent, covering wars, and political upheaval in other countries. How quickly she devolved into the worst kind of conspiracy nut is staggering.
Dreher, was, not long ago, a centrist Republican, often fighting against the right wing of the GOP (“Crunchy Cons” was his, remember). His evolution into a ultra hard right lunatic on gay and trans issues has been breathtaking.
I’m curious what causes people to change so radically in just a few years.
If it happens to me, just shoot me. Seriously.
And if the theater that is WWE was not absurd enough already, Baby Wrestling makes his WWE debut. The most recent in a parade of family involvement and home invasion story lines to add a touch of “real” world.
@Flat Earth Luddite: Sorry to hear that. It is a less sad story than the one about the 39-year-old country music singer who died the day after his wedding that I read earlier today, though. 🙁
@EddieInCA:
Dreher has on enough occasions made “if homosexuality were okay, every man would be gay” remarks that I’m pretty sure his descent has been driven by self-loathing and a refusal to deal with his sexuality.
@Just nutha ignint cracker:
Oh, my . What a week I picked to quit smoking. And shooting smack.
@EddieInCA:
Saw one of these at the local mall. Sure is cute, in much the same way as my 1970 Honda N600 was. However, when this old creaky Luddite tried to get back out of the thing, it required assistance (fortunately they got me out before the jaws of life arrived). But glad it works for you.
https://www.motortrend.com/vehicle-genres/collectible-classic-1970-1072-honda-600/
@Stormy Dragon:
I wonder if that’s the cause of the break-up of Dreher’s marriage.
@EddieInCA:
As far as Lara Logan goes, I think her descent was caused by her 2011 gang rape in Egypt.
@EddieInCA: The newer electrics coming out are definitely good, but their Achilles heel is their charging network that is going to take a few years to catch up to Tesla’s.
/still perfectly happy with my Y
@Franklin: I should add: yes, the hopefully rare service will be a pain once I need it. The closest place is more than an hour away.
@Just nutha ignint cracker: Stumbled across a version of the article I’d read this morning:
https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/us/country-singer-jake-flint-dies-hours-after-getting-married/ar-AA14IvFd?ocid=msedgdhp&pc=U531&cvid=a469b553d52548cc94cb03a4be27af48
@EddieInCA:
The Porsche 356 knockoff could have me opening my wallet.
https://www.emvauto.com/eroadster
@Franklin:
Like most things in life, the number of charging stations will depend on who can profit from them. Electricity is cheaper than gas, and I suppose EVs don’t require a check on fluid levels (but the tires still need air).
So, I don’t know who can even profit from charging EVs. I’ve some thoughts, but no data.
Trump’s allies–whoever they might be–were supposedly so shaken by his dinner date with Ye and Fuentes that from now on, a handler “will be present with him at all times.”
Dear God. A president who needs a 24/7 babysitter.
@Franklin:
For those who can charge at home/work, a charging network is close to meaningless. The one person that I know who has only one vehicle that is a Tesla, rents a car if he needs to take a road trip.
@CSK:
Handler, aka nurse, Caring for the senile.
@Flat Earth Luddite: Just got back from Costco where I saw my first Rivian crew cab pickup truck. Must have been just off the production line.
Don’t think it is a work truck.
@EddieInCA: Just got back from Costco where I saw a Rivian RT1 Crew Cab. Must be just off the production line.
Don’t think it is a work truck.
https://rivian.com/r1t
I worry about where you would get maintenance for an EV made by one of these small companies. My hope is that we see enough standardization in components that almost any place that provides service for electric cars can handle any kind of car. I suspect Tesla will hold out on that and unless it somehow becomes another Apple could kill the company.
Steve
@Sleeping Dog: Now THAT is in my wheelhouse!
@Sleeping Dog:
Will whoever the babysitter is have a muzzle handy? A straitjacket? A tranquilizer?
This is just…I don’t know what to call it. A man running for the presidency of the United States needs a keeper at all times.
@Stormy Dragon:
I heard that a lot more often in the past. 90s stuff, usually from virulent homophobes.
There are few propositions more easily tested: homosexulity is mostly ok through much of the western world, and yet most men remain stubbornly not gay.
Heinlein liked to claim that everyone’s attraction is a little mixed up. So now and then a straight man might feel some attraction to another man, and the same with straight women. Most simply won’t act on it, and their predominant attraction will remain heterosexual. of course this means a gay man might feel attracted to a woman from time to time, and the same goes for their predominant attraction as well.
I wonder what that means in settings where only men are available the vast majority of the time, like prisons. Women’s prisons tend to employ more men than men’s prisons tend to employ women.
@DK: I have said the same, only with a lot more words. I understand him wanting to avoid a rail strike, but he could have at least split the baby in half and given the RR workers ate least some of what they were demanding. But instead they are going to force a contract the workers rejected down their throats.
He may well be the most pro-union president ever, but there is still room for improvement.
@Sleeping Dog:
I already have one reserved. 🙂
Well, I’m on the list to reserve one soon as it’s ready. I’m definitely getting that when it’s out.
@Kathy:
@Sleeping Dog:
Can’t speak to other jurisdictions, but here in and around LA, there are so many free charging stations. Smart retail centers have put in charging stations that are 100% free to whomever is charging. There are 8 chargers at the Northridge Mall, where I go to the movies, and for sushi regularly. There are two charging stations at three of the LA Fitness gyms I go to. Those are just some of of the ones I visit regularly. With Level 2 charging, I get about 17.5% per hour, so I can go from 20% to 55% during one visit to the movies, or get fully charged by going to a dinner first, and then the movie.
@Sleeping Dog:
@EddieInCA:
OMG that is stunning. Wow.
@CSK:
I’ve a theory Republiqans like Benito for the same reason they like oil: it’s crude and unrefined.
@Kathy:
I have a notion that there are two kinds of Trump fans remaining:
1. The kind who refuse to believe anything bad about him. As far as they’re concerned, he’s a devoted, monogamous husband, a wonderful father, a devout Christian, and the best president we ever had.
2. The kind who adore him precisely because he’s such an oaf and a boor. He fights!
Both kinds love not only Trump, but to a lesser degree, Marjorie Taylor Greene, Matt Gaetz, and Lauren Boebert. Every other Republican, including Kevin McCarthy, is a communist Deep Stater.
@Sleeping Dog:
Nice. If I were to win one of the big lottos, I would have a custom bright red “Hot Rod Lincoln” electric built for me.
@Scott: Nonsense. Any truck that can be written off as a “business” expense is a “work” truck. Especially if all you have to do is drive to the site and look around.
@CSK: Welcome to the brave new world of the octogentocracy.
@Kathy: I suspect that rape in prison has more to do with violence than sexual release, but I might be wrong.
@Steven L. Taylor:
Two years ago, when the Arizona state senate hired the Cyber Ninjas to hand count the ballots from Maricopa County, my prediction was they would waste weeks counting, and no matter what their actual hand count number was, they would release results that were within a tiny margin of the counts Maricopa County got. Because the scanners are that damned good, and humans aren’t, and everyone knows it.
@EddieInCA:
My pet theory is that when confronted with something that is so staggeringly huge (trauma, sexuality/gender issues) most people will choose whatever path is easier and available to them rather deal with the actual problem.
I’m fairly certain most people don’t want to deal with the terrible thing that lives inside of them until they are forced to. That’s why you see a lot of adult transitioners seemingly meltdown and transition in the most intense and immediate way possible. People who have intense trauma generally don’t like reliving that. Why do all that hard awful work when you can just descend into the loving arms of conspiracy madness.
@Kathy:
Oh I know. My intuition is more that many of the people who think that everyone’s orientation would change wildly absent social pressure are in-denial LGBTQ people because they are projecting the internal conflict they have to consistently deal with onto the rest of the population.
@Just nutha:
Sagan and Druyan talk a lot (and I do mean a lot) about symbolic sexual acts in dominance games among chimps, in Shadows of Forgotten Ancestors. A male will mount a subordinate male. They usually don’t penetrate or climax, but the act is otherwise the same they’d do with a female.
The authors say this behavior is not seen among humans. they should have looked at prisons. BTW, there’s plenty of dominance and submission in prisons as well, more explicitly and intensely than what you see among free H. sapiens
@Stormy Dragon:
That’s one possibility. And in this I’d include bisexuality as well.
Another is they had a passing same sex attraction a few times, including maybe a physiological response (sometimes these happen when there’s contact), and were horrified and repulsed. But also convinced themselves all men want to be gay, and presumably all women lesbians, unless forcefully and constantly restrained.
@Sleeping Dog: The Tesla Coupe and Tesla S are beautiful to look at. All subsequent efforts seem to consist of a bunch of amateurs saying things like, “let’s morph the exact same design into a completely different kind of vehicle by randomly stretching or bulging this or that bit.”
@EddieInCA: Oh my god. That is a beautiful car. The first one in decades that has me saying, “I don’t care, I want that!”
This is a good example of a misleading headline. Link shortly.
it’s not wrong, it does refer to content withing the piece, but it misses the point.
Headline says Milo Yiannopoulos claims he set up Fuentes dinner ‘to make Trump’s life miserable’
But inside you find this:
So Milo was trying to be helpful, and the headline is empty provocateur-style attempt at shock.
Not to be outdone, though, Fuentes shows he’s not well-endowed brainwise. His reply to the headline is:
One begins to understand the meaning of “an idiot’s idea of a smart man.”
@Sleeping Dog: True about the home charging.
For the few road trips I’ve taken, I did plan in advance where I could charge up. The Tesla stations are reliable. My understanding is the other stations are frequently out of order, at least here in the Midwest.
Kathy: Tesla stations just know my car and have my credit card on file, it’s as simple as plugging in. They do charge more than the electricity costs, but I don’t have the exact surcharge numbers in front of me at the moment.
@OzarkHillbilly: This seems like a good time for the New Zealand courts to mandate (1) the surgery, and (2) the removal of the child from custody his whack-job parents. Or do it the other way around if that’s easier.
@Flat Earth Luddite: I’m crushed. Stevie Nix was the sexy one, but McVie was the talented one.
@Just nutha:
Porque no le dos? It’s a twofer.
@Franklin:
LADWP charges me $.17 per kilowatt hr during the day, slightly less 10pm-6am. I’ve only charged twice at home, as I charge mostly at free charging stations during my daily trips.
Most of he pay stations near me charge $.17-$.29 per kilowatt hour.
To charge my vehicle from 10% to 90% costs me $2.36, and I get about 80 miles with that. That comes out to $0.0295 per mile, or less than three cents per mile.
Compare that to my Cayenne. To go 80 miles, it takes about 6 gallons of premium gas, currently running here in LA around $5.31 on average, creating a per mile cost of $0.4095, or almost forty-one cents per mile.
Even in my wife’s Z4, where 80 miles takes about 4 gallons, it’s still 26.5 cents per mile.
3 cents a mile electric car vs 41 cents a mile – Porsche Cayenne
3 cents a mile electric car vs 26.5 cents per mile – BMW Z4 Convertible
First month alone, I’ve saved almost $500 in gas that I didn’t spend. End of one year, that will pay for my trip to Scotland. 🙂
Unfortunately, my wife drove my little mini-electric car last weekend. Before she drove it, it was “His car”. Now it’s “Our car”.
@EddieInCA: Nice. Ok, I did some math and at home I’m paying roughly 5 cents per mile. (Me driving 80+ on the freeway is less efficient than toodling around town at 30-40mph with frequent regenerative braking)
I’m pretty sure those chargers cost me about double what my own electricity costs, based on my last Supercharger session. Still cheaper than a reasonably efficient car with the $4-something gas in Michigan.
@Franklin: And luckily, no wife to “borrow” it.
Yeah, when I was married, I bought a cute little sportscar but with an automatic so she could drive it, too. Big mistake. She hated driving the car anyway, so I should have got the manual and enjoyed it fully.