Tuesday, October 23, 2018
Disbelief
Maybe Brexit is good, but the process has underscored how just about every Tory is a blithering idiot who couldn't put together the simplest Ikea bookcase even if he had to in order to keep mummy's inheritance.
That they don't have the infrastructure to even begin handling customs controls has been known all along by anyone who wanted to know anything.
Britain is drawing up plans to charter ships to bring in emergency food and medicines in the event of a “no-deal” Brexit next March, in a move greeted with disbelief at a stormy meeting of Theresa May’s cabinet on Tuesday.
The cabinet was told that the heavily used Dover-Calais route could quickly become blocked by new customs controls on the French side, forcing Britain to seek alternative ways of bringing in “critical supplies”.
That they don't have the infrastructure to even begin handling customs controls has been known all along by anyone who wanted to know anything.
The Caravan Of Doom
Republicans kick the ball, the press chases the ball. Dems almost never pull this off. Savvy reporters will tell you the Dems just aren't as good at the game. Enlightened news consumers will wonder why reporters see it as a game they are playing.
It Isn't The Lies, It's The Lying
Everybody lies, some. I'm not going to debate the ethics of dishonesty. But Trump lies all the time. The question isn't whether a particular declaration is true, or partially true, or exaggeration, or hyperbole, or a bit wrong. It doesn't even matter most of the time. The specifics don't matter. The point is that his utter disregard for the truth means that nothing that comes out of his mouth should be evaluated on some truth-fiction scale. It's all a lie, because he's indifferent to whether what comes out of his mouth is true or not. If it's true it's only an accident.
I don't think this is some big challenge the reporters make it out to be. This idea of deference to the office of the presidency is a made up notion that only applies sometimes. It's stupid and it's fake. He's just a man. If someone lies to all you all the time, even if they're a newsworthy figure you treat them accordingly. You know, as if they are liars. The UK press (which has its own problems so I am not being envious overall) has no trouble dealing with lying politicians. They're people. They work for us. If they're full of shit, discount everything they say and ignore them most of the time.
I don't think this is some big challenge the reporters make it out to be. This idea of deference to the office of the presidency is a made up notion that only applies sometimes. It's stupid and it's fake. He's just a man. If someone lies to all you all the time, even if they're a newsworthy figure you treat them accordingly. You know, as if they are liars. The UK press (which has its own problems so I am not being envious overall) has no trouble dealing with lying politicians. They're people. They work for us. If they're full of shit, discount everything they say and ignore them most of the time.
Whatever You Do,
Don't forget to vote.
If your state has early voting, vote today.
Not tomorrow.
Today.
If your state has early voting, vote today.
Not tomorrow.
Today.
Monday, October 22, 2018
Courting
I've never quite figured out if journalists realize that while they imagine they are courting sources, sources rightfully understand that they are courting journalists. Most readers don't, at least. I saw enough of the sausage factory in my limited visits to DC to know that it's pretty standard for "ground rules" of providing "scoops" (which often aren't) to journalists ensure that at least initial coverage of things is slanted in certain ways. And most of the time "scoops" are really just "which journalist gets the info that the source wants to get out there no matter what first." Source has story, wants to get it out there in the best favorable light, at least initially, and finds the journalist willing to agree to that. Make it a running agreement and suddenly your journalist job got a bit easier. Take the press release, print the press release. You know the drill.
And it isn't as if this is always an indefensible practice, but in the aggregate...
And it isn't as if this is always an indefensible practice, but in the aggregate...
He's Just Doing What He Promised
I come back to this occasionally, but one of the worst narratives of the Trump press coverage (and from some liberals, too) is Trump is just giving the country what he promised during the campaign. This just isn't true. He's giving the country half of what he promised during the campaign, roughly, or maybe a better way to put it is that he's giving one side of the coin. He promised a lot of stuff! Some of it was good or at least not so bad! Of course the good betting money was on "Trump is full of shit about that stuff" but given how Trump was covered during the campaign I think you can forgive some people for believing him even if you don't forgive them for fact that they voted for him despite the really bad stuff he promised.
He was gonna be the best of pals to the LGBT community. There's even a tweet (there's always a tweet).
He was gonna be the best of pals to the LGBT community. There's even a tweet (there's always a tweet).
Sure
One of the easiest places to drive and navigate in the world. Good place to start.
I could win that lottery thingy soon, too.
For awhile I was putting these absurd claims on a calendar like I used to do with Friedmanesque Iraq war statements but I just stopped because they're almost always ludicrous.
A fleet of autonomous taxis could roll onto the streets of the U.K. capital within three years, after one of London’s biggest private-hire taxi companies struck a deal with a maker of autonomous vehicle software.
I could win that lottery thingy soon, too.
For awhile I was putting these absurd claims on a calendar like I used to do with Friedmanesque Iraq war statements but I just stopped because they're almost always ludicrous.
Sunday, October 21, 2018
Nothing Really Matters, Anyone Can See
The question of whether Jim VandeHei's children belong in cages isn't about policy; it is about both sides making a cultural argument to turn out their base voters.
The War On America
It's not completely true, of course, but I suppose a big difference between Trump and Bush is the latter declared war abroad and the former is declaring it a home.
Again, not completely true.
Again, not completely true.
Saturday, October 20, 2018
Cool That Sounds Interesting
Running fixed route self-driving vehicles (with a driver and "chaperone" in the car just in case) sounds like a great idea. I mean, with 3 vehicles (later 5) you'll be able to carry 15 (25) people at a time with just 6 (10) employees.
I mean it's cool that this company is gonna provide this service for free while doing their rese..(record scratch):
Who knows? Maybe this kind of research is a great use of public money. But Arlington basically doesn't any public transit. The willingness of places to throw money at things like this which at best have a miniscule capacity...
AT&T Stadium holds 100,000 people.
Today, startup Drive.ai is launching a self-driving car service in Arlington, Texas, which sits halfway between Dallas and Fort Worth and is home to the Cowboys’ AT&T Stadium. The service will run several routes in multiple parts of the city, bustling to and from big venues including that stadium, Globe Life Park (where baseball’s Texas Rangers play), and the Arlington Convention Center.
I mean it's cool that this company is gonna provide this service for free while doing their rese..(record scratch):
Drive.ai is set to run these routes for a year, and while it’s not charging riders anything, it’s being paid $434,952 for the service. A federal Congestion Mitigation Air Quality Improvement Grant will provide $343,000; the rest comes Arlington’s coffers.
Who knows? Maybe this kind of research is a great use of public money. But Arlington basically doesn't any public transit. The willingness of places to throw money at things like this which at best have a miniscule capacity...
AT&T Stadium holds 100,000 people.
Friday, October 19, 2018
Political
So much of the way the press covers things is impacted by which issues are seen as political, where there are two sides in the political debate. Sometimes I see people being proud of their own or another reporter's work that does something like get a wrongly convicted person freed from prison. We all agree it's bad that people go to prison for crimes they didn't commit, right? So it's good when they're freed! Good job, journalism!
But what about when one major political party decides well, no, locking up people (some people, anyway) who didn't commit crimes is actually good, that it provides a good deterrent effect that outweighs the injustice, and these dogooder "journalists" who are getting innocent people released are causing a lot of problems in society. At the very least the reporting didn't *prove* innocence, and undermining the actions of those fine members of the jury and of our wonderful boys in blue is actually a very bad thing to do. Mistakes are made, and that's a necessary part of the sanctity of our justice system (conservative judges basically make this argument sometimes).
Maybe those journalists would still do those stories, but they'd stop short of feeling like they could congratulate themselves for what the story led to... the release of an innocent person. It might still be news, but "objectivity" would require not having an opinion about the highly controversial consequence of that news.
So I chuckle a little bit whenever I see journalists patting themselves on the back for some "supposed" injustice that their reporting helped to correct. Because next week the rules might change, and then will need to hear both sides of the "are Nazis good?" question, and properly ethical journalists won't have an opinion on that.
But what about when one major political party decides well, no, locking up people (some people, anyway) who didn't commit crimes is actually good, that it provides a good deterrent effect that outweighs the injustice, and these dogooder "journalists" who are getting innocent people released are causing a lot of problems in society. At the very least the reporting didn't *prove* innocence, and undermining the actions of those fine members of the jury and of our wonderful boys in blue is actually a very bad thing to do. Mistakes are made, and that's a necessary part of the sanctity of our justice system (conservative judges basically make this argument sometimes).
Maybe those journalists would still do those stories, but they'd stop short of feeling like they could congratulate themselves for what the story led to... the release of an innocent person. It might still be news, but "objectivity" would require not having an opinion about the highly controversial consequence of that news.
So I chuckle a little bit whenever I see journalists patting themselves on the back for some "supposed" injustice that their reporting helped to correct. Because next week the rules might change, and then will need to hear both sides of the "are Nazis good?" question, and properly ethical journalists won't have an opinion on that.
Cruz
Houston Chronicle:
I'm puzzled how people like Ted Cruz, including specifically Ted Cruz, manage to become a senator. By accounts nobody likes him. He is not charismatic. I get that any asshole with a bit of luck can fall backwards into a House seat, but Texas senator is a pretty big prize. You don't just have to convince a bunch of other assholes to vote for you in the general. That's easy! You have to beat out all of the other people trying to be a Republican senator from Texas. The primary's the thing. How did he get all the way there? I'm sure this could all be explained to me. But I don't care so much about Ted Cruz specifically, just how so many horrible people somehow manage to become US senators. Not just horrible to me, but seemingly just... horrible.
Ted Cruz — a candidate the Chronicle endorsed in 2012, by the way — is the junior senator from Texas in name only. Exhibiting little interest in addressing the needs of his fellow Texans during his six years in office, he has kept his eyes on a higher prize. He's been running for president since he took the oath of office — more likely since he picked up his class schedule as a 15-year-old ninth-grader at Houston's Second Baptist High School more than three decades ago. For Cruz, public office is a private quest; the needs of his constituents are secondary.
It was the rookie Cruz, riding high after a double-digit win in 2012, who brazenly took the lead in a 2013 federal government shutdown, an exercise in self-aggrandizement that he hoped would lead to the repeal of the Affordable Care Act. Cruz, instead, undercut the economy, cost taxpayers an estimated $2 billion (and inflicted his reading of Dr. Seuss's "Green Eggs and Ham" on an unamused nation). Maybe the senator succeeded in cementing in his obstructionist tea party bona fides, but we don't recall Texans clamoring for such an ill-considered, self-serving stunt.
I'm puzzled how people like Ted Cruz, including specifically Ted Cruz, manage to become a senator. By accounts nobody likes him. He is not charismatic. I get that any asshole with a bit of luck can fall backwards into a House seat, but Texas senator is a pretty big prize. You don't just have to convince a bunch of other assholes to vote for you in the general. That's easy! You have to beat out all of the other people trying to be a Republican senator from Texas. The primary's the thing. How did he get all the way there? I'm sure this could all be explained to me. But I don't care so much about Ted Cruz specifically, just how so many horrible people somehow manage to become US senators. Not just horrible to me, but seemingly just... horrible.
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