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Police shootings and guns everywhere

Why do police seem to shoot so many more people in America than in other countries?

Might I suggest it’s because of guns?

Let’s face it — being a cop isn’t an easy job, and you never know if some lunatic is going to take a pot shot at you. It’s not like that hasn’t happened before. Even the most enlightened, best trained officer worries about that.

But maybe what makes America different from other countries is that lots of people have guns. We have politicians who, instead of trying to keep guns out of the hands of criminals, the insane and terrorists, make it easier for them to get these guns.

So when an officer makes a stop, they never know if the person theythcajdgcpz pull over is carrying. The officer has to be on his or her guard. Sometime they’re just not trained in how to handle these things. And sometimes, of course, the cops really are the bad guys.

This, of course, does not in the slightest explain why the victims of these police shootings are overwhelmingly not white people. Many of these shootings can easily be attributed to a combination of blatant racism and poorly trained officers.

But I can’t help but wonder if our gun culture also has a lot to do with it. I mean, it’s not like there aren’t police stops and crime in other civilized countries. What they don’t have are guns everywhere — and maybe that explains the difference.

 

 

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Please explain to me Hillary’s “crime”

I am serious here. I am willing to examine evidence and will certainly base an opinion on that evidence. What is this terrible crime that Hillary committed (this time)?

At first it was Whitewater (where she and Bill lost a lot of money in an investment). No one could exactly explain to me what the terrible crime was there. Then there was Vince Foster’s suicide (who was a friend of the Clintons). Once more, no one could tell me exactly why Hillary was to blame for that. Then there were the millions spent investigating Benghazi (which, while tragic, seems to have been caused by the GOP’s cutting of the embassy’s security budget). hillary-clintons-little-email-fussI begged over and over for someone to tell me what the crime was there as well, and after many investigations, even the Republicans in Congress had to admit there was nothing.

Now there’s the email “scandal.”

Seriously, explain it to me. I’m a lawyer; I can understand big words.

And if you can, please explain why these emails, which were not distributed, stolen, or leaked, make a scandal while the 22 million emails deleted by the Bush administration while on a Republican server is not.

Apparently, from what I have read, Hillary had a private server for her emails, in the same way the previous (Republican) Secretaries of State did, and actually did better than they did, because hers were all on a personal server she controlled to prevent leaks. The policy changed after she left the position and apparently the GOP wants to hold her to the new standards that didn’t apply to her, hoping to entrap her in a loophole.  The Republican head of the FBI did an investigation and concluded that there was no crime here.

Again.

So please, seriously, those of you Hillary haters out there (because it always seems to come from people who didn’t like her anyway and never from anyone neutral): Explain it to me.

Remember that I supported Bernie in the primaries. I didn’t want Hillary as my candidate — I don’t like political dynasties (whether Bushes or Clintons), I don’t really trust what she says, and with the exception of women’s issues (on which she is great) I don’t think she really stands for anything given how she changes her position based on the polls.  I’m no “Hillary lover” so don’t call me that.

I am a facts lover. I like truth. Sometimes that means the politicians I support do bad things and I admit it, and sometimes that means the politicians I don’t like do good things and I admit it.

So. Give me some facts. Tell me why I am wrong.

 

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Electoral college predictions and voodoo

Predicting who will win the election based on the Electoral College is a bit like predicting who will win the Super Bowl six months prior — there is a bit of guesswork involved because things could change dramatically by the final day, but, at the same time, there are statistics you can use to make your prediction as accurate as possible. Depending on the source, a prediction may be as scientifically perfect as possible or it may be complete voodoo.

I hate the Electoral College, but we’re stuck with it. That’s how we pick Presidents. Suck it up and deal. Let’s move on.

In previous years, I enjoyed using Electoral-Vote.com that takes the map and updates it daily based on the most recent polls. The problem with that approach is that it treats each poll separately, and sometimes they may vary wildly.

More accurate this year is Nate Silver’s 538 map. This website is run by a bunch of math nerds. They don’t just take the most recent poll; they take them all and average them together based on a number of factors including the previous accuracy of that particular pollster, whether it was a poll of all voters or likely voters, how old the poll is, and a bunch of other things I don’t completely understand because math.

According to Silver, Hillary has around an 80% chance of winning the election, which isn’t completely surprising. The problem is that this election has already broken all the rules. Silver had also predicted in the past (like every other “expert”*) that Trump would never be the nominee.


This map is from 270toWin.com and matches Nate Silver’s current prediction

Seriously, Trump’s campaign is a classic example of what not do to in a campaign. The whole thing has gone against everything I ever learned as a Political Science major, a campaign manager, a lobbyist, and a campaign worker. It goes against everything I ever taught when I was a Political Science professor. He’s done everything wrong.

Of course, that could also be why he’s only given a 20% chance of winning.

But hey, the conventions haven’t even happened yet. For all we know, the GOP will find a way to nominate someone else and then we’re back to square one. Hillary, after all, is popular only in relation to Trump. If they nominate someone else, that 80% chance of winning would drop quickly.

*including me

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Editorial cartoon: Undue Burdens

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Nick Anderson

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Editorial cartoon: Publicity stunt

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Steve Sack

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Editorial cartoon: Sit in

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Darrin Bell

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Editorial cartoon: Profits

gun sales

Pat Bagley

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Just a reminder…

Posting memes and comments on Facebook to your friends is not how you achieve change.

You have to actually get up and do something.

Write, call, and email your representatives. Contribute to groups that support your view so they can lobby for you. Join a political party and go to their meetings to see how to help. Work on a campaign.

And most importantly: Vote.

Having good intentions, praying for survivors, and hoping for things to change does nothing to achieve that change.

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We choose the lesser of two evils every day

Life is full of tough choices.  Deal with it.

As I encourage my fellow Democrats to support Hillary over Trump, I constantly get people who point out Hillary’s faults (which I acknowledge many of) and profoundly say, like they’re reading a fortune cookie, “The lesser of two evils is still evil.”*donald-trump-h-1024

Most insulting is when the Bernie Bots say these things to me as if I am just too stupid to understand. Yeah, the old “wake up, sheeple” really helps to convince me. The decades I have spent getting my Political Science and law degrees, working as a lobbyist, college professor, campaign manager and lawyer, getting elected as a Judge of Elections, writing about politics, and being an officer in the Democratic party means nothing — the teenager who will be voting for the first time understands the system way more than me.

This is not to say you can’t have a different opinion about things, but please don’t lecture me about how politics works when you believe the superdelegate process is “illegal.”

Look, I supported Bernie too, as anyone who has read this blog knows. But he lost. Now we have a choice between someone who isn’t perfect and someone who is the most unqualified and dangerous person to ever win a major party nomination.

Two evils? Perhaps. Two equal evils? Not even close.

We have to make tough choices every day in life. We don’t always get what we want. Part of being mature is recognizing this. You don’t give up striving for a the best, but you also don’t refuse to take second best when that’s your best option.

I only wish someone had said that to me when I was young, because I was a lot like these Bernie supporters at that age.

*in bed

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You have to play the game to win

Hillary won the nomination, as was always expected. I wanted Bernie but hey, Obama was the only time the candidate I supported in the primaries actually got the nomination. I’m used to not always getting my first choice. hillary2

Some Bernie supporters are not taking this well. Some of their complaints are indeed legitimate — there were some irregularities in voting in some of the contests that are suspicious — but those things still wouldn’t have changed the ultimate result. After all, Hillary did get more delegates and more votes.

And that’s not counting the superdelegates. Some Bernie supporters spent the entire campaign complaining about them, saying that they were thwarting the “will of the people.” These same people are now saying that the superdelegates should ignore the “will of the people” and cast their votes for Bernie instead. Come now, how can you commend Bernie for having a consistent set of policies that don’t change based on poll numbers while arguing this?

Politics is a game, and it helps to know the rules of the game. Hillary plays the game well, and she has been preparing for this day for a dozen years or more. Those superdelegates were there the whole time, and Bernie could have been playing that same game to get them on his side all those years, but he didn’t. You can’t complain about the rules of the game if you don’t play.

And let’s face it, is this a bad thing? Isn’t that what politics is about — getting people on your side, making deals, compromising to get what you want? Isn’t that a skill we want our President to have?

I congratulate Bernie on his successful campaign. He originally announced that he was running to raise the issues he felt important, and he did. People are really talking about income equality now. He also accomplished two other goals: He showed that it is possible to run for President and raise money without having to appeal to the standard Big Money interests; and he showed that you can move to the left and even call yourself a socialist and still get significant support. Those are huge things that no political scientist would have predicted a year ago (including me, here on this blog).

The important thing now is to defeat Trump. If I were a betting man, I’d place my bets on Hillary winning this for a lot of reasons, but it’s certainly not a sure thing. Those Trump supporters are rabid and fanatic, and they will vote.  We Democrats have the problem of sitting at home on election day despite the fact that there are more of us than them, and despite the fact that polls show our views are the majority ones.

And when you don’t play the game, you lose.