Keep Calm and. . .

No, really, just keep calm. . . please.

"The worst thing about America is GUNS!"  I'm told, and if I disagree, I've been brainwashed by an organization I don't belong to or listen to and have contempt for.  Why? because zealots argue by the numbers the way a salesman is trained: with lists of objections and standard responses but without the yelling and insulting that make it hard to sell insurance or swamp land. When it comes to guns, food, cars, economics, taxation, immigration, religion and a few other subjects dear to the brainwashing trade, it's mostly about avoiding the facts to avoid refutation. "Don't ask questions, just look at the bogeyman!"

 One preempts the calm, rational approach by attacking first. Nebulous and ill -- defined attacks are best for this purpose.  Sure, guns frighten the hell out of some people and everyone has the right to their fears, but other things may be more dangerous. That's why when I suggest banning the most dangerous feature of any gun, I get "no, only assault weapons, read the script or shut up,"  If you want to see a working definition of "conniption" just keep calm and stick to the facts.

Sign here to send a petition to "Help stop the use of bee-toxic pesticides!"  Could we keep a bit more calm because there's no particular evidence that pesticides are causing or contributing to this apparently widespread phenomenon of  hive collapse syndrome, and even if the EPA has the power to ban or eliminate such things if they do exist, it doesn't mean there's any scientific consensus on the etiology of this disease which may not actually be new and appears on more than one continent. There's plenty of activist consensus, but as with the fanatical but unsupportable assertions about Autism spectrum syndrome and vaccines,  it's based on rumor and conjecture and hysteria, just as the previous notion that it was all about cell phones because after all, Post Hoc means Propter Hoc. Certain people prone to see real and imaginary ills to be the product of evil corporations (aren't they all evil?) won't question it though, and if you don't, well you're brainwashed. Science?  Just keep banning until the problem goes away.

"I don't need any facts, I just know" said one Solon after I asked him whether a proposed measure had a record of previous successes.  I'm afraid that response is too commonplace when certain, activist-dominated subjects are involved. But what do I know?  I've been brainwashed by the facts and made a fool of by calm reflection. The 'solution' has been an abject failure more than once, but he just knows it will work which is a form of the argument from ignorance.  After all it's a gun control proposal and so it will, ipso facto,  control guns, just as all those "Crime Bills" we were urged to support in the 70's and 80's that made things worse. Or those bills to "untie the hands" of the police that also made things so much worse and the Drug bills that filled our jails with harmless and ordinary people, destroying the lives and families we were supposed to be protecting.  As old Daniel Webster said:

 "the strong conviction that something must be done is the parent of many a bad measure." 

The end may justify the means sometimes, but the urgency and fear don't justify all proposals. None the less, if your plan fails, you can always blame it on the appropriate bogeyman to escape the inevitable "told you so."

I'm looking at a list of statistical rankings of fatality risks in our country.  It's in response to the "worst thing" assertion.  Of course as with all such things you have to define terms and I'm taking the liberty of defining worst as the most dangerous, the most likely to kill you, and of course Heart disease, stroke and cancer are by far the leading causes of death. Odds are it's curtains for you and me sooner or later, I'm afraid.  It's full of many  interesting observations including that bicycles are enormously more dangerous than motorcycles in terms of how many people are killed on them.


 Assault by firearm?  It's number ten at 1 in 300 and that's terrible at first glance or at second glance, but then as with motorcycle accidents at 1 in 802  and death by drowning and immersion at 1 in 1073, those are averages for the entire population and if you don't go near the water and don't ride a motorcycle these risks don't apply, just as if you don't live in certain neighborhoods and don't get involved in gangs or drugs, your odds of firearm assault may vary - enormously.

Cause for some thought here about apparent risk and actual risk?  Nah. We just know we're right and reflection is weakness and if the group advocates something but I advocate something stronger, I must be a dupe, a stooge of the standard bogeyman. Pick one from the menu.

The overall likelihood of a fatal drug overdose is almost on a par with fatal shooting, but of course neither you nor I is likely to do them, (although I can't be too sure about you) Averages can be hugely misleading and they certainly are when used to frighten people into grasping at straws or laws.  So if I say that chances are something other than guns is gonna gitcha even if you do watch out, it's not because there's no danger from firearms and killers, but it's not the worst and I can prove it. There may be something worse in other senses than guns - say like injustice or the lack of access to medical care or higher education voting rights or legal council or even safe water, for our suburban Detroit friends.

But there is no anti-motorcycle advocacy group. The Motorcycle Haters are far less organized than the Monsanto Haters and of course since hardly anyone is an organic chemist or geneticist, has a degree in biology or agriculture, it's a perfect windmill for the bee saving Quixotes of America to tilt at. Bike haters?  They're around but not nearly so outspoken.  I think they're afraid of us.

As with all things relative to our fear and anger industry, the Worst Thing, as Orwell told us in 1984 is very personal. The worst thing may just be your own fear. It may be something you haven't thought about while being terrified of something else because what you fear is mostly about partisanship and manipulation. It's about preventing calm and objectivity.  It's all about what group has washed your cerebral cortex. It's less about the principles than about the principals. 

Orlando Post Mortem: Merchants of Hate in a Moment of Crisis

(With minor changes and revisions, the following post will be syndicated

later this week in the USA Today family of newspapers.

An acknowledgement to Shaw for links to

rightwing evangelical hate screeds)

First reports: Shots fired in an Orlando nightclub. Three hours later, a swat team storms the building. By morning, we learn the scope of the carnage: 49 dead, 53 wounded, and 26 in critical condition. During the siege, the shooter dials 911 and claims allegiance to ISIS. Fragmentary soundbites trigger waves of suspicion and fear.

“This is not the Islam I know,” my Muslim friends and neighbors assure me. An editorial in TcPalm reads: “This is not who we are.”

Our local Islamic community responds. “It violates the teachings of Islam,” says Dr. Taher Husainy, a prominent neurologist and Muslim spokesman in my community. This is not the Islam he knows.

Victor Ghalib Begg, a guest columnist of this newspaper, quotes the Quran: “Whoever kills a person, it is as though he has killed all humankind.” This is not the Islam he knows.

In Dallastown, Pennsylvania, Rev. Christopher Rodkey of St. Paul's United Church of Christ posts a sign: ”Wishing a blessed Ramadan to our Muslim neighbors.” A crank caller slams Islam. Rodkey traces the call to a Republican National Convention delegate pledged to Donald Trump.

Within days, new details emerge. Daniel Gilroy, a former Florida police officer who knew the shooter, describes him as unstable and unhinged.  According to Gilroy, the shooter abhors gays, blacks, Jews, and women — slurs often riddled with threats of violence.

Sitora Yusufiy, the shooter’s first wife, recalls an abusive former husband. He beat her, confiscated her paychecks, and kept her confined as a virtual prisoner. She flees the marriage after four months.

In 2013 and 2014, the FBI investigates the shooter for possible ties to Muslim terrorist groups. Insufficient evidence; case closed.

On Monday, we learn the shooter lived a double life. He frequents a gay nightclub on a regular basis. Patrons recall an exchange of text messages on a gay networking site.

“Why, if he is gay, would he do this?" asks the father of the shooter. Perhaps this term applies: Reaction formation. It is the public mask of a disturbed person disguising an inner torment. It explains why a closet homosexual may present himself as an angry homophobe. New details change our portrait of the gunman.

But not according to Donald Trump who wants us to be very afraid. “I said this was going to happen,” he boasts with chest-thumping bravado. Muslims murder gays, and the president is a terrorist sympathizer. His cheap shots misfire. The shooter is not an immigrant but a native-born New Yorker.

Pious words segue to customary pander. We hear sleazy soundbites of derogation and scorn from Twitter to television. The latest Frankenstein turns audiences into angry villagers brandishing pitchforks.

On FaceBook one day later, Assistant State Attorney Kenneth Lewis describes the City of Orlando as “a melting pot of third world miscreants and ghetto thugs.” He is immediately suspended.

We hear reckless rhetoric from the pulpit. Evangelist James Dobson claims transgender people who use public restrooms should be shot.

After hosting Ted Cruz, Mike Huckabee, and Bobby Jindal at a religious liberties conference last year, Pastor Kevin Swanson called for gays to be sentenced to death if they refuse to repent.

Senior Pastor Robert Gallaty says: “Go to Leviticus 20:13. God gives us the punishment for engaging in these sins … They must be put to death.”

“This is not the Christianity I know,” says a pastor in my circle of friends. This is not the America I know, nor the country I want for my children, grandchildren and future generations. 

For a nation that prides itself as the melting pot of the world, hate speech turns us into hypocrites. We demonize and dehumanize our differences. We scapegoat and persecute the innocent along with the guilty.

We fail to condemn the bully pulpits of animus and injustice among us. Where is our moral compass? It is time to restore the values of honesty and decency in our public life and hold everyone accountable. Enough is enough!

And the home of the Brave

I'm sure the mourning and weeping and candle lighting will go on for a while and I'm sure the finger pointing, panic mongering and political accusations of guilt will continue apace.

I have to look at how France has reacted after their own, much larger attacks in recent years.  It's been very different I think. From over here, it looks like expressions of solidarity and refusal to be afraid typify the nation we like to joke about and accuse of cowardice.  Paris has just lit up the Eiffel Tower as a token of solidarity with the usually supercilious and superior USA.  Thank you and Vive La France.

We on the other hand have been spending our time both trying to stress that Orlando was a Jihadi attack and furiously denying it. Look not to the murderer's hand, say some. It's all about the guns. It's all because Obama won't say Islamic terrorism, say others. It's only because he used an "assault rifle" said one guy before I blocked him on Facebook. He would not admit that the Glock 17 pistol he carried actually was "military grade" but the rifle wasn't. Handguns are irrelevant apparently, if you're rabid about "assault rifles" but don't really know what that means. Many think they are legal machine guns, others thing the same bullet is more deadly because the rifle has a pistol grip, but neither panic nor politics make for truth or support logic. The first thing I saw this morning was an admonishment that we don't have a constitutional right to shoot 100 people at once.  Thanks for reminding me that murder is illegal but I'd like to see a gun that can do that. We don't have a constitutional right to blow up buildings or set fires in nightclubs either. Meaningless non-sequitur designed to argue for the gun control policy that failed so miserably in this case. Be afraid! We're all in danger!

Where is the "let's stand together" rhetoric? No, it's more like "you can't go out any more" cowardice being hyped up by anti-gun panic brokers and when coupled with "they're going to take away our guns" panic on the other side, we're as funny as a Punch and Judy show to people that wish us harm and destruction.  We're simply not the home of the brave we once were and apparently Europeans still are. From a gun-free America to driverless safety cars to the idea of a locked down walled country I feel surrounded by mewling, trembling, pants-pissing cowards.  None of this bodes well for us remaining as the home of the free either.

ACT NOW

I've got to admit it's getting better (Better)

A little better all the time (It can't get more worse)

-the Beatles-

Panic is big business. Hysteria is a moneymaker and the road to riches for those who can inflame and outrage the public.  So of course the persuaders of every persuasion are here to make you think everything is going to hell. Immigrants are going to ruin us, the debt is out of control, all our jobs are going to Mexico and most of all we're all going to be killed. After all you can't go to nightclubs or movie theaters and it's open season on Black children. Gluten will kill you and disease resistant crops will turn you into a wheat stalk and preservatives and processed food?  Oh my God!  This is the worst ever, we're all going to die and all trends point in the direction of Hell. 

All these arguments seem to be the worst when they're not really true or are oversimplified to the point of distortion. The overall trend in violent crime has been down for decades, employment is at record highs and so many things have improved over the last 8 years you'd think someone would notice the dire prognostications of Obama's failure didn't happen, but it's not to the benefit of power that we notice.  Every downward blip is a trend, and an indicator of impending calamity. So obviously we need to stay inside and buy guns before the Obaminator - oh excuse me - Dishonest Hillary takes them away.  We also need to make them disappear with the magic wand of badly written legislation. After all last time we banned "assault weapons" sales went up and numbers increased in a big way.  Lets do it just as badly again.

And by all means let's stay angry. Lets believe these are the last days as they have been for thousands of years now.  Nothing is random, nothing is cyclical, everything is a trend and a downward one. 

The best way to show a trend in a set of data, is to take a small sample. A large sample of mass shootings in the US looks quite a bit more than a series of irregular occurrences with quiescent  periods in between. The previous "worst mass shooting" was in 1927 when the population was a third of today's and falls behind the latest by about 4 deaths. Perhaps toning down the "if this trend continues" rhetoric just a bit might allow some breathing room, but again, that doesn't serve the interests on any side who like the used car salesman, wants you to ACT NOW! 

Act now before we discuss how we go about reducing these things.  Is it one problem of several? How much can we expect from gun regulations, how much increased surveillance and enforcement will we accept.  Do we deprive people of constitutional rights if they are under suspicion?  Do we accept racial profiling? We've already set aside the 4th amendment and perhaps illegally. Do we set aside the 2nd without due process because we are afraid?  this is more than a rampage shooting, more than an act of terrorism, this is an existential crisis for Democracy in America and certainly we need to handle it by pumping up the volume, hyping up the sloppy rhetoric, fuzzying up the logic and making it personal. The craziness, the evil - it's all on their side, but don't question our assertions, our shibboleths or our logic.  Now all together POINT THOSE FINGERS.

Message to Hillary

Dear Mrs. Clinton,

Yes, I plan to vote for you, but to an extent it's a default vote and I disagree with certain of your declarations of intent. One of those is illustrated by your declaration that modern rifles like the AR-15 are weapons of war and unfit for civilian use. The facts are otherwise even if some terrorist uses one. May I point out that Ammonium Nitrate and the Boing 737 have been used to murder  far more people than the two weapons used yesterday in Orlando.

Of those two firearms, one actually was a weapon of war, in the sense that it's identical to the Military M9 pistol, the other one is not military and thus not an assault rifle. It is not used by any military in the world, it just looks like it.  Let me illustrate:

This is the M1 Garand. It's an actual semi-automatic military assault rifle, (no longer used) It holds 8 rounds.

This is the AR-15. It's semi-Automatic but not military and not used by any military for assaults or wall decoration for that matter. Like the military M16, It holds 20 rounds minimum but up to 100 with a drum magazine.

The first uses a massively powerful .30 caliber cartridge cartridge, the second does not, but rather the diminutive .223. Past "assault weapons" bans as we've known them have banned the second and allowed the first.  I suggest that if you do find the ability to ban weapons for any legitimate purpose other than to placate the phobics,  you notice the essential difference between these two weapons is the high capacity magazine on the modern rifle and consider an honest definition of "assault rifle."  It would be very difficult to accomplish, but finally more productive to ban or restrict the sales and ownership of such high capacity magazines on all firearms.

Very truly yours and ever at your service,

Glenn R. Geist

ORLANDO MASSACRE - 2016

I am not persuaded by motivated reasoning. I read the same news and hear the same media reports, yet form my own conclusions. Historically low crime statistics are irrelevant when specific crimes and accidental deaths are preventable.

In 2016, over 100 children killed themselves or other family members after finding unsecured weapons. The NRA has fought legislation mandating safety locks and secure gun storage.

The shooter worked as a security guard with a carry permit and access to guns. We also learned of domestic abuse; his former wife reported regular beatings. The NRA has fought legislation that would confiscate weapons owned by domestic abusers. Shall we ignore this point?

The shooter armed himself with an AR-15 assault rifle — the same weapon used in the Sandy Hook and San Bernardino shootings. A law banning sales of this weapon expired years ago. Yet Congressional Republicans blocked reinstatement of this law. Does cognitive bias blind us?

Furthermore, the NRA lobbied Congressional Republicans to defund research by the CDC on causes of gun deaths in America.

Finally, here is one more point buried beneath the media noise: CNN reported an arrest in West Hollywood, California, during a gay parade. Police found an arsenal of weapons including an assault rifle and pipe bombs.

Anti-gay messaging and anti-Muslim rhetoric conspire to up the ante on hate speech. Dead bodies and grieving families are not numbers. They deserve more than deceptive, self-serving soundbites and decades of legislative obstruction.

Blood on their Hands

Nothing stops a bad guy with a gun.  Not more guns.  Nor the NRA.  Not their stooges in Congress holding us in thrall.  Nor public outrage over dead kids, dead neighbors, dead friends.  Certainly not voters who have demanded common sense gun legislation for years.

Congressional Republicans, Senate Majority leader McConnell, House Speaker Ryan, 'open carry' hooligans and thugs, Christian fundamentalist gay bashers, and the North Chinalina legislature … all have blood on their hands.  

Up yours, America!  Land of the free, home of the knave.

Tick, Tock, Schlock and Shock

He says. She says. The sky is falling. The sky is blue. Point, counterpoint. In any discussion thread, there are no doubt strong differences of opinion. Filled with competing claims, stock narratives, and old shibboleths. Since the beginning of this election cycle, I have often wondered about what motivates people, not necessarily the motivations of candidates (who often appear as two-dimensional caricatures), but the motivations of supporters, cultists and voters. 

At one extreme is a candidate with an obvious character disorder, a man who claims he will make America GRR8 with appeals to bigotry and H8. For months, we have witnessed his grandiosity, his fixation on power, his need for constant admiration, his ruthless and often malicious disregard for others, and his tendency to defame, devalue, derogate, insult, and blame. Yet, he has fervent followers who ignore these flaws (and not all followers are "idiots" or “stupid").

Here is a snapshot of politics in America today:

Deception. Defamation. Pander. Slander. Smears and jeers. Sophistry and hyperbole. Our media is a supermarket of mendacities and sleaze.

Let me offer this conjecture based on “motivated reasoning” and “cognitive bias.” Motivated reasoning explains how people cling to false beliefs despite overwhelming evidence that contradicts those beliefs.

Cognitive bias explains why people deny or turn tone-deaf to new evidence that might change their thinking. And why they filter information that might invalidate their attitudes and core beliefs. Partisanship and politics are not necessarily about seeking evidence or truth, or distinguishing between right or wrong, but about defending our sense of personhood.

Without taking sides, here are questions we should ask ourselves: Are we willing to look in a mirror and confront our own biases? Are we willing to sift through the media noise and separate fact from fiction? 

Here is the irony. At the end of this election, it is not the candidates whom we will hold accountable. Rather, we should hold ourselves accountable for the choices we make.

Pocahontas

Well there he goes again.  Donald Trump keeps calling Elizabeth Warren Pocahontas.  It's not that the daughter of a Powhatan chief, closely associated with Illegal English immigrants to our shores is someone to be ashamed of and neither is Elizabeth Warren who when compared to most of us and to Donald in particular, seems spectacular.  But Donald thinks it's funny and Donald doesn't care that he looks like a bigoted oaf and blowhard and ignoramus.  In fact he gloats at how that earns him the loyalty of what we used to call "the ugly American."

I would hate to have Ms. Clinton lower herself by responding in kind, but I don't see why I can't.  I would suggest calling him Shitting Bull, but on reflection will refrain out of respect for that great Lakota leader. So on second thought perhaps it's better to let him go on, digging his own grave, deeper and deeper. We can shovel in the dirt later.

Viva Las Sandanistas!

Bernie Sanders has boasted

“If, on November 8th of this year, Hillary Clinton is elected President, we will have only begun to fight,”  

Writes Andy Borowitz in the New Yorker.  I have to wonder who he is going to fight with or for and about what. Is he going the way of  many Republicans when Bill Clinton was elected and declare that she's not the "real" president, or not "his" president? Does he envision a sort of schism with two oval offices, or perhaps this is just a metaphorical statement. Might he take his guerrilla forces into the Vermont woods?  Maybe it's just the kind of willful delusion I'm seeing as standard fare among his supporters. Magic thinking seems to be all the thinking that's going on.

Of course there's the possibility that Clinton will get into some legal trouble that would cause her to drop out, allowing Bernie somehow to find himself as the dowager candidate, but that may be more of a delusion than the hope I'll win the Irish Sweepstakes without having a ticket. Some of his supporters are accusing her of espionage and treason in a manner that puts Republican liars to shame - (or would if Republicans could feel shame.) I can't dismiss the idea that he really believes he can still become president without an election by somehow staging a Putsch at the convention.

Is this obstinacy a sort of Sanderista Leitmotif which plays in Wagnerian fashion behind his recent career?  Is it the same kind of thinking that lets him boast about how he's going to re-organize world banking and finance and fiscal and monetary and trade policy by fiat and to declare that henceforth college tuition will be free and never mind what congress or the courts or the colleges say.

It's either deceit or delusion but we've already had one president who thought he was Alexander the Great and we can't afford another. The voters didn't just reject Senator Sanders, they dodged a bullet.