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Author Archive for JOHN ADAMS

Daily Bread

Daily Bread for 8.28.20

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Good morning.

Friday in Whitewater will be cloudy with a high of eighty-five.  Sunrise is 6:16 AM and sunset 7:34 PM, for 13h 17m 43s of daytime.  The moon is a waxing gibbous with 78.1% of its visible disk illuminated.

 

 On this day in 1963, Martin Luther King, Jr. gives his I Have a Dream speech.

Recommended for reading in full — 

Elie Mystal writes We Need to Talk About the GOP’s ‘Black Friends’:

You can tell that the Republicans are engaging in tokenism at their convention if you listen to the content of the speeches given by Black speakers instead of being preoccupied (as I suspect many Republicans are) with the fact that they are talking while Black. Close your eyes, and you will hear their silence on issues of racial and social justice. The Black speakers, like the rest of the Republican Party, offer no agenda to extend economic or social opportunities to people of color. They offer no policy prescriptions to address police brutality or violence against Black people. They offer no rebuttals to the assaults on voting rights or immigrant rights the Trump administration engages in. And they’ve been as silent about the disproportionate toll Covid-19 has taken on communities of color as Herman Cain.

The Black people who were allowed to speak at this convention were there to transmit one message to white listeners: “It’s OK.” Trump’s racism is OK, because here’s one of Trump’s Black golfing buddies. Cops and vigilantes’ shooting black people is OK, because here’s a Black ex-con who complied with the police and is still alive. Caring only about your own pocketbook and 401(k) is OK, because here’s a Black guy who started his own business and made a lot of money. All of them wanted to talk about their individual experiences with Trump. None of them wanted to talk about systemic issues facing Black people who don’t have the benefit of knowing a Trump (or a Kardashian) personally.

Jane Lytvynenko reports RNC Video Showing Rioters In “Biden’s America” Is Actually Spain:

On the first night of the Republican National Convention, the party aired a segment featuring Catalina and Madeline Lauf warning of dire consequences if Democratic candidate Joe Biden is elected president.

“This is a taste of Biden’s America,” one sister says in a voiceover as images of protests play onscreen. “The rioting, the crime. Freedom is at stake now and this is going to be the most important election of our lifetime.”

The problem is that one of the images in the segment doesn’t show the US at all — it shows Spain.

As first reported by Catalonian public broadcaster CCMA and independently verified by BuzzFeed News, one of the four images of protests was filmed in October 2019 in Barcelona. Protests broke out in the city after Spanish courts sentenced Catalan separatist activists to prison. The image used during the RNC video showed fires burning in the streets. One of those same streets can be seen as being in Barcelona by using Google Street View.

Sarah Shevenock reports With Schools Closed, PBS Doubles Down on Offering Digital Content:

While subscription streaming services have proven beneficial for legacy media companies during the COVID-19 pandemic, PBS has sought to emphasize its free educational material by expanding its digital offerings.

Jonathan Barzilay, PBS’ chief operating officer, said the company worked quickly to pivot to meet the educational needs of children, both over the air and online, after schools across the country were shut down in March.

March of the microscopic robots:

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America, Authoritarianism, Books, City, Liberty, Trump, Trumpism, Tyranny

Snyder’s On Tyranny

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Prof. Timothy Snyder’s On Tyranny: ‘Lesssons from the Twentieth Century’ (2017) recently came my way. By design, it’s a brief presentation of twenty lessons that Snyder has discerned after a long career as a historian, with significant study and research on twentieth-century European history.

It’s a small, inviting pamphlet addressing a big, unwelcome subject.

We’ve reached the point, and probably reached it some time ago, when many on Snyder’s list of tyranny’s characteristics apply, at least in a rudimentary way, to this federal administration and its reach into American life.

The strongest evidence of this is the Republican convention: the party no longer advances a liberal democratic ideal. It rejects the existing constitutional order in favor of a herrenvolk state under an autocrat’s whims. This is a fascist party under Trump.

Preservation of a free and just civil society demands that Trump be defeated; candor about our present condition compels one to acknowledge that he has built a major American party into a fascist one.

Trump’s dark inspiration and accomplishment is doing what the Bund was never able to do.

Some years ago, when I began to mark the days since Trump’s election, someone wrote to ask why I was so focused on him. Why, of all places, would I do so in Whitewater, Wisconsin? Were there not other issues? And after all, were the city and nearby places not chock-a-block with red-hatted followers of Trump? Why risk alienating those people?

Trump deserves attention in the way that a rabid creature deserves attention, Trumpism deserves attention in the way that a suppurating wound deserves attention. Trump and Trumpism are destructive of liberty, justice, and morality.

Whitewater is not a place part from America, however much some might pretend so.

As it turns out, however, this website has done better each year over the year before, and one might hope that says something about the value of holding fast to reason and tradition, on local or national topics.

And yet, and yet — the price of alienating some would, in any event, be imperceptible as against defending sound principles that should be, as our forefathers believed, self-evident.

There’s nothing extraordinary about seeing as much, or doing as much. It’s the least that one should see and do, and so brings no credit.

What’s extraordinary is the size and power of the threat the American constitutional order now faces.

It’s hard to tell precisely what hour this is, but Snyder’s pamphlet suggests the hour is now into the evening.

Daily Bread

Daily Bread for 8.27.20

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Good morning.

Thursday in Whitewater will be partly sunny with a high of eighty-nine.  Sunrise is 6:15 AM and sunset 7:36 PM, for 13h 20m 29s of daytime.  The moon is a waxing gibbous with 68.9% of its visible disk illuminated.

 

Whitewater’s Community Development Authority meets via audiovisual conferencing at 5:30 PM.

 On this day in 1832, Black Hawk surrenders to U.S. authorities, ending the Black Hawk War.

Recommended for reading in full — 

 Jonathan Chait writes Reports: Trump Sabotaged Coronavirus Testing to Keep Numbers Low:

Public-health officials believe that widespread testing is a key element of any response to the coronavirus. President Trump does not believe this. And now the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention has officially adopted Trump’s view. It has modified its official guidelines, and no longer recommends that those who have been exposed to the virus but currently lack symptoms get a test.

The first reports of this change were filled with comments from incredulous experts, whose assessments included “bizarre,” “very strange,” “this is going to make things worse,” and so on. Now we have an explanation for this bizarre policy: High-level officials ordered it. CNN reports the change “came this week as a result of pressure from the upper ranks of the Trump administration.” The New York Times adds, “One official said the directive came from the top down. Another said the guidelines were not written by the C.D.C. but were forced down.”

Evidence that Trump has sought to slow down testing has been available for a long time. In March, Trump told reporters he kept infected passengers offshore on a cruise ship in order to hold down the official numbers of infections: “I like the numbers being where they are. I don’t need to have the numbers double because of one ship.”

 Russell Brandom reports Facebook chose not to act on militia complaints before Kenosha shooting:

In the wake of an apparent double murder Tuesday night in Kenosha, Facebook has faced a wave of scrutiny over posts by a self-proclaimed militia group called Kenosha Guard, which issued a “call to arms” to in advance of the protest.

Facebook took down Kenosha Guard’s Facebook page Wednesday morning, identifying the posts as violating community standards. But while the accounts were ultimately removed, new evidence suggests the platform had ample warning about the account before the shooting brought the group to prominence.

At least two separate Facebook users reported the account for inciting violence prior to the shooting, The Verge has learned. In each case, the group and its counter-protest event were examined by Facebook moderators and found not to be in violation of the platform’s policies.

One user, who asked not to be identified by name, said she had reported the Kenosha Guards event in advance of the protest. Facebook moderators responded that the event itself was not in violation of platform policy, but specific comments could be reported for inciting violence. She reported a specific comment threatening to put nails in the tires of protestors’ cars, but it too was found to be within the bounds of Facebook policy.

“There were lots of comments like that in the event,” she says. “People talking about being ‘locked and loaded.’ People asking what types of weapons and people responding to ‘bring everything.’”

Bella the Beluga Whale Gives Birth:

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Daily Bread

Daily Bread for 8.26.20

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Good morning.

Wednesday in Whitewater will be sunny with a high of eighty-eight.  Sunrise is 6:14 AM and sunset 7:37 PM, for 13h 23m 13s of daytime.  The moon is a waxing gibbous with 58.2% of its visible disk illuminated.

 

Whitewater’s Community Involvement & Cable TV Commission meets via audiovisual conferencing at 5:30 PM.

 On this day in 1883, the 1883 eruption of Krakatoa begins its final stage.

Recommended for reading in full — 

Ian Millhiser explains The RNC’s big Covid-19 lie, refuted in one chart (‘The United States has had one of the world’s worst responses to Covid-19. Trump wants you to believe the opposite’):

If you spent the last five months living in a cave, then learned about the outside world solely through a livestream of the 2020 Republican National Convention, you would think Donald Trump was a visionary leader who saw what no one else saw — and who has led his nation to triumph against a deadly plague as a result.

“From the very beginning,” starts an RNC video misrepresenting Trump’s record on Covid-19, “Democrats, the media, and the World Health Organization got coronavirus wrong.” As heroic music plays over an image of Trump surrounded by American flags, the video claims, “one leader took decisive action to save lives: President Donald Trump.“

The video even features a clip ridiculing New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo (D-NY) for saying — way back in early March — that he didn’t think that the coronavirus pandemic was “going to be as bad as it was in other countries.”

The reality is that, under President Trump’s leadership, the United States has one of the highest rates of coronavirus in the world — far higher than our peer nations. Indeed, Trump’s entire argument can be refuted in a single chart. This one:

The data in this chart represents the number of cases per one million people in the United States and several other nations — and, as you can see, the number of cases in the United States vastly outstrips the prevalence of coronavirus in these other nations.

Jon Meacham writes Restore the Voting Rights Act. It’s long past time to ‘make it plain’:

The John R. Lewis Voting Rights Act of 2020, meanwhile, languishes in Congress. Among other things, the bill would restore the provisions of the 1965 Voting Rights Act that requires states and localities with demonstrable records of discrimination to seek “preclearance” from the Justice Department or the U.S. District Court in Washington before any changes in election laws or policies.

The House has passed the bill, but — sadly and predictably — Mitch McConnell’s Senate has refused to act.

 Kyle Hopkins reports Alaska attorney general resigns following report that he sent hundreds of texts to state employee:

Alaska Attorney General Kevin Clarkson resigned Tuesday following the publication of an Anchorage Daily News and ProPublica investigation that found he sent hundreds of “uncomfortable” messages full of flattery, kiss emoji and invitations to a state employee.

Prior to his resignation, Clarkson had quietly been placed on unpaid leave for the month of August. Records obtained by the newsrooms show the junior state employee raised concerns about 558 text messages that Clarkson sent to her personal phone in March. Over a 27-day span, the attorney general asked the woman to come to his house at least 18 times, often punctuating the messages with comments about the much-younger woman’s beauty.

Lukashenko: The story of ‘Europe’s Last Dictator’:

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Coronavirus, Education, Justice, Law, Laws/Regulations, Public Health, School District

Whitewater School Board Meeting, 8.24.20: 5 Points

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At last night’s meeting of the Whitewater Unified School District’s board, the board heard, among other items, a report on summer school, a report on the district’s use of seclusion and restraint, approved unanimously a new metric the district will use to determine its next instructional plan beginning September 28th, and held a budget hearing.

Embedded above is the video of the meeting. There is no better record than a recording.

A few remarks —

 1. Seclusion and Restraint.  As is required by law, and as should be reported apart from any legal requirement, the administration presented a seclusion and restraint report for the past school year. See Seclusion and Restraint Annual Report. (Video, 21:00).

The more serious the subject, the more careful the commentary. For now: What type of seclusion, by what means of restraint, and by whom? 

The question is, properly, more exacting than it might seem. There is no greater power the district, or a third party acting at the district’s request, possesses than the power of seclusion and restraint. As with the prevention and redress of harassment, these are questions of justice. Nothing else the district does is more important.

 2. A New Model. To manage during a pandemic, institutions public and private have adopted various metrics from epidemology (positivity rate, case incidence, etc.) to estimate the seriousness of the conditions they face in their communities. In this case, the district has shifted, with unanimous approval of the board, from a measure of positivity to one of case incidence to guide their decision making. (Video, 26:43.) As epidemiology moves from one model to another, it’s reasonable to move in the same direction.

For some, however, these metrics have become a fixation, and they pore over daily numbers.

And yet, and yet, these metrics are our attempt to make sense of a communicable disease among a mobile and interacting population. Daniel Fahrenheit’s temperature scale does not, for example, create conditions of hot or cold – it merely assigns a measurement to independent conditions of warmth or chill. In situations of mobility and interaction, one does the best one can with even greater levels of complexity than mere temperature.

So it is with these metrics about COVID-19: the various measures used are all (understandably) imperfect efforts to assess whether and when conditions may be unbearably dangerous to ordinary social conduct. Neither high nor low assures individual or group safety in particular cases.

Reason, faith, and tradition admit of no magic: neither tea leaves nor crystal balls allow one to see the future.

It is, and always will be, the danger to ordinary social conduct that is the risk of the pandemic. We’ve already lost many and much as a country, and we will lose yet more. One need not speculate about epidemiology to see – if one can see at all – that this our present condition.

 3. A Budget Hearing. The Whitewater school board held, and unanimously approved, a preliminary budget recommendation, with many uncertainties to be resolved before a final approval in October. (Video, 1:01:00.)

 4. No Comments. There was during this meeting not a single public comment, neither in the part of the meeting reserved for general comments nor during any part of the meeting reserved for comments on particular items. The recent, considerable controversy (with public comment) about school openings has not produced an enduring engagement. Anyone aware of the several, debilitating conditions this small Midwestern community has endured since the Great Recession would have expected this. Here, anger quickly fades into exhaustion. Neither anger nor exhaustion is a desirable condition. This is, however, the present to which the past has led this community.

 5. Asides. One can well grasp that these are difficult times to manage an institution, let alone to begin to manage one. Few would reasonably say that it would be opportune to arrive during a pandemic. Perhaps a person suited to dialog and mutual understanding would find this moment… somewhat jarring. These turbulent conditions, however, offer a fuller view of the community than would more placid times in which tours and promises were all one saw and heard. There is a revelatory honesty from these recent months. 

Daily Bread

Daily Bread for 8.25.20

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Good morning.

Tuesday in Whitewater will be partly cloudy with a high of eighty-six.  Sunrise is 6:13 AM and sunset 7:39 PM, for 13h 25m 58s of daytime.  The moon is a waxing crescent with 47.1% of its visible disk illuminated.

 

 On this day in 1944, the Allies liberate Paris.

Recommended for reading in full — 

David A. Fahrenthold, Jonathan O’Connell and Joshua Partlow report New York attorney general files legal action against Trump Organization, revealing state investigation into the company’s financial dealings:

The New York attorney general is investigating whether President Trump’s company misled lenders and taxing authorities by improperly inflating the value of his assets, according to a court filing on Monday.

The filing from Attorney General Letitia James (D) said that the Trump Organization has declined to hand over some documents that had been subpoenaed, and that the president’s son Eric has refused to be interviewed. James’s inquiry began 18 months ago, but James had not disclosed its focus or scope before Monday.

Eric Trump — now the day-to-day leader of his father’s company — agreed to an interview, and then canceled two days before, according to the filing. He has declined to set another date, citing “rights afforded to every individual under the Constitution” to justify refusing the subpoena for an interview, the attorney general said.

 Cameron Peters reports The difference between the DNC and RNC, in one tweet:

While the DNC roll call showcased the diversity of America and made a point of featuring Indigenous people, Black and Hispanic Americans, activists, and LGBTQ people, the RNC roll call was a procession dominated by older white men, all in front of a white background emblazoned with #RNC2020.

Michael Scherer reports Republican convention videos use stock footage from Thailand:

During a video tribute to Trump early in Monday’s program, convention producers flashed an image of a woman in a window holding a sign that read “Thank You Doctors & Nurses.” Another piece of tape showed a lab worker in mask, gloves and bodysuit next to a sign that says “Danger Covid-19 Biohazard.”

Both pieces of tape are listed for sale as stock video through Getty Images, and in both cases the visuals are described as a product of Thailand.

Why Is Kodak Making Pharmaceuticals?:

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