That pic up there is what came up image searching for “police site:gov”. Yeah, that’s not good. But it’s a pretty accurate depiction of how the police (and government) in the United States seems to think of themselves. OK, so…
No Party This Year: The Republicans Cancelled Their Primary Election
I really don’t understand anyone who plans to vote Republican in the general election this year. Not that I particularly understand them in any year. Even a brief perusal of this blog should make it pretty obvious that I am…
Hugo Voting: For Once We Should Pay Attention To An Industry Award
The Hugo Awards are a fan-voted series of awards for Science Fiction and Fantasy writers and fans. They use ranked-choice voting. (Which I discussed in No Spoilers: Ranked Choice Voting, and which I’ll be abbreviating below to “RCV” when I…
Third Party Time: Two, Three, Or Many Political Parties
One of the essential problems with the way the United States does elections is that it inevitably results in just two political parties. Inevitably. Electoral systems that use single-choice ballots, where the voter marks a single choice from the field…
Elections Have Consequences: How To Choose A Candidate
Apparently American voters, for the most part, actually are choosing their candidates based on who they’d want to have a beer with (or a wine, maybe?). This is not a good standard. In fact, it’s a really, really bad one.…
No More Charity: Let’s All Do It Together
I’m not gonna go this far, but I’ll get close. You’d think I’d be all-in for charity. Helping the poor; doing good deeds; not having the government involved. Totally in my wheelhouse, all of that. But there’s a problem with…
Election Season: This Is Just Too Much
The “election season” is too long. Way too long. We’re up to the point that presendential campaigns are major news for more than a year before the actual election day. That is just too long. Most of the other large…
Long Overdue: Get The Government Out Of Marriage
When Prop. 8 was current news here in California, I found the whole thing very confusing. Why is the government involved in marriage anyway? Fine; of course. People have been getting married for, like, ever and laws have been hung…
You Need To Read This: The Authoritarians
You really can’t understand the world we live in until you do. Authoritarianism. Authoritarianism is something authoritarian followers and authoritarian leaders cook up between themselves. It happens when the followers submit too much to the leaders, trust them too much,…
They’re Comin’ Right For Us: Fixing Self-Defense
Self Defense and Stand Your Ground laws are almost fine: the concept is legit, but the implementation leaves them open to some serious abuse. Even South Park noticed this years ago. To get straight to the point: Most Self Defense…