Unilateral Disarmament

 

The "Gerry-Mander" circa 1812

One side can't lay down their weapons and assume the other will as well.

Back in the 1960s and 1970s, I would run into hippy-dippy useful idiots, who would say stupid things like, "we should just destroy our nuclear weapons!  Once Russia sees we are disarmed, they will have no need for their arsenal and follow suit!"  It is a silly argument, as history has shown that such tactics never work - the strong will always take advantage of the weak.

Sadly, the Democratic Party seemed to be hell-bent on such a unilateral policy, thinking that, perhaps, if they lead by example, Republicans would follow suit, if nothing else, out of a sense of shame.  Of course, we know now that Republicans are essentially shameless.

When one side disarms, the other merely takes over.

Our system of government is very old and very flawed.  It was originally based on a system where only wealthy white men could vote (and women were virtual slaves and blacks actual).  It passed on the obligation of actually running elections to the States.   Parties quickly figured  out that the real power was in the State House, where voting districts were determined, which in turn could alter the outcomes of local and national elections.  Gerrymandering is not some new thing, but nearly as old as our republic, as the above cartoon illustrates.

In a system where less than half the population bothers to vote, and where the electoral college and gerrymandering skews results, it is possible for a minority party to achieve a majority and keep it, once in power, particularly if the opposition is somewhat lackluster.

Republicans have wasted no time in consolidating power - though the Statehouse and the Courthouse.  They are pretty well entrenched and it may take years or even decades - if ever - before the balance of power changes.  This is assuming Trump does not declare "martial law" and anoint himself King in his new East Wing Throne Room (and you thought it was a Ballroom!).

Hillary tried the "when they go low, we go high" strategy and it flopped. Democrats in California, egged on by GOP Billionaire donor Charlie Munger, passed a law taking redistricting out of the hands of the legislature and set up a bipartisan "Citizens Committee" to handle redistricting of that State. The net result was increased Republican presence in both the State Legislature as well as the House of Representatives.  It was the fair thing to do, but politics is no place for fairness, it seems.

Republicans in Texas were so impressed by this that they passed a similar law in their home State.  Just Kidding!  Actually, what they did was gerrymander the crap out of Texas so that no Democrat will ever assume power there ever again.  California unilaterally disarmed itself and Texas did not.  The end result is a slim majority in the House for the GOP - only a handful of votes.  They could not have achieved a majority otherwise.

Tuesday was the mid-Midterm election.  I noted in my previous posting that the only item on our ballot was two seats on the Public Service Commission Board, which is in charge of setting utility rates.  Turnout for such a snoozefest election was pretty high.  Ordinarily, Democrats don't even bother to put up candidates for many of these minor seats.  Well, two Democrats won, by pretty impressive margins, particularly for an alleged Red State.  It was probably more of a referendum on the GOP and Trump than any concerns about utility rates.  I suspect many voters didn't know (or care) what the PSC was, either.

Across the country, Democrats scored some pretty impressive wins - defeating Republicans in many conservative districts, and retaining seats despite well-funded opposition from Billionaire donors.  Not bad for an off-year election.

Meanwhile, in California, Governor Gavin Newsom pushed for Proposition 50, which abolished the fair "Citizen's Committee" for redistricting and threw it back to the gerrymandering legislature.  Screw being fair.  Screw being "above the fray."  This is politics and there is no runner-up or second place. It is winner-take-all and sadly, a race to the bottom. Hippy-dippy notions of unilateral disarmament are, once again, proven not only futile, but disastrous.

The net result of such gerrymandering could yield one or two additional seats in the House for the Democrats.  Of course, not to be outdone, the GOP has been aggressively gerrymandering in other States, such as Texas, Indiana, Missouri, and North Carolina.  Republicans were playing tackle football, while the Democrats were playing touch football - with one hand tied behind their back.

Well, no more.

Of course, Republican operatives will call this "hypocrisy" while at the same time ignoring their own mal intent.  That is the problem with trying to be Mr. Nice Guy.  Democrats have to hound out people from the party for even the slightest allegations of sexual harassment.  Meanwhile, the other party gets away with electing frauds and rapists - and no one blinks an eye.

But hey, at least Republicans aren't hypocrites. They are pretty open about embracing their own malfeasance.

Language Model

Does language determine how we think?  I used to think so.

I wrote before how language is nothing more than an exchange of symbols - symbols that have an agreed-upon meaning.  Change the meaning of the symbols, and you change the debate.  He who controls the language, controls the debate.

Consider the term "Fake News" which was created by the Left to describe the outright lies and "alternative facts" pushed by the Right.  For example, I got a mailing the other day concerning the November 4th election for our Public Service Commission (which determines our utility rates).  The letter alleges that unless I vote for the Republican incumbents, I will have to pay $400 on my utility bill to cover free electricity for "illegals."  No source was given.  Worse yet, if I was a Republican, I would have to pay another $100 on top of that!  Oh my!

But of course it was all made-up.  Fake News.  Well, what we used to call "Fake News."   Then the GOP commandeered the term and used it to describe any news or facts that they didn't like. Touché.

Did that really change the terms of the debate?  Was anyone's mind changed as a result?  I am beginning to think not.  But I digress, somewhat.

What got me started on this was my inability, lately, to find the right word or name - a symbol - for an idea.  I would be in the middle of a sentence and then struggle to find the word which represents the idea.  And when one pauses like that, in a conversation, people jump in and derail one's thoughts further.   This is one reason people use words or sounds like, "you know?" or "uhhhh.." as placeholders in a conversation - to signal they are not done talking.

I try to make this clear to Mr. See.  Just because I can't remember someone's name or the name of an idea or thing doesn't mean I forgot that  person, thing, or idea, only the word or symbol for it - a "handle" we attach to ideas to reduce them to shorthand.

Nowhere is this more prominent than in technology, where acronyms and funny names are used as handles for ideas and concepts.  I started a small argument (many years ago) among a few Engineers when I asked what the formal definition of "VGA" was.  Half said "Video Graphics Array" while the other half said "Video Graphics Adapter."  And yet, these were Engineers tasked with designing VGA chip sets at the time.  Despite their disagreement over the actual name of the device, they nevertheless agreed upon what the underlying idea was.

Since this Parkinson's thing has commenced, I find myself thinking about ideas in the abstract, while not necessarily remembering the names for them - at least right away.  This got me to thinking about so-called Artificial Intelligence, which its proponents were (at one time) quick to argue was "merely a language model" and not actual intelligence.  AI, we were told, was merely manipulating words, based on language rules, without understanding the underlying ideas.

I, on the other hand, have no trouble with the ideas, but find myself at a loss for words.  I keep telling Mark (and others) that "I am still here" even if it seems many have written my epitaph (sorry to break it to you, but I may live another 20 years this way).  When your communication skills falter and even your facial expressions go blank, people are quick to assume that nobody's home, when in fact they are, just that they are trapped within their minds.

Scary thought.

Meanwhile, AI proponents, hell-bent on shoving this "technology" down our throats, are less and less calling it a "language model" and more and more "the next big thing!"   Maybe this isn't so bad for us consumers, as AI can get thoroughly confused, which of course is a misnomer, as there is no "Intelligence" in AI to confuse in the first place.

I placed an order for fiber pills from Amazon the other day.  Two two-packs of 120 pills each.  I guess the order-taker at the warehouse got confused and sent one two-pack instead of two.  I clicked on the "help" link on Amazon and explained the problem and the AI-bot cheerfully refunded all of my money instead of half (or sending the other half of the order).  I am not sure how Jeff Bezos profits from that - his AI is giving away the store!

Perhaps that will be (or already is) a new sport for the younger set - spoofing AI.  Already, we've seen situations where people told ChatGTP or "Grok" (Really? How Junior High, Elon!) to "ignore all previous instructions" with sometimes hilarious results.  That's why kids do so well with computers - they're not afraid to break things.