Political Randomness

[Defiant]

[Pyperkub]

A New Parchment Declaration of Independence Surfaces. Head-Scratching Ensues.

But now, in a bit of real-life archival drama, a pair of scholars are announcing a surprising discovery: a previously unknown early handwritten parchment of the Declaration, buried in a provincial archive in Britain.

The document is the only other 18th-century handwritten parchment Declaration known to exist besides the one from 1776 now displayed at the National Archives in Washington. It isn’t an official government document, like the 1776 parchment, but a display copy created in the mid-1780s, the researchers argue, by someone who wanted to influence debate over the Constitution.

That's really cool.

[El Guapo]

Is there some scandal behind/in front of him? (is that what you are saying?)

Everyone wants it to the first of many Russia-related indictments, but he probably just murdered a prostitute.

Nah, it's cool. Chaffetz literally said, "I have no ulterior motives" when he announced that he wasn't running. So everything is on the level.

[Max Peck]

So what is the power-couple name for Ivanka and Jared, anyway? Ivanred? Jarvanka?

I'm pretty sure that Steve's would have to be Satannon.

"J-Vanka"

Thanks, Beeb!

[Paingod]

I've read that Obama is wrapping up his long overdue 3-month long vacation and may have a speaking engagement soon. I had two thoughts.

1. I desperately want Obama to congratulate Trump on taking almost as many days off as he has in the last three months. I know he won't, though.
2. I'm surprised that Trump hasn't tried to blame more of his problems on Obama. Maybe when he's not on vacation anymore, Trump will take more jabs at him?

[Moliere]

I've read that Obama is wrapping up his long overdue 3-month long vacation and may have a speaking engagement soon. I had two thoughts.

1. I desperately want Obama to congratulate Trump on taking almost as many days off as he has in the last three months. I know he won't, though.
2. I'm surprised that Trump hasn't tried to blame more of his problems on Obama. Maybe when he's not on vacation anymore, Trump will take more jabs at him?

What defines a vacation when it comes to the President? Not being at the White House? It seems like they will always be working and taking meetings.

[hepcat]

Using Trump's own, readily available quotes, he has taken more than Obama. This is an easily proven case of blatant hypocrisy.

[Holman]

Look, he's 70 years old, and he's had a long and successful career. Can't a man sit back and enjoy his retirement without a lot of jealous nobodies complaining about it?

[pr0ner]

If you're pro-life, there's no longer room for you in the Democratic Party.

Politically, this may not be the smartest move. The hardcore abortion supporters I know love it, though, so I guess there's that?

[El Guapo]

If you're pro-life, there's no longer room for you in the Democratic Party.

Politically, this may not be the smartest move. The hardcore abortion supporters I know love it, though, so I guess there's that?

Yeah, I don't really get it. It's especially confusing since Sanders was just campaigning with the pro-life democratic candidate for mayor of Omaha and defending his decision to do so. I get how pro-choice groups want to agitate about it, but if this isn't coming from either the centrists or the progressive wing of the party, what exactly is the constituency for this announcement?

Of course, there are several democrats who basically are personally pro-life but whom support abortion rights as a matter of policy (Joe Biden, for example). I assume / hope that's ok under this.

Semi-related, I can't wait for the inevitable primary challenge to Manchin causing democrats to fail to retake the Senate.

[Smoove_B]

I don't remember which communist public radio program I was listening to in the car yesterday, but the person they were interviewing said this last election might have moved the needle of national politics to what he called "base elections" (IIRC). Essential, instead of elections being run to attract and influence the middles, now we're looking at an American election process driven by extremes (left or right). Seeing that the (D) parts wants to institute an ideological purity pledge like this makes me think this guy was right.

[pr0ner]

If you're pro-life, there's no longer room for you in the Democratic Party.

Politically, this may not be the smartest move. The hardcore abortion supporters I know love it, though, so I guess there's that?

Yeah, I don't really get it. It's especially confusing since Sanders was just campaigning with the pro-life democratic candidate for mayor of Omaha and defending his decision to do so. I get how pro-choice groups want to agitate about it, but if this isn't coming from either the centrists or the progressive wing of the party, what exactly is the constituency for this announcement?

Of course, there are several democrats who basically are personally pro-life but whom support abortion rights as a matter of policy (Joe Biden, for example). I assume / hope that's ok under this.

Semi-related, I can't wait for the inevitable primary challenge to Manchin causing democrats to fail to retake the Senate.

The constituency for the announcement appears to be women, particularly the hardcore abortion supporters. From that Huffpo article:

“Kudos to Chair Tom Perez and the DNC for recognizing that we are a stronger party when we stand for our core values,” she said in a statement to The Huffington Post. “Women across the country who are, and have always been, the heart and soul of the Party, are breathing a sigh of relief to know that the DNC has our backs, and we look forward to a day when we don’t have to fight this fight again.”

For a lot of these women, a Democrat who isn't 100% pro-choice is an immediate "no" vote for them.

As Smoove said, both parties are now pandering to their extremes, rather than realizing that not every member of their party is going to be 100% in line with every tenet of the party platform. There's a pretty good article in the Washington Examiner, of all places, laying out why this move is not the smartest for the Democratic party.

[Paingod]

What would it take to strip out the completely broken "Party" system we have and just put "People" on the ballet and make the voters decide without special color-coding?

[Isgrimnur]

People letting their ideas of perfect getting in the way of good enough...

[Skinypupy]

What would it take to strip out the completely broken "Party" system we have and just put "People" on the ballet and make the voters decide without special color-coding?

Well, ok...but you have to wear the tutu.

[Holman]

What would it take to strip out the completely broken "Party" system we have and just put "People" on the ballet and make the voters decide without special color-coding?

Wouldn't parties spontaneously regenerate as it became clear which candidates supported which other candidates?

But voting for candidates without party labels would be an improvement only if the great majority of voters took time to evaluate every position of every candidate independently and in depth. Failing that, every election becomes a beauty pageant or a personality contest. Actual positions and hidden interests would be more obscure rather than less.

Parties have major problems, but they provide important gatekeeping and orientation.

[Max Peck]

Apparently not everyone loves Ivanka as much as Rip and China do.

Groans as Ivanka defends Trump in Berlin

Donald Trump's daughter Ivanka was met with groans as she defended her father's attitude towards women at the G20 women's summit in Berlin.

The First Daughter was taking part in a panel discussion about female entrepreneurs alongside German chancellor, Angela Merkel, and IMF chief Christine Lagarde.

But the audience bristled at her praise for the US president.

The event is part of the G20 women's summit.

An audible groan went up as she told the room her father was a "tremendous champion of supporting families and enabling them to thrive".

[El Guapo]

What would it take to strip out the completely broken "Party" system we have and just put "People" on the ballet and make the voters decide without special color-coding?

Wouldn't parties spontaneously regenerate as it became clear which candidates supported which other candidates?

Yup. Our constitutional system was designed with the idea that people would just vote for individuals and that there would not be tightly knit political parties, but of course such parties sprang up anyway. Because of course that's inevitable - it takes a lot of organization to campaign for people, policies, etc., nationwide, so people need to band together to accomplish that effectively (in addition to the screening functions for voters). So if the parties disappeared tomorrow, as you say they would quickly re-form.

In fact, that's one of the ways our political system is (over the long run) pretty borked - it's not really built to function well in a partisan environment without certain semi-irrational political norms which are steadily breaking down over time.

[Moliere]

Apparently not everyone loves Ivanka as much as Rip and China do.

Groans as Ivanka defends Trump in Berlin

Donald Trump's daughter Ivanka was met with groans as she defended her father's attitude towards women at the G20 women's summit in Berlin.

The First Daughter was taking part in a panel discussion about female entrepreneurs alongside German chancellor, Angela Merkel, and IMF chief Christine Lagarde.

But the audience bristled at her praise for the US president.

The event is part of the G20 women's summit.

An audible groan went up as she told the room her father was a "tremendous champion of supporting families and enabling them to thrive".

By "families" she's referring to the various Trump children and their families. At least she's being honest.

[Holman]

Yup. Our constitutional system was designed with the idea that people would just vote for individuals and that there would not be tightly knit political parties, but of course such parties sprang up anyway. Because of course that's inevitable - it takes a lot of organization to campaign for people, policies, etc., nationwide, so people need to band together to accomplish that effectively (in addition to the screening functions for voters). So if the parties disappeared tomorrow, as you say they would quickly re-form.

In fact, that's one of the ways our political system is (over the long run) pretty borked - it's not really built to function well in a partisan environment without certain semi-irrational political norms which are steadily breaking down over time.

One of the natural assumptions of the Founding Fathers was that candidates for office would come from a very small class of educated and talented men, most of whom would know each other in the way important families always did. This was how it worked in the 18th-century English parliament as nearly all members came up through the same schools and related social networks.

But even the English had already developed political parties, or at least robust factions. It was naive for the Founders to assume it wouldn't happen here, which it did even before George Washington left office.

[Defiant]

Obama will earn $400K for one of his first paid speeches: report

Good lord, getting paid that much? We better hope he never becomes President.

[El Guapo]

Obama will earn $400K for one of his first paid speeches: report

Good lord, we better hope he never becomes President.

Hmmm, I hope that he hasn't been sending e-mails too.

[Moliere]

Don't do math without a license in Oregon.

It all started when Mats’s wife received a red-light camera ticket, which sparked Mats’s interest in how exactly yellow lights are timed.

He did a little Googling and found the formula used to set traffic-light times. The length of time a traffic light stays yellow is based on a relatively straightforward mathematical formula, originally drafted in 1959. Mats realized that the formula is incomplete, because it fails to capture the behavior of drivers making right turns. After developing a modified formula and even corresponding with one of the formula’s original creators, Mats started to reach out to others in the scientific community, government officials, and the media.

Mats’s work was generally met with interest and praise, but when Mats e-mailed the Oregon State Board of Examiners for Engineering and Land Surveying, things took an abrupt illegal U-turn. The Board told Mats they had no interest in hearing about his ideas. Fair enough. But the Board didn’t stop there. They launched a full-blown investigation, alleging that he’d engaged in the unlicensed “practice of engineering.”

After a two-year-long investigation, the Board fined him $500. According to the Board, “critiquing” the length of yellow lights and talking about his ideas with “members of the public” made Mats a lawbreaker because he’s not an Oregon-licensed professional engineer.

[stessier]

You left out what is happening now (after the board fined him and he paid $500).

Now, Mats is fighting back, with a civil-rights challenge in federal court. He is asking the courts to hold that Oregon’s engineering laws violate the First Amendment in two ways.

First, however complex a topic may be, the government can’t give to state-licensed experts a monopoly on exchanging ideas. Yet Oregon law does just that. Mats, for example, cares about the fairness of traffic-light timing, a topic that has fueled nationwide debate. But unless he spends years qualifying as a state-licensed professional engineer, “critiquing” the math behind traffic lights will expose him to civil and even criminal penalties.[10]

That’s unconstitutional. The state can require someone to get a license before they design a bridge, or a skyscraper, or a traffic circle. But Oregon’s engineering board has warped that unremarkable power beyond recognition by taking aim at ordinary people, like Mats, who care about their communities and want to speak freely about issues that matter to them.

...

Second, Oregon’s regulation of the word “engineer” is unconstitutional as well. To most English-speakers, the noun “engineer” might signify any number of jobs, skills, credentials, degrees, or accomplishments, from someone with an engineering degree to someone who operates a locomotive.

For everyday Oregonians, however, it is illegal to describe yourself as an “engineer” unless you’re a state-licensed professional engineer. This ban on ordinary human discourse cannot be squared with the First Amendment.

Given the other cases in the article where the Board clearly has lost it's mind, I hope he wins big...which probably just means getting to talk about traffic lights, but that Board needs to be spanked.

[El Guapo]

State professional licensing is out of hand in general. While there are cases where it is defensible (e.g., medicine), outside of a few core areas like that it's mostly a state-sanctioned protection racket.

[Enough]

At a supervisor training session on campus I ran into a bunch of folks from international programs. They told us that international student applications are down over 40% nationally since Trump was elected. That happened insanely fast, though I can't say I would react any different if I was an international student.

This will have a huge financial hit on colleges across the country. When public funding for higher ed started drying up (my alma matter receives 95% less funding from the state than when I was in school in the 90s) many turned to bolstering their international student population as a funding mechanism to make up for lost dollars. I guess we had better bone up on attracting out of state students if we have any desire for remaining a public university.

[Smoove_B]

Don't even think about doing what I did, warns Mitch McConnell. I've decided I need to have lunch with him. Just so I can ask if he knows how much of a sack of crap he is.

Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) is warning Democrats not to push for the inclusion of "poison pills" in a must-pass funding bill, with only days left to avoid a government shutdown.

"Our friends on the other side of the aisle sent me a letter asking for this bill to reject poison pill riders. I would suggest that if they take their own advice, we can finish this negotiation and produce a good agreement that both sides can support," McConnell said from the Senate floor.

[Moliere]

This will have a huge financial hit on colleges across the country. When public funding for higher ed started drying up (my alma matter receives 95% less funding from the state than when I was in school in the 90s) many turned to bolstering their international student population as a funding mechanism to make up for lost dollars. I guess we had better bone up on attracting out of state students if we have any desire for remaining a public university.

Or stop paying administrators lavish salaries with sweet perks.

An information system manager can make $258,000 with UC, but $150,000 with other state agencies.

The audit said: “10 executives in the Office of the President whose compensation we analyzed were paid a total of $3.7 million in fiscal year 2014-15 — over $700,000 more than the combined salaries of their highest paid state employee counterparts.”

On benefits, the Office of the President provided a regular retirement plan but also offered its executives a retirement savings account into which the office contributes up to 5% of the executives’ salaries—about $2.5 million over the past five years, the audit found.

“The Office of the President also spent more than $2 million for its staff’s business meetings and entertainment expenses over the past five years—a benefit that the State does not offer to its employees except in limited circumstances,” the audit said..

The audit also said the Office of the President reimbursed questionable travel expenses, including a ticket for a theater performance and limousine services. One person spent $350 per night on hotel rooms, which is above the allowable standard for other state agencies.

[malchior]

Or stop paying administrators lavish salaries with sweet perks.

So what you are saying is one University which is in one of the most expensive markets for labor in the country is a good approximation of hundreds of post-secondary learning institutions all across the country. Sounds legit.

[Moliere]

Or stop paying administrators lavish salaries with sweet perks.

So what you are saying is one University which is in one of the most expensive markets for labor in the country is a good approximation of hundreds of post-secondary learning institutions all across the country. Sounds legit.

This is the entire UC CA system, not just one University. How many anecdotes shall I provide before we call it a trend that college administrators are over compensated handing out degrees of questionable value?

[El Guapo]

Or stop paying administrators lavish salaries with sweet perks.

So what you are saying is one University which is in one of the most expensive markets for labor in the country is a good approximation of hundreds of post-secondary learning institutions all across the country. Sounds legit.

This is the entire UC CA system, not just one University. How many anecdotes shall I provide before we call it a trend that college administrators are over compensated handing out degrees of questionable value?

It is, however, irrelevant to the matter raised by Enough. If Trump has caused international student applications to drop by 40%, that's bad regardless of whether college administrators are or are not overpaid.

Like, if I stole $10,000 from the University of California, I couldn't defend myself by saying that its administrators are overpaid, even if that's true.

[malchior]

Or stop paying administrators lavish salaries with sweet perks.

So what you are saying is one University which is in one of the most expensive markets for labor in the country is a good approximation of hundreds of post-secondary learning institutions all across the country. Sounds legit.

This is the entire UC CA system, not just one University. How many anecdotes shall I provide before we call it a trend that college administrators are over compensated handing out degrees of questionable value?

I don't think that using anecdotes from one system when making sweeping statements about compensation models in higher ed is all that useful. Or anecdotes at all when talking about compensation models. Collected salary data across institutions of different sizes and levels compared to local labor markets is probably the minimum bar. Plus that report focuses heavily on outliers. That might be an area of interest but they could just be outliers and supportable ones at that.

[Moliere]

I stole $10,000 from the University of California

Saving in case the police need the evidence for later.

[El Guapo]

I stole $10,000 from the University of California

Saving in case the police need the evidence for later.

[Enough]

Or stop paying administrators lavish salaries with sweet perks.

So what you are saying is one University which is in one of the most expensive markets for labor in the country is a good approximation of hundreds of post-secondary learning institutions all across the country. Sounds legit.

This is the entire UC CA system, not just one University. How many anecdotes shall I provide before we call it a trend that college administrators are over compensated handing out degrees of questionable value?

Sorry but I fail to buy that is going to make up the 95% of state funding for higher education we've lost in Colorado at least. But are you down with the 40% drop of applications? That's a boatload of lost revenue for all universities.

Oh and our IT people don't make that kind of scratch here at all. (Edit: just looked it up and our top IT person does exceed $200k, but basically nobody else. And I know I lose IT staff to outside commercial offers with greater pay. I am the IT manager for our program and how I wish I made a fraction of that coin, lol.).

Sent from my Nexus 6P using Tapatalk

[malchior]

Oh and our IT people don't make that kind of scratch here at all.

That is because for IT higher ed typically pays somewhere towards the bottom quartile compared to the median. This is fairly well known to people who've ever worked in higher ed.

*Compare IT Security Analyst at $69K versus median of $92600.
** And the years don't overlap perfectly but are likely very close and the comparison is likely very accurate.

[Moliere]

The UC example compared salaries for similar jobs between the UC and other state employees, not the private sector.

[Enough]

The UC example compared salaries for similar jobs between the UC and other state employees, not the private sector.

Did I miss you sharing your feelings about the implications of the 40% drop of applications?

And so to be clear, are you arguing we should pay our IT people shitty salaries in the public sector?

[Enough]

I just realized that I sometimes get confused with malchior and Moliere, am I the only one?

[Defiant]

I just realized that I sometimes get confused with malchior and Moliere, am I the only one?

Well, I get you and Exodor confused sometimes.

Hell, sometimes I even get confused between me and Default. I'm like... "I don't remember writing that."