"A LOT more beautiful (breathtaking, actually) places in Canada than that."

Said Original Mike in "The Canada Café," apparently under the impression that I am searching for what is beautiful/breathtaking as I do my virtual traveling and frame selections in Google Street view. That made me want to put up some more selections:

"I love the NYT. I have been reading it for 50 years. I'm begging it to go straight."

I say in the comments, half an hour after posting "The NYT struggles to fight off Trump's use of that NYT headline 'Wiretapped data used in inquiry of Trump aides.'"

And Original Mike says:

You are in an abusive relationship and you're the enabler. Isn't there a hot line you can call?

At last night's canceled Trump rally, why did individual protesters, asked on camera what they were protesting, say "I choose not to answer"?

In the comments to the first post of the day, sane_voter said:

Lots of Mexican flags at the riot, with the folks holding them flipping the bird and shouting profanity. Just doing the jobs that many Americans won't do.

Original Mike said "I saw that" and added:

Fox had reporters going through the crowd later in the evening. When asked why they were protesting, several protesters said "I choose not to answer". WTF kind of protester is that?

I'm making a separate post out of that because I believe the question is easy to answer. I know the answer from thousands of history lessons and Hollywood movies, like that one where the child disperses a lynch mob by talking to one individual and calling him by name.



There are the things people do in groups, where the individual is merged with the feeling of the whole group, where the group activity deafens the individual's access to conscience...



... and the way the conscience can snap back when the individual is singled out, confronted squarely, and asked to speak — to bring forward thoughts from his own mind. In the movies, that individual stares silently, then turns and goes away. On television, with a microphone aimed at his face, he says: "I choose not to answer."

The greatest mob break-up in the history of cinema came, I believe, in the 1927 silent film "King of Kings," discussed a few years ago on this blog, here. The mob is about to stone a woman to death for the sin of adultery, and Jesus goes one by one to individuals and writes in the sand, for each, the name of a sin. Each individual, on seeing the name of his sin, turns and walks away.

Cruz campaign practices the withdrawal method on an ad with an actress who's done porn movies.

Here's the Cruz ad:



If I had to guess what was supposedly so offensive about that, I'd say they were making fun of people with substance abuse problems. Maybe recovery therapy sessions are supposed to be looked upon with empathy. The support group must be supported.

But no, the female in the little drama — about people seeking treatment for their addiction to Marco Rubio — was discovered to have done "soft-core pornography."

The woman, Amy Lindsay, as first reported by BuzzFeed, has appeared in multiple movies with titles like “Carnal Wishes,” “Insatiable Desires” and “Private Sex Club.” Ms. Lindsay told BuzzFeed that she was a Christian conservative and a Republican, deciding between supporting Mr. Cruz or Donald J. Trump....

She applied for the acting job through the normal process and got hired. Then she was rejected because the campaign is embarrassed by the jobs she's taken in the past and their own failure to do a background check commensurate with their potential for embarrassment.

I hope the Trump campaign figures out a way to embrace this woman, who is, we're told, deciding between Cruz and Trump. Cruz — who's running another ad about how mean Trump was to an old woman who wanted to keep her house and not lose it to eminent domain — would have denied a job to a woman who's struggled in the acting industry. Here's that Cruz ad about Trump's oppression of the female homeowner:



I'd like to see an ad, copying that presentation, putting Cruz in exactly the same negative light, oppressing the ex-porn actress. I'm not saying the Trump campaign should do it. I'd just like to see it, because there are those of us who will empathize with a woman who's treated as toxic because she took a sex-related job at some point, and there are those of us who don't want to give big political power to someone who's excessively censorious about sexual expression.

ADDED: Original Mike said: "Oh, for crying out loud, Cruz. I thought you believed in redemption."

Yes, that's what I thought when Meade told me about it. I said: "Not very Christian of him."

Citation: John 7:53-8:11.

Go, and do not sin again.

I love it. Robots helping you — you, not me, I don't need it — be more human.

"Yesterday, IBM announced the new 'Watson Tone Analyzer,' a helpful program designed to enlighten you about the way your messages come across to other people."

Like a robotic writing coach, the 'tone check' tool can analyze a chunk of text to provide insight about the emotion it conveys (cheerful versus angry), if it seems agreeable and conscientious, and whether it reads as confident or tentative (or, bonus: analytical). Designed for both personal and business use, the program will also point out suggestions for alternative word choices to tweak the tone of the message.

IN THE COMMENTS: Original Mike says:

So they've (re)invented the thesaurus.

It's the opposite of a thesaurus more than it's the same.

1. You have to decide when to go looking for alternate words in the thesaurus. The thesaurus won't pro-actively tell you where there's a good place for rewording.

2. The thesaurus deprives you of information about the tone and notoriously — dishonorably, opprobriously, shamefully! — lures naive users into screwing up their tone.

The American Presidency is structured to exclude women, Camilla Paglia essentially argues...

... in this essay explaining why the U.S. — unlike all those other countries "from Brazil and Norway to Namibia and Bangladesh" — has never had a female President.

[T]he complex, coast-to-coast primary system in the U.S. forces presidential candidates into well over a year of brutal competition for funding and grass-roots support. Their lives are usurped by family-disrupting travel, stroking of rich donors, and tutelage by professional consultants and p.r. flacks. This exhausting, venal marathon requires enormous physical stamina and perhaps ethical desensitization to survive it.

In contrast, many heads of state elsewhere ascend through their internal party structure. They are automatically elevated to prime minister when their party wins a national election. This parliamentary system of government has been far more favorable for the steady rise of women to the top.

The protracted and ruthlessly gladiatorial U.S. electoral process drives talented women politicians away from the fray. What has kept women from winning the White House is not simple sexism but their own reluctance to subject themselves to the harsh scrutiny and ritual abuse of the presidential sweepstakes....

That's the meat of the argument.  She praises some women and takes some shots at others, notably Hillary Clinton:

Most of the American electorate has probably been ready for a woman president for some time. But that woman must have the right array of qualities and ideally have risen to prominence through her own talents and not (like Hillary Clinton or Argentina’s President Cristina Fernández de Kirchner) through her marriage to a powerful man.

ADDED: In one way, Paglia is saying it's not sexism. (Voters have long been ready for a woman.) But in another sense, it is. The system has been structured to fit the needs, qualities, and life patterns of men. It's in the Constitution. It's not parliamentarian. Paglia doesn't call that sexist, but it should be called sexist if you think disparate impact — especially once it's noticed and not changed — is enough.

IN THE COMMENTS: Original Mike said:

"The system has been structured to fit the needs, qualities, and life patterns of men."

If by that you mean it was purposefully structured to benefit men I'd say that's ridiculous.

It depends on what you mean by purposeful. I said "structured to fit... men." Men were the model the structure was designed for, whether anybody ever thought in terms of excluding women or not.

The Drill SGT brings up the analogy of firefighters:

Can't haul 50 feet of hose and an axe up 10 flights of stairs in 90 seconds wearing a tank and turn-out gear? Change the test...

If the test is really about what is needed for the job, it shouldn't be changed. So, I do want to add something to my statement that "disparate impact... once it's noticed and not changed" is sexist. Once it's noticed, we should look more closely to see if there's good reason to keep whatever it is that tends to exclude women.

The ordeal of running for President — is that something worth keeping? Quite aside from whether it excludes women, it doesn't get us to the best man either.

By the way — and this cuts in the other direction — running for and serving as President does not need to be made family-friendly. Both men and women should run for President only after their children — if any — have become adults.

Mary Burke apologizes. Do you understand why?

Scott Walker's opponent in Wisconsin's gubernatorial race got criticized for doing something that's extremely common in politics: telling the story of one person as if it represents and explains some problem that's a current issue.

Neenah District Administrator Mary Pfeiffer sent Burke a letter [on September 19th] "to express my disappointment regarding your use of our district as an example of your perceived negative impact of Act 10 on education.... It is unfair and misleading to claim that Act 10 is the primary reason why one specific candidate chose to accept a position in Minnesota over an opening in the Neenah Joint School District.... There are many reasons why candidates choose to work in other districts and certainly some effects of Act 10 may factor into those decisions."

Now, it is reported that Pfeiffer says Burke called her on the phone on September 24th and apologized, and then apologized in person yesterday.

Is this the beginning of the end of anecdotal politics? 

IN THE COMMENTS: Original Mike recommends reading Pfeiffer's entire letter: PDF. Pfeiffer calls attention to Burke's position as a member of the Madison School Board, which really does underscore the need for Burke to be strongly fact-based and accurate in whatever she chooses to say about the effects of Act 10.

"It’s important for students to know the ID they were issued at the beginning of the semester, that’s a perfectly good ID for all other UW purposes, but it’s not in the acceptable list for voting purposes."

In the aftermath of the 7th Circuit decision reinstating Wisconsin's voter ID law, the university scrambles to get IDs that work as voter IDs to out-of-state students.

Out-of-state driver’s licenses, for example, are not valid photo IDs under the law.

Who would think that they were?!

IN THE COMMENTS: Ignorance is Bliss said...

"Out-of-state driver’s licenses, for example, are not valid photo IDs under the law."

Actually, they are valid photo IDs, that establish conclusively that you are not eligible to vote in Wisconsin because it is not your place of residence. If you wish to make Wisconsin your place of residence then you need to act like you live in Wisconsin which include changing your driver's license.

And Original Mike, quoting the article, says:

"It certainly alleviates a huge burden for students who would have to travel [to the Division of Motor Vehicles]. In the case of UW-Madison, they’d have to research a bus line they’re not used to and travel further down University Avenue than they’ve traveled before.”

When did college students become children?

I think the issue is that out-of-state students tend to want to keep their home-state driver's license. So the question I have is whether a person with a current, non-Wisconsin driver's license is entitled to vote in Wisconsin? If not, the university should not be processing in-state IDs for persons who are not qualified to vote. The reason students should have to go to the DMV to get their IDs is so that they can replace out-of-state IDs with in-state IDs.

"I would take a Johnsonville brat from the hand of a Koch brother if it were offered with the proper condiments and a good beer."

Citizen Dave explains Wisconsin values.

IN THE COMMENTS: The Farmer said: "Bravo, ex-Mayor Dave! And MadisonMan said: "Yes, Bravo -- except for the no ketchup part, you heathen!!!!" Original Mike said: "Ketchup on a brat??? MM, you're kidding, right?" Mr. D said: "Mayor Dave is right. No ketchup on a brat." And David-2 said:

MM - meet DH!

Is Eric Hovde the new Ron Johnson?

Larry Kaufman on the GOP Senate primary in Wisconsin.

But Ron Johnson did not have to fight off Tommy Thompson, the former governor who chose not to go for a Senate seat when it required ousting an incumbent. It's an easier seat to get in the general election because the incumbent is retiring, but that makes the primary more contentious.

Is Thompson up for that fight? Or is he just assuming we know him and like him? So far...

... Thompson is a no-show for debates and often "phones in" speeches at the events he does attend. There's a growing sense that Thompson is acting like he's entitled to the job...

When is the Senate primary anyway? It's August 14, after the recall elections, which are June 5th. Kaufman tries to predict the post-recall political climate:

If Gov. Scott Walker loses, dispirited GOP voters will be far more likely to hunker down and cast a "safe" vote for Thompson to take on Democratic challenger Tammy Baldwin. 

Really? Wow. GOP folk go completely beta? Gotta win something.

But in the more likely case where Walker wins, the surge in Republican confidence would favor candidates like Hovde running on a stronger and more forthright fiscal conservatism. Wisconsin's open primary could also favor Hovde, since he's a fresh face with more crossover appeal than his opponents.

Why wouldn't they cross over and vote for whoever is the weakest candidate to face Baldwin? These open primaries are a bitch.

IN THE COMMENTS: Original Mike said:

Thompson clearly doesn't have it in him anymore. He should step aside. 

If the GOP had a brain, all the other candidates would step down and endorse Hovde. Don't you think? There's only one declared candidate on the Democratic side, the primary isn't until August, and it's an open primary.

"I give Ben Roethlisberger a lot of credit. He's man enough to stand in the pocket and look down the barrel of a gun and take the hit."

"There's not a lot of quarterbacks in the league that do that. Most quarterbacks don't like getting hit. They get hit and they turn into a totally different person.''

How does football fit into the new civility? As Original Mike said in the comments yesterday:

Oh, great. The Packers are playing the Bears for the NFC championship and it's "let's all be civil" week.

Maybe a civil AFC game would make more sense, but I'd rather watch Roethlisberger look down the barrel of a gun and take the hit. (I've got to admit, it seems wrong to write that... even though Sports Illustrated wrote it.