Beyond Labels

I promised to send a letter to Sen. Angus King to inquire about the background and format of the recent North Woods monument meetings. Since the Senator’s web site has an email “form” instead of an email address, here’s a copy of what I sent:

A couple of questions about the North Woods Monument

Senator King:

First of all, thank you for hosting National Park Service Director Jarvis in the two meetings to discuss the possible designation of Katahdin region land as a national monument. I think it is important for those most affected by the proposal to have a voice in the decision.

Two questions about the format of and publicity surrounding the meetings:

1) From your May 13, 2016 press release, it seems as if the format for the two meetings was also quite different, in that the general public was not invited to speak at the E. Millinocket meeting and, instead, only certain public officials were allowed to participate in the discussion. As indicated above, I’m very interested in hearing what the local folks have to say about the proposed monument, not just their elected officials. And, if the argument is to be made that these elected representatives are an adequate voice for the citizenry, it seems most fair to have adopted the same format in Orono.

What drove the choice of format for the E. Millinocket and Orono meetings? Was it done at the request of the local officials, Director Jarvis, your office or some other group?

2) I note that only the Orono meeting is available as a YouTube webcast. From what I’ve read, the attendees at the Orono meeting were of a substantailly different “composition” than those attending the E. Millinocket meeting–at least that’s what the op-ed writers seem to think–with E. Millinocket being attended mostly by people who live in the region and Orono being attended by a much broader swath of Mainers. In that light, I’d be very interested to see a video of the E. Millinocket meeting to see what those closest to the proposed monument had to say.

Is such a video available? If not, a transcript of the meeting? If not, why not? It would be unfortunate to stifle the publicity available to these (E. Millinocket attendees’) voices in the public dialogue.

Thank you again for fostering local dialogue on this subject and connecting those with an interest in the subject to the corresponding Federal government organization.

Scott Miller
Blue Hill, ME

Views about meeting on Katahdin-area national monument. Pointless meeting, says Pine Tree Politics (PTP),  a feature of Bangor Daily News that describes itself as:

The initial focus of PTP was to offer quality coverage, analysis, reporting and commentary with a distinctly center-right point of view.  What began as only superficial regurgitations of the daily news quickly grew into its own as a center for breaking news, biting commentary, and detailed analysis.

A while back I wrote a post recommending Reddit, here on BL and here on my personal blog.

I’ve been reading several of these subs, and find them informative. Kind of Beyond Labels for the rest of the week.

For example, from: /r/PoliticalDiscussion

..the reality is if the GOP put up a half-dead monkey and the Dems put up a ham sandwich, both should poll over 40%.

The Daily Kos has actually proposed that the Dems should run a  Ham Sandwich for President.

The sandwich has a facebook page Ham Sandwich for President

And its own website:  http://hamsandwichforpresident.com.

So fine, the Dems have the ham sandwich. Where’s the half-dead monkey? Oh, I guess it’s Trump.

Other reddit subs that are interesting (have not browsed them all):

/r/Neutral Politics
/r/NeutralTalk
/r/AskSocialScience
/r/ChangeMyView
/r/Economics
/r/EconPapers
/r/ModeratePolitics
/r/Politics
/r/Scholar
/r/TrueReddit
/r/PoliticalFactChecking

Al Franken for Vice President.  Former Senator, and author of the best selling book: “Rush Limbaugh is a Big Fat Idiot” and a guy who can go head-to-head with Trump.

How do we deal with cited authority? Some of us think that the Democrats do a better job of making their arguments. I think liberals do a crappy job, because the terms of discussion already tilt to the right. Debate “entitlements” and the debate is already lost. Or “right to work” laws.  George Lakoff is the guy who as made the argument about Framing  in his book “Don’t think of an elephant.”  NY times article on Lakoff and the framing wars. The problem is that too many people are caught up in the framing theory, and not enough in making good arguents.

A better argument from a non-academic is: “The Ass is a Poor Receptacle for the Head” which takes apart the Democrats for using crappy, weak terminology. He says Democrats should have referred to the Iraq war as “The Bush War” and the “Great Recession” as “The Bush Recession” and hammered the point home, again and again. It may not be entirely true, but it sure as hell would have been effective.

Warren Buffett’s says his tax rate is lower than his Secretary.  Not he pays less taxes, but that his rate is lower.  Disagreement from Forbes which argues that Employment Taxes shouldn’t count. Why? And “assuming a conservative corporate federal tax rate of 25%, Berkshire will ultimately pay $4.76 billion in federal corporate income taxes on this taxable income. ” Well, not quite.  According to the GAO:

However, the average corporate tax rate in 2011 dipped to 12.1%, its lowest level since before World War I

This from the firebrand left-leaning Wall Street Journal

Author of Pipi Longstocking had a marginal rate of 102%.

Stackexchange and do this. Author here.

Can elections be bought? Candidates who outspent opponents won 95% of elections according to “Lets free Congress” This may be correlation rather than causation. If you know a guy is going to win, it might worthwhile giving him or her some money to spend. Why? Soros: Money can’t buy elections. It can buy influence

Open secrets on influence.

Stanislav Petrov and Vasily Arkapov are two Russians we should all be grateful to. Each of them took action that probably prevented nuclear war.  Five close calls.

Could this have happened in the US?

Story of John Bordne, and refutation in Stars and Stripes. So who knows.

“From 1962, when John F Kennedy instituted PAL encoding on nuclear weapons, until 1977, the combination to fire the devastating missiles at the height of the Cold War was just 00000000.

Student loan forgiveness Dangers of from Forbes.

Robocalling arms race. It doesn’t take a lot of intelligence to make marketing calls.  So why not AI? And it doesn’t take a lot to create something that will foil people making marketing calls. So why not AI?

On the consumer’s side: Jolly Roger Telephone Company is a simpleminded AI that wastes telemarketers time. Here’s a YouTube video (audio, really) of his program at work.

On the enemy side: Samantha West is an AI that claims to be a person, and does a pretty good job.

Conversica is an AI that sends out email and handles initial interaction.

More analysis of the rise of AI in marketing here. And some examples here

Debate.org on AI in marketing  “Will artificial intelligence/robots eventually eliminate company call centers with human representatives?”

Outbound robocalls

Action Solutions, interactive calls.

Latest Predictit odds on Republicans winning the election.

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Trumpublican trademarked by Trump campaign, later abandoned. Story. Trademark record.

More detailed analysis on percentage depletion.

Urban dictionary.

History of tax breaks.

More details on tax breaks — mainly corporate, assuming tax breaks for alternative energy, and some personal. Does not include the largest individual tax breaks.

As Women Take Over a Male-Dominated Field, the Pay Drops. 

Difference between national parks and national monuments:

The primary difference lies in the reason for preserving the land: National parks are protected due to their scenic, inspirational, education, and recreational value. National monuments have objects of historical, cultural, and/or scientific interest, so their content is quite varied.

Oil depletion allowance, is not what I thought it was.

Power, Persuasion and Attractiveness

Money spent on Indian affairs about 2.8 Bn.

Indian boarding schools  particularly Carlisle Indian Industrial School

Opposition to national monument

Bill on Monument in Maine goes to LePage’s desk

Trump/Clinton Persuasion techniques

Trump policy details

So what do you do if you want to persuade voters but you don’t want to give policy details that are nothing but targets for critics? A trained persuader would create a situation in which everyone can see whatever they want to see. Trump literally takes both sides of the issues whenever he can. As a candidate, he’s a human Rorschach test. I might see in Trump a skilled persuader who always makes aggressive opening offers, and you might see a future dictator. We are looking at the same set of facts but we are primed by our experiences to interpret them differently. I study persuasion in all its forms and perhaps you watch the History Channel too much. Trump’s persuasion strategy depends on a growing number of voters finding something they like about him and fewer people reflexively making History Channel analogies. So far, it seems to be working. You’ll see Trump’s strategy fully-flowered over the summer. Watch for how many different reasons people offer for why they support him. That’s your tell.

Younger Dryas Period

Putin taking back royalty

Atlantic article on “Who are Trump’s supporter?”

Selling encyclopedias