Friday’s Forum
Steven L. Taylor
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Friday, October 4, 2024
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32 comments
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About Steven L. Taylor
Steven L. Taylor is a Professor Emeritus of Political Science and former College of Arts and Sciences Dean. His main areas of expertise include parties, elections, and the institutional design of democracies. His most recent book is the co-authored
A Different Democracy: American Government in a 31-Country Perspective. He earned his Ph.D. from the University of Texas and his BA from the University of California, Irvine. He has been blogging since 2003 (originally at the now defunct Poliblog).
Follow Steven on
Twitter and/or
BlueSky.
I hope the October narrative of the Harris Walz campaign pivots to (or adds) the theme that Trump is just a blowhard and a phony, all talk but delivering nothing. It’s true, and it may reach some of his less fanatical voters (think spouses of MAGAts), or at least discourage them from showing up.
Dream on…
@MarkedMan: @Mister Bluster:
We don’t need a single MAGA to vote for Kamala, we just need about 2% of them to stay home. This is going to be (conventional wisdom spouted here) a turnout election. Their motivation vs. ours. Their GOTV vs. ours.
Both the administration and the longshoreman’s union cited the efforts of Pete Buttigieg in ending the dock strike.
I realize that I’m fangirling here, but I really hope to see him in the top spot one day.
Oh, and hey:
U.S. Hiring Surges, Surpassing Expectations
I’m sure our resident Trumpers will be by momentarily with some conspiracy nonsense or similar.
This is a very detailed explanation of what Israel can and cannot do to Iran from a logistics guy. Bottom line: they could probably hit two of Iran’s nuclear facilities with bunker busters. I don’t think we would help them aside from intel. The Saudis could theoretically help with mid-air refueling, but a) I doubt the KSA’s air force has been practicing operations with the IAF, and b) that’d be a very big commitment, even though Saudi would love to see Iran’s nukes blown up.
I would love @Andy or someone else with more detailed knowledge to weigh in, but when I hear that Iran has dispersed their nuclear supply chain, I focus on the words, ‘dispersed’ and ‘supply chain’. ‘Dispersed’ does not mean, ‘duplicated.’ You don’t need to break every link in a chain, just one – as we learned in the aftermath of Covid.
@Jen: Since the Longshore strike is still a current topic, I’ll note that the Longshore worker that I used to have lunch with on Friday when I worked warehousing made roughly twice what I made. I made $15.30-something/hour. That was in Seattle with strong unions.
It was also 1985. When I heard that these workers were making ~$39/hr., my reaction was that workers have lost a lot of ground given how “good” the American economy has been and continues to be in spite of setbacks.
A possible solution to the Fermi Paradox: all high tech civilizations with interstellar communications potential, have had their SETI/CETI efforts proxmired.
I read early on that West Coast Longshoreman make almost twice what East Coasters do, and that’s the reason for the high demands, but I haven’t seen this mentioned since.
@Kathy: Given that any high-tech societies may well be/probably are light years distant from one another, proxmiring SETI/CETI initiatives may well be the rational response.
So, Marjorie Taylor Greene is at the “THEY CONTROL THE WEATHER!!!!” phase of her descent into madness. Any bests on who “they” are in her tweet?
@just nutha:
Well, given most stars are light years away from other stars, it is self evident most technological civilizations would be light years from each other 😉
IMO, nearly 65 years of SETI efforts show there are no advanced civilizations in great numbers. Or at least not nearby. But the plain truth is we have too little to go on to even speculate intelligently. We know of one life bearing planet and one sentient species. We can’t generalize from that.
Something that doesn’t get mentioned often in these discussions, is that we know of only one planet with land life. This is relevant, because a great deal of technology depends on fire in order to exist. If every other star has a planet inhabited by ultra-intelligent sea creatures, they won’t ever progress much past the stone age. Not unless 1) they are contacted by air breathers who can help them make things, or 2) they figure out a means of working outside of the water.
So the speculations get wilder, and we find no facts.
Forty years ago today, my agent called to tell me my first novel had been bought.
@CSK: Happy Anniversary! Care to share the title? Totally understand if not.
@CSK:..Forty years ago today…
1984
I live in a very large 55+ community in Florida. It’s on the East Coast, just south of Boca Raton. For a Florida 55+ community it’s pretty moderate politically, probably slightly blue. Went to the gym this morning, on the way back stopped at the deli in the community to get some bagel chips. On the way out two guys sitting in a bench talking loudly about how horrible Harris is and how great it will be when Trump is president again. I’ve learned not to talk politics with 80+ white men, they’re often nutjobs. Just about out of earshot, then heard one say how “Harris only got the job because she’s colored”. I turned and said “how the hell can you vote for a rapist for president”. He prattled on about how safe the border was under Trump, and then said that Biden was just going after Trump and he didn’t do any of the things he’s accused of. I came back with a measured he’s a rapist, a traitor and a thief. He came back with she’s dumb as an iron pole (never heard that one before). Then I totally lost it, and told him he was a brain dead racist, and said my seven-month-old granddaughter cared more about this country then he did. The whole time the other guy just told his friend to drop it. I think my parting shot was that if I had a company, I wouldn’t hire Trump to shovel shit, and I’m sorry if I insulted shit shovelers because they do an honest day’s work. My wife always tells me not to talk politics with anyone you don’t know, and she’s probably right. But I felt pretty damn good afterwards.
@Lucysfootball: I feel your pain. The last 10-15 years have been brutal on interpersonal relations. Not just neighbors but families. I don’t see the end of it. Facebook friends muted. Family phone calls occurring less frequently. The initial promise of the internet and social media was that people’s voices would be empowered; that people would be heard. The reality is that people find themselves powerless and alone; that they are really insignificant among millions. And it is driving people nuts. And, in reaction, driving the rise of authoritarianism in an attempt to find meaning.
@Mister Bluster:
That’s not it. 😀
@Kathy:
And such will probably always be the case given that any information we acquire will be thousands/millions/billions of years old by the time we acquire it. We should invest our efforts closer to home given that we barely understand ourselves.
@just nutha:
All astronomical information is old. Cosmological data is ancient.
A few years ago, we didn’t even know for certain there were any planets around other stars. Today we have detected many, and can pretty much conclude a vast majority of stars, if not all, have planets.
What will we learn in another 20 years?
@Kathy: I havc no idea about what we will learn astronomically/cosmologically over the next 20 years. I’m skeptical that anything we learn in that arena will make us wiser or more concerned about humanity– (ETA:) our own or as our own relates to our relationships with others, but I’m just skeptical like that.
@Just nutha ignint cracker:
I’ll skip the reductio (this time), and point out that having another exemplar of sentient, rational beings, even if long gone, would help a great deal in understanding ourselves.
@Kathy: Saw a SETI paper once from a few years ago in which they said that aside from a few military strength radars (a rather highly intermittent transmission -and directional) they could not detect ourselves just a hand full of light years away. Even our high-wattage AM radio transmissions are, compared to the RF generated by stars, as close to nothing as makes no difference…and in just a handful of decades we have moved away from that method of communications ourselves. It’s quite likely a civilization far advanced of our own would’ve too. Pretty crude stuff.
So it seems that despite Fermi being Fermi, his paradox is quite silly. Only that his name is on it makes it a thing. It’s akin to the Europeans who refused to believe in the existence of gorillas in the earliest days of the Age of Exploration, y arguing “Than where are they??”
@Lucysfootball:
Not Deerfield Beach
CemeteryCentury Village?I live in a 55+ community in Florida. It’s on the East Coast, just north of Boca Raton. Don’t know if 14 buildings (with either 56 or 72 condos in each) qualifies as large or not.
@Kathy: I’m glad someone believes that. Go in peace.
@Bill Jempty: Bingo, I live in CVE. Just became full time a little over a year ago. CVE has 253 buildings, a total of about 8,500 units. About 13,000 people during season, about half full time. Guessing you live in Delray or Boynton.
@Lucysfootball:
That was a good guess by me! I’m old enough to remember Red Buttons doing CV commercials.
My family moved to Florida in 1976 and from July that year to June 1979 when I went in the Navy, I lived in Lighthouse Point. I’m also a graduate of Deerfield Beach High School. So I know Northern Broward very well.
That qualifies as a large se
As for the politics of my neighbors, I avoid those things. My 90-year old neighbor who can’t drive anymore and who I take to Publix once a week (In trade for me using his parking space) has expressed his support for Trump. Another neighbor had a vehicle with a Trump bumper sticker.
Boynton Beach resident here. I’ve lived in PB County since 1989.
@Bill Jempty: If the one guy hadn’t made the colored remark I would have hurried away, but that just set me off. I know it accomplished nothing but I felt really good after the incident. As I said, CVE is probably slightly more Democratic than Republican. If you haven’t seen this website, you can use it to see what party your full time neighbors are:
https://voterrecords.com/street/berkshire+b-deerfield+beach-fl/
Something that has bothered me about the scientists who say damn near every star they examine they can detect an object between that star and us. Scale models of our system show that if the sun was the size of a basketball, Jupiter would be a small marble about half a mile away. Our planetary “disk” is extremely narrow, and anyone who could detect planets crossing between them and our sun from another star system would have to be in an extremely narrow band of alignment…or they would see nothing.
We should only be able to detect planets by this method in a very small minority of other stars, even if every star has them.
@dazedandconfused:
There are several methods for detecting exoplanets.
The two I can comprehend and kind of explain are:
1) When a planet passes between its star and us, the stars luminosity decreases. If you think this would mean by an infinitesimal amount, you’d be right. Instruments can be that sensitive. But also, one measurement or sighting is nothing. It takes several to obtain confirmation. This is why most exoplanets detected are hot jupiters. They are large, which means the occlude more light, and they orbit their stars in a short time, meaning repeat measurements take months rather than years.
2) A planet can also tug on its star, causing it to jiggle a bit. Again, yes, the movements are tiny and the instruments sensitive. And again this method also favors hot jupiters.
Other kinds of planets have been found. Smaller terrestrial type planets. Large jovian type worlds orbiting at more reasonable distances, not closer to their star than Mercury to ours. But these take longer to verify.
And yes, we are limited by what planets we can find by line of sight and other limitations.
BTW, no one has seen an exoplanet. But astronomers can deduce some data about them, like size and mass. It should be possible to isolate and analyze starlight filtered through the atmosphere of an exoplanet to determine its composition via spectroscopy. I’m not sure this has been done yet.
If you want a thorough explanation, I recommend The Search for Exoplanets Great Courses lectures.
Why I can no longer trust Silver’s punditry:
“ Last update: 1:30 p.m., Friday, October 4. Another day, another few polls added to the model, and still very little change to the overall forecast. At the moment Harris has an ever-so-slight edge — she has a 56 percent chance of winning the election to Trump’s 44 percent chance — but we’re about as close to a pure tossup as you can get.
Harris is still hurt by Electoral College bias though. She leads by 3.1 points in our national polling average but only 1.3 points in the Pennsylvania average. And the model thinks there’s a 21 percent chance Harris wins the popular vote but loses the Electoral College.”
All true based on the offered data.
But Harris is up by “only 1.3 points” in PA… compared to Trump’s lead of .5 in NC, 1 in Georgia, and 1.2 in Arizona. All of those are battleground states and [double checks math] smaller leads than Harris’s in PA. And smaller than her leads in other battleground states (1.9 in MI, 2 in WI, 1.8 in NV). So of the 7 big battlegrounds, the only one he comments on is Harris’s weakest with the framing of “only.”
Kick rocks, dude.
@Kazzy:
PA has the most EC votes, it is considerably more difficult to get to 270 without PA than without any of the other 6.
MI + WI + PA gets to 270 while MI + WI + NV does not.
For MI + WI + only one other, only PA works.
Or, for Trump,
PA + NC + GA gets to 270.
Which is why both campaigns are paying so very much attention to PA.
Harris can not win without at least one out of PA or NC or GA.