VAST: ICELAND from Sean Stiegemeier on Vimeo.
The latest in a series I call, "places I've seen videos of, and my sister has visited." Averaged together, we travel quite a lot compared to the average person.
Thursday, January 17, 2019
VAST: ICELAND
The latest in a series I call, "places I've seen videos of, and my sister has visited." Averaged together, we travel quite a lot compared to the average person.
Sunday, January 13, 2019
Mid-January Links
Interesting stories from the last week or two:
Mike Trout is the God of WAR - FiveThirtyEight. Video.
Female Ranchers Are Reclaiming the American West – New York Times
Court Strikes Down Iowa's 'Ag-Gag' Law That Blocked Undercover Investigations - NPR
Meet The Granary Weevil, The Pantry Monster Of Our Own Creation - The Salt (via my old boss)
Fire, Floods and Famine: The Pessimist's Guide to 2019 - Bloomberg. Even I hope this is too far-fetched.
Small Weasel-Like Animals Are Taking Down Big Cats – National Geographic
Norway Embarks On Its Most Ambitious Transport Project Yet – NPR. Floating bridges and tunnels? I'll let somebody else design those.
This GIF shows how far the 100th Meridian has shifted since 1980 – Grist
This is how Canada’s housing correction begins – McLean’s
Meet The Woman Turning The Payday Loan Industry On Its Head – Forbes. Trying to work up a low-interest payday loan replacement was one of my not-for-profit goals.
The French Burglar Who Pulled Off His Generation’s Biggest Art Heist – The New Yorker
Taleb the Philosopher – First Things
The Grand Illusion – Lapham’s Quarterly
After the Storm – The Baffler
Learn about the Iowa district that re-elects Steve King year after year - Des Moines Register
Mike Trout is the God of WAR - FiveThirtyEight. Video.
Female Ranchers Are Reclaiming the American West – New York Times
Court Strikes Down Iowa's 'Ag-Gag' Law That Blocked Undercover Investigations - NPR
Meet The Granary Weevil, The Pantry Monster Of Our Own Creation - The Salt (via my old boss)
Fire, Floods and Famine: The Pessimist's Guide to 2019 - Bloomberg. Even I hope this is too far-fetched.
Small Weasel-Like Animals Are Taking Down Big Cats – National Geographic
Norway Embarks On Its Most Ambitious Transport Project Yet – NPR. Floating bridges and tunnels? I'll let somebody else design those.
This GIF shows how far the 100th Meridian has shifted since 1980 – Grist
This is how Canada’s housing correction begins – McLean’s
Meet The Woman Turning The Payday Loan Industry On Its Head – Forbes. Trying to work up a low-interest payday loan replacement was one of my not-for-profit goals.
The French Burglar Who Pulled Off His Generation’s Biggest Art Heist – The New Yorker
Taleb the Philosopher – First Things
The Grand Illusion – Lapham’s Quarterly
After the Storm – The Baffler
Learn about the Iowa district that re-elects Steve King year after year - Des Moines Register
Here's an update of what was called last year as "One of the most important charts about the economy this century.” Price Changes of selected consumer goods and services over the last ~20 years. It made the rounds at the Fed last year. @ritholtz @slangwise @AEI @MichaelRStrain pic.twitter.com/pt8UEJSIL5— Mark J. Perry (@Mark_J_Perry) January 11, 2019
Monday, January 7, 2019
Early January Links
It looks like the National Championship game might end up 54-52 or something. Here are a few links for your reading pleasure:
The Ball Family Circus Comes To Ohio - Deadspin
Chicago Catholics struggle to build future with fewer priests as parishes shrink, cash dwindles – Chicago Tribune. Not surprising, but kind of sad anyway.
St. Louis city and county: Divorced in 1876. Remarried in 2020? – St. Louis Post-Dispatch. The massive number of municipalities in St. Louis County is crazy. One only has 13 residents.
Wettest-Year Records for 2018, Take Two – Weather Underground. So much rain.
Scientists Have 'Hacked Photosynthesis' In Search Of More Productive Crops - The Salt
Putin says Russia will supply soy beans, poultry meat to China – Reuters. Probably just bullshit to rock the boat politically, but we really are shooting ourselves in the foot.
The Farm Bureau: Big Oil’s Unnoticed Ally Fighting Climate Science and Policy – Inside Climate News
Fracking’s Secret Problem—Oil Wells Aren’t Producing as Much as Forecast – Wall Street Journal
Trump Has Promised to Bring Jobs Back. His Tariffs Threaten to Send Them Away. - New York Times. The steel and aluminum tariffs just punish metal consuming manufacturers. More foot-shooting.
How Mark Burnett Resurrected Donald Trump as an Icon of American Success – The New Yorker
Donald Trump Was Never Vetted - New York Magazine. When people are voting for him because The Apprentice convinced them that Trump is a genius businessman, I'm not sure more vetting was going to convince them he's a fuckup.
American Exceptionalism Is a Dangerous Myth – New York Magazine.
The Businesspeople Who Have Helped Enable Steve King’s Rise - Iowa Informer. Looks like a who's who of Iowa business.
This Map Shows Where in the World the U.S. Military Is Combatting Terrorism – Smithsonian. It would almost be easier to show where the U.S. military isn't.
The Ball Family Circus Comes To Ohio - Deadspin
Chicago Catholics struggle to build future with fewer priests as parishes shrink, cash dwindles – Chicago Tribune. Not surprising, but kind of sad anyway.
St. Louis city and county: Divorced in 1876. Remarried in 2020? – St. Louis Post-Dispatch. The massive number of municipalities in St. Louis County is crazy. One only has 13 residents.
Wettest-Year Records for 2018, Take Two – Weather Underground. So much rain.
Scientists Have 'Hacked Photosynthesis' In Search Of More Productive Crops - The Salt
Putin says Russia will supply soy beans, poultry meat to China – Reuters. Probably just bullshit to rock the boat politically, but we really are shooting ourselves in the foot.
The Farm Bureau: Big Oil’s Unnoticed Ally Fighting Climate Science and Policy – Inside Climate News
Fracking’s Secret Problem—Oil Wells Aren’t Producing as Much as Forecast – Wall Street Journal
Trump Has Promised to Bring Jobs Back. His Tariffs Threaten to Send Them Away. - New York Times. The steel and aluminum tariffs just punish metal consuming manufacturers. More foot-shooting.
How Mark Burnett Resurrected Donald Trump as an Icon of American Success – The New Yorker
Donald Trump Was Never Vetted - New York Magazine. When people are voting for him because The Apprentice convinced them that Trump is a genius businessman, I'm not sure more vetting was going to convince them he's a fuckup.
American Exceptionalism Is a Dangerous Myth – New York Magazine.
The Businesspeople Who Have Helped Enable Steve King’s Rise - Iowa Informer. Looks like a who's who of Iowa business.
This Map Shows Where in the World the U.S. Military Is Combatting Terrorism – Smithsonian. It would almost be easier to show where the U.S. military isn't.
Sunday, January 6, 2019
Cellulosic Ethanol Holy Grail?
60 Minutes:
Video after the jump.
Perhaps Medoff's most consequential discovery is how to extract the plant sugars and convert them into to environmentally-friendly biofuels: ethanol, gasoline and jet fuel. Lesley Stahl: And I'm told that you call this thing a still. Marshall Medoff: It is a still. Lesley Stahl: It is a still? Marshall Medoff: It's actually making alcohol right now. Alcohol that you can drink, or you can put in your car, or you can do both. Marshall Medoff: Here we are, on the road again. Lesley Stahl: So Marshall, I am driving a huge truck on biomass fuel. It doesn't feel any different than normal gas to me. Marshall Medoff: No. It wouldn't. No. Medoff's ethanol is much better than regular corn ethanol in terms of greenhouse gas emissions - 77 percent better, according to a study that was independently reviewed.This is definitely worth watching. I have no idea if this can be scaled up, but it would seem to be more promising than previous efforts. Of course, there was no information about how much biomass would have to be harvested in order to produce 30% of petroleum used in the country, but it takes 30 to 40 million acres of corn to produce 10% of the gasoline we consume. I'd probably still take the side saying this won't work out.
Video after the jump.
Thursday, January 3, 2019
Deep Tunnel, Deep Trouble?
 + |
| credit: Lisa Larson-Walker |
Slate has a nice piece which takes a look at the Chicago Deep Tunnel sewer project (formerly the TARP), and the challenges it faces keeping up with the greater intensity rains which appear to be a part of climate change. The project scale is massive:
Altogether, 109 miles of subway-size tunnel lie beneath Chicago and its suburbs, covering more miles than the L, culminating in three suburban reservoirs (not the kind you drink from)...The gist of the project is that many of Chicago's sewers handle both sewage and stormwater. When the city would get almost any rain, the sewers would be overwhelmed, basements would be flooded with sewage, and untreated waste would be dumped in the rivers. So the city came up with this crazy project to build giant tunnels a couple hundred feet underground to divert the excess flow to giant reservoirs to hold it until it could be pumped through the treatment plant, where it would be treated and released. Obviously, the cost of such a program is astronomical. On top of the cost, the changing climate has been a game-changer:
Fitzpatrick drives me to McCook Reservoir, the mammoth holding pen, opened in late 2017, for the tunnels that run beneath the Chicago and Des Plaines rivers. We stand on the edge of a pit that can hold 3.5 billion gallons of wastewater, enough to fill the Empire State Building and then some. It doesn’t smell terrible, thanks to floating aerators and because the pool has dwindled to 30 feet deep—Friday’s leftovers from a half-inch of rain on Tuesday. At the far end we can see the circular tunnel mouth leading downtown. The city’s wastewater netherworld has its own Chicago-centric measurement system. Lake Michigan is elevation 0. The pumping-station control room, on a little hillock, is +25, or 25 feet above the lake. The roaring motors that empty McCook after the rain sit at -297, 30 stories below ground.Behind us, the second section of McCook—which will more than double the holding capacity of the Mainstream Tunnel—is being excavated by gigantic mining trucks. Vulcan Materials, the country’s largest vendor of crushed rock, is digging millions of cubic yards of limestone out of the ground.
“The large and costly deep tunnel-reservoir system in Chicago is not adequate” to handle 50-year storms, Changnon wrote of the impacts from a September 2008 storm that caused the evacuation of more than 10,000 homes in the region. The Chicago Tribune reported that in the four years after the tunnels were completed in 2006, the MWRD released nearly 19 billion gallons of stormwater into Lake Michigan compared to 12 billion gallons in the preceding 22 years. Similarly, there have been 24 incidents of sewer overflow in the lake since the first tunnel came online in 1985, compared to about 21 in the previous 40 years. Then, in February 2018, after McCook had opened, tripling the capacity of the main tunnel, a big rainstorm filled the new 3.5 billion-gallon reservoir and sent another 3.8 billion gallons of sewage into local waterways....By the time I visited in November, McCook Reservoir had filled to capacity five separate times. Chicago’s multibillion-dollar anti-flooding system is already struggling to keep up with the region’s larger and more frequent storms.As the article notes, the change in storm intensity over the 50-year construction timeframe exceeded the designers' imaginations. The scary part is that the combined sewers were also a result of lack of foresight by their designers. They were glad at that time to get the sewage out of the gutters and away from the city. Later, they had to re-engineer the Chicago River so that the sewage wouldn't foul the water intakes and cause disease outbreaks. Then, development caused massive flooding because the sewers weren't able to handle the increases in runoff from all of the pavement laid over the formerly pervious soil. Now that they have designed a system to handle the overflows, climate change is causing more intense rainstorms with longer durations. None of our storm infrastructure is built for it. I've been out of the civil field for almost 10 years, so I'm not even sure if the powers-that-be have even tried to grapple with what our design standards should be under the new climate regime. That should terrify people. It sure does me.
Monday, December 31, 2018
End of Year Links and New Year's Resolutions
2018 was a pretty bad year, both for this blog and for the world. 2019 might be better, but I have my doubts. Here are a bunch of links I've saved from the last part of the year:
My Dad's Friendship With Charles Barkley – NPR Only A Game. This is a great read.
#CardCorner: 1958 Topps Wally Post - National Baseball Hall of Fame. Local legend from St. Henry, Ohio.
Nebraska vs. Oklahoma State in an old-school battle in South Dakota? How did that happen? - Omaha World-Herald. Here because of the gym.
The game of their lives was 25 years ago. They’re still replaying it in their minds. - Washington Post
How Christmas evolved from raucous carnival to domestic holiday - The Economist
A Storm and a Strike Hit Blueberry Giant's Global Supply Plans – Bloomberg
TREADING WATER | Unfocused and underfunded, goal of cleaner water falters – Cedar Rapids Gazette
Uncertain fate awaits quirky Rochester landmark – Minnesota Public Radio
40 million Americans depend on the Colorado River. It’s drying up. - Grist
As oil and gas exports surge, West Texas becomes the world’s “extraction colony” - Texas Tribune
Oklahoma’s Future Rests in the Hands of Two Very Different Oil Billionaires - Bloomberg
Dr. Elon & Mr. Musk: Life Inside Tesla's Production Hell – Wired
The Genius Neuroscientist Who Might Hold the Key to True AI – Wired
Bizarre ‘dark fluid’ with negative mass could dominate the universe – what my research suggests – The Conversation
Indiana's 'broken arrow' — that time 5 nuclear bombs got caught fire – Indianapolis Star. How we survived the Cold War I will never know.
Austin Rising - Louisville Courier-Journal. A series on Austin, Indiana, where an HIV outbreak in 2015 linked to IV drug use shocked the Midwest.
Losing the Farm - Belt Magazine
The Corruption of the Republican Party – George Packer
The Plot Against America – The Atlantic. Paul Manafort
A college kid running for 13th Ward alderman gets a lesson in the Chicago Way – Chicago Tribune
The godfather of fake news – BBC
King of the Low Road – The Weekly Standard
These charts show how Democrats represent the growing modern economy – and how Republicans are left behind - CNBC
Finally, for the resolutions. One, I'm going to have to start exercising. I am not looking forward to that. Two, I'm going to have to take on a lot of maintenance projects this year. Finally, I'm going to try to get back into regular blogging, with at least two posts a week. We'll see how that goes.
My Dad's Friendship With Charles Barkley – NPR Only A Game. This is a great read.
#CardCorner: 1958 Topps Wally Post - National Baseball Hall of Fame. Local legend from St. Henry, Ohio.
Nebraska vs. Oklahoma State in an old-school battle in South Dakota? How did that happen? - Omaha World-Herald. Here because of the gym.
The game of their lives was 25 years ago. They’re still replaying it in their minds. - Washington Post
How Christmas evolved from raucous carnival to domestic holiday - The Economist
A Storm and a Strike Hit Blueberry Giant's Global Supply Plans – Bloomberg
TREADING WATER | Unfocused and underfunded, goal of cleaner water falters – Cedar Rapids Gazette
Uncertain fate awaits quirky Rochester landmark – Minnesota Public Radio
40 million Americans depend on the Colorado River. It’s drying up. - Grist
As oil and gas exports surge, West Texas becomes the world’s “extraction colony” - Texas Tribune
Oklahoma’s Future Rests in the Hands of Two Very Different Oil Billionaires - Bloomberg
Dr. Elon & Mr. Musk: Life Inside Tesla's Production Hell – Wired
The Genius Neuroscientist Who Might Hold the Key to True AI – Wired
Bizarre ‘dark fluid’ with negative mass could dominate the universe – what my research suggests – The Conversation
Indiana's 'broken arrow' — that time 5 nuclear bombs got caught fire – Indianapolis Star. How we survived the Cold War I will never know.
Austin Rising - Louisville Courier-Journal. A series on Austin, Indiana, where an HIV outbreak in 2015 linked to IV drug use shocked the Midwest.
Losing the Farm - Belt Magazine
The Corruption of the Republican Party – George Packer
The Plot Against America – The Atlantic. Paul Manafort
A college kid running for 13th Ward alderman gets a lesson in the Chicago Way – Chicago Tribune
The godfather of fake news – BBC
King of the Low Road – The Weekly Standard
These charts show how Democrats represent the growing modern economy – and how Republicans are left behind - CNBC
Finally, for the resolutions. One, I'm going to have to start exercising. I am not looking forward to that. Two, I'm going to have to take on a lot of maintenance projects this year. Finally, I'm going to try to get back into regular blogging, with at least two posts a week. We'll see how that goes.
Thursday, November 22, 2018
Thanksgiving Mini-Links: Sports Traditions Edition
Here are a couple sports stories for your Turkey Day, and an Onion sweetener:
St. Dot’s vs. St. Bernie’s: A Drexel Hill football tradition spanning six decades - Philadelphia Inquirer
Doyel: Students will run for miles to maintain this Indiana basketball tradition - Indianapolis Star
How Turkey Trots Became a Thanksgiving Tradition - New York Times
Does Thanksgiving Glorify The Historical Slaughter Of The Detroit Lions - The Onion - I'm pretty sure grandpa will mention at some time during the day that the Lions used to play the Bears every year on Thanksgiving Day (not true-the Packers have a better claim for that).
St. Dot’s vs. St. Bernie’s: A Drexel Hill football tradition spanning six decades - Philadelphia Inquirer
Doyel: Students will run for miles to maintain this Indiana basketball tradition - Indianapolis Star
How Turkey Trots Became a Thanksgiving Tradition - New York Times
Does Thanksgiving Glorify The Historical Slaughter Of The Detroit Lions - The Onion - I'm pretty sure grandpa will mention at some time during the day that the Lions used to play the Bears every year on Thanksgiving Day (not true-the Packers have a better claim for that).
Wednesday, November 7, 2018
The Day After
Wow. I had gone into the election thinking that voters nationwide would have seen through Trump's lies and bigotry. People in cities and suburbs did, but folks in rural areas just want to drink from the fire hose (with Steve King, how bigoted does one have to be to lose?). In that respect, Trump was vindicated, so we can expect more of the same in the next two years. In Ohio, Republicans cruised. No incumbents in the state legislature lost. Based on the Kansas and Wisconsin examples, the Republican party has to completely drive the state into the ground before they lose a statewide election. I personally was hoping to avoid that, but I think that is what will happen. For example, our next State Representative, like much of the rest of the legislature, wants to roll back Medicaid expansion. The only reason the state expanded Medicaid was because John Kasich did it by executive action. Now we have to depend on Mike DeWine and the health care lobby to keep it in place. If it were to be rolled back, rural areas and the people who live there will suffer, and some places may lose hospitals. I am sure we will get more useless tax cuts which strip resources from rural areas and put greater burdens on local populations, and more talk about rolling back regulations. I doubt that much on the regulatory front will actually happen, but I expect you won't see DeWine pushing to deal with algae blooms in Grand Lake St. Mary's or Lake Erie, either. Overall, rural areas will continue to decline, and they will continue to work to drag the rest of the country down with them.
Tuesday, November 6, 2018
Election Day Live Blog
6:03 AM: Off to the polling place. I'm making sure my ballot gets cast. Don't worry, I won't be casting a single one for the Republican Party cult.
5:33 PM: Just got home from work and feeding the cows. Cracked a Troegs Scratch Series #342 Fest Lager. It is pretty damn good. I've got some work to do yet starting the grill and wood stove and feeding the calves. I should be settled in around 6. That's when the polls close in parts of Kentucky and Indiana (which are practically the same state).
6:01 PM: Fire is taking off and the grill is warming up. Polls are closed in most of Indiana. As is always the case, I don't expect anything good to come out of Indiana. Hopefully Joe Donnelly can eke out a win, but I am personally chalking the seat up as a loss to the GOP. Maybe I will be surprised.
6:18 PM: Just heard an interview on NPR with a FreeDumb caucus member who was repeating Jim Jordan's talking points about doing what they promise, even if it is miserably stupid. About the time I was wondering who it was, they said it was my useless Congressman, Warren Davidson. Fuck me.
6:44 PM: The first two stories on Marketplace tonight were about Foxconn and Amazon HQ2. One thing I would like to see come to an end are subsidy giveaways to multinational corporations. Maybe a Scott Walker loss will make politicians think twice about making outrageously foolish deals. Then again, lots of suckers think Donald Trump is some kind of expert negotiator. Maybe they ought to read about his negotiating prowess for The Art of the Deal.
6:53 PM: I wonder what the race will be the first one that news organizations call? Maybe Vermont governor (a Republican)?
6:59 PM: Just started on a Sam '76 out of the Sam Adams Winter Classics variety pack.
7:00 PM: CNN called Bernie and Tim Kaine as winners. How many times will we be told we are waiting on results from Lake County, Indiana (home of Gary)? Interesting side note, Crown Point is the county seat of Lake County.
7:05 PM: While we wait for results to come in, I emphasize enough how important it is that we see some results that indicate Trump's ridiculous minority and refugee scapegoating doesn't work. I'm afraid we'll see a Senate result which will cause him to double down on the crazy for the next two years. I'm not sure I could get through that with my sanity.
7:09 PM: Polls in Ohio close in about 20 minutes. Because of radical gerrymandering, we only have one (OH-12) or two (OH-1, which is doubtful) potential seat changes, barring a serious wave. The statewide races should be very interesting, though. I'm almost optimistic there.
7:15 PM: Election night distraction. Wes Goubeaux, I know you are looking forward to picking up some Reds 1939 merchandise:
7:21 PM: Also, this:
7:26 PM: No matter who wins, it may be a tough slog economically between today and the 2020 election
7:30 PM: Polls are closed in Ohio.
7:33 PM: I would expect the race is called for the Ohio 80th House district. Even though she really didn't campaign after the primary, I'm sure Jena Powell will win. That is unfortunate, because she is a truly useless right-wing nut. Her opponent, DJ Byrnes put together a couple of nice ads, but this district is ridiculously skewed to right-wing nutters.
7:39 PM: Kent State vs. Buffalo is on ESPNU.
7:44 PM: I can't believe college basketball is already here.
7:52 PM: My county's results came in. Powell beat Byrnes 68%-32%, while only repeating tripe about lowering taxes and cutting regulations that strangle business. I hate how big of suckers rural voters are.
7:57 PM: My county is so right-wing. Jim Renacci won 57% of the vote even though his campaign was a joke.
8:00 PM: Luckily, the rest of the state appears to have elected Sherrod Brown. Overall, Democrats seem to be doing well so far, nationally.
8:10 PM: I still can't believe how big the rural/urban divide is. Why do rural voters buy into the Republican bullshit about taxes when wealthier folks in cities and suburbs don't?
8:14 PM: I would like to see a Democratic sweep of Governors' races in the Midwest. It might be doable.
8:18 PM: When I was signing the election register, I saw my sister's name listed as an active voter, even though she's been out of the state for almost 20 years. She hadn't voted today. I tried checking the Ohio Secretary of State's listing of registered voters. I was there, but she wasn't. All I could figure was that she was one of the voters who got purged in recent years for not voting, but maybe her name was restored because the ACLU won a suit against the Secretary of State for removing voters from the rolls. Either that or my county is just incompetent, which is also likely.
8:24 PM: Indiana is looking bad for Donnelly, and thus, for the United States. Geez, I can't stand Hoosiers or Donald Trump.
8:34 PM: Why do rural voters, who claim they don't like how their local economies are going, keep voting for Republicans who never, ever give them any help? I just don't get it.
8:35 PM: Well, I don't get it if I don't take into account bigotry.
8:36 PM: I see the billionaire challenger in Illinois beat the nearly billionaire incumbent. Unfortunately, Illinois residents will get four more years of dysfunction. On the plus side, Rahner will probably be one of the few recent former governors of Illinois not to go to prison.
8:40 PM: Goddamn Florida.
8:42 PM: If Democrats aren't working tomorrow to register voters for 2020, they are insane. Donald Trump and his idiot base must lose.
8:44 PM: In good news, felons may have voting rights restored in Florida.
8:48 PM: Indiana is a shithole. Braun and Pence win.
8:52 PM: Things are not looking good for Democrats right now.
8:57 PM: Going to have to speed up the beer consumption.
9:03 PM: I still struggle so much with the idea that rural areas keep electing politicians who have no interest in helping out their constituents. It is just like the Brexit abortion. Rural voters are committing economic suicide electing conservatives.
9:11 PM: Trump is going to be off the hook for the foreseeable future. The United States is going to be screwed.
9:13 PM: This is insane. Who are all of these GOP voters, and why do they hate rationality?
9:17 PM: County-by-county results do not show Ohio suburbs breaking for Democrats.
9:23 PM: Donald Trump campaigned with an insane freakout about the caravan, and mountains of lies. Why on earth do people support him? Are they as big of assholes as he is?
9:29 PM: CNN is currently building up Beto O'Rourke. I dread watching his lead slip away, too, as it is one of the few bright spots on the map right now.
9:36 PM: So far it looks like Republican voters in Ohio didn't find out who the GOP was pushing for state Supreme Court. One bright spot for Democrats so far.
9:43 PM: If Democrats don't find those 1.6 million felons in Florida and get them registered to vote, they do not deserve to be called a political party.
9:52 PM: I understand why Ted Cruz is so unpopular, but how in the fuck can anybody like Donald Trump?
10:00 PM: It looks like urban and suburban voters are going to carry Democrats across the line to gain control of the House, which is a very good thing. However, rural results are so depressing that I'm chalking 2018 up as a loss. Rural areas are going to suffer miserably in the future.
10:02 PM: I see Kris Kobach is projected to lose. Thank God.
10:04 PM: Dem candidate wins Michigan, but Scott Walker is leading. WTF is wrong with Wisconsin?
10:09 PM: Warning to Ohio: Kansas has discovered how fucked up Republican governance is. Are we going to have to follow them clear to the bottom before we get some goddamn sense?
10:18 PM: Ted Cruz wins. Today sucks.
10:31 PM: How in the fuck is Mike DeWine winning? His campaign was godawful.
10:40 PM: The rural/urban split keeps getting worse, and rural voters keep getting more and more wrong. Brexit 2.0.
10:41 PM: Republican plus third party vote is 55-45 in Ohio. What the hell is going on?
10:59 PM:
Truth, and dominating in rural areas, but getting crushed outside of them.
11:26 PM: Right now, all I've got is the hope that Scott Walker loses.
11:29 PM:
11:35 PM: Oh, I also forgot about the possibility Steve King might lose.
12:01AM: There are a lot of things going on tonight. Somehow, Republicans swept all of the statewide executive offices. Oddly, I didn't really see any campaign ads for state Supreme Court justices, and they lost both seats (it appears). That is one tiny bright spot in a very depressing bunch of electoral result in Ohio. Regionally, Indiana is horrible as always. Michigan looks pretty good, as does Minnesota. Iowa could go either way, but it looks to remain with a Republican governor, but they lost at least one Congressional seat. If Scott Walker loses, I'll be smiling. Nationally, our Constitutional dysfunction gets worse. We have a popular vote loser sitting in the White House, while a minority of the population holds the Senate. It also appears the Democrats crushed Republicans nationally in the House. This will allow the Republicans to continue to stack the courts with lifetime appointments, giving them a generation of control of the only branch of government that can prevent Executive overreach. Additionally, the rural/urban split worsened. Nothing good will come of this. I dread our political (and economic) future.
12:08 AM: Also, racism won where it normally wins. That saddens me.
12:12 AM: Why in the fuck is that useless sack of shit Rick Santorum on CNN?
12:20 AM: Would Rick Santorum please shut the fuck up?
12:27 AM: How does a complete dumbass like Rick Santorum dominate the debate on CNN? Every other person at that table is smarter than him and has more useful stuff to say. This is a perfect example of what is wrong with our political discourse. I'm going over to Twitter and drinking until I have to go to sleep.
5:33 PM: Just got home from work and feeding the cows. Cracked a Troegs Scratch Series #342 Fest Lager. It is pretty damn good. I've got some work to do yet starting the grill and wood stove and feeding the calves. I should be settled in around 6. That's when the polls close in parts of Kentucky and Indiana (which are practically the same state).
6:18 PM: Just heard an interview on NPR with a FreeDumb caucus member who was repeating Jim Jordan's talking points about doing what they promise, even if it is miserably stupid. About the time I was wondering who it was, they said it was my useless Congressman, Warren Davidson. Fuck me.
6:44 PM: The first two stories on Marketplace tonight were about Foxconn and Amazon HQ2. One thing I would like to see come to an end are subsidy giveaways to multinational corporations. Maybe a Scott Walker loss will make politicians think twice about making outrageously foolish deals. Then again, lots of suckers think Donald Trump is some kind of expert negotiator. Maybe they ought to read about his negotiating prowess for The Art of the Deal.
6:53 PM: I wonder what the race will be the first one that news organizations call? Maybe Vermont governor (a Republican)?
6:59 PM: Just started on a Sam '76 out of the Sam Adams Winter Classics variety pack.
7:00 PM: CNN called Bernie and Tim Kaine as winners. How many times will we be told we are waiting on results from Lake County, Indiana (home of Gary)? Interesting side note, Crown Point is the county seat of Lake County.
7:05 PM: While we wait for results to come in, I emphasize enough how important it is that we see some results that indicate Trump's ridiculous minority and refugee scapegoating doesn't work. I'm afraid we'll see a Senate result which will cause him to double down on the crazy for the next two years. I'm not sure I could get through that with my sanity.
7:09 PM: Polls in Ohio close in about 20 minutes. Because of radical gerrymandering, we only have one (OH-12) or two (OH-1, which is doubtful) potential seat changes, barring a serious wave. The statewide races should be very interesting, though. I'm almost optimistic there.
7:15 PM: Election night distraction. Wes Goubeaux, I know you are looking forward to picking up some Reds 1939 merchandise:
1939 Home. #RedsThreads pic.twitter.com/MZfaV1Ou7F— Cincinnati Reds (@Reds) November 5, 2018
7:21 PM: Also, this:
Good videoThe Reds proudly commemorate the 150th anniversary of professional baseball in Cincinnati during the 2019 season. pic.twitter.com/PO2JX4NU7G— Cincinnati Reds (@Reds) November 5, 2018
7:26 PM: No matter who wins, it may be a tough slog economically between today and the 2020 election
Word to the wise. We have endured two 10% corrections in the same year for all three major averages. This has only happened in 1973, 1974, 1987, 2000, 2001, 2002 and 2008. All but 1987 signalled recession, but that wasn't a pretty picture either.— David Rosenberg (@EconguyRosie) November 6, 2018
7:30 PM: Polls are closed in Ohio.
7:33 PM: I would expect the race is called for the Ohio 80th House district. Even though she really didn't campaign after the primary, I'm sure Jena Powell will win. That is unfortunate, because she is a truly useless right-wing nut. Her opponent, DJ Byrnes put together a couple of nice ads, but this district is ridiculously skewed to right-wing nutters.
7:39 PM: Kent State vs. Buffalo is on ESPNU.
7:44 PM: I can't believe college basketball is already here.
7:52 PM: My county's results came in. Powell beat Byrnes 68%-32%, while only repeating tripe about lowering taxes and cutting regulations that strangle business. I hate how big of suckers rural voters are.
7:57 PM: My county is so right-wing. Jim Renacci won 57% of the vote even though his campaign was a joke.
8:00 PM: Luckily, the rest of the state appears to have elected Sherrod Brown. Overall, Democrats seem to be doing well so far, nationally.
8:10 PM: I still can't believe how big the rural/urban divide is. Why do rural voters buy into the Republican bullshit about taxes when wealthier folks in cities and suburbs don't?
8:14 PM: I would like to see a Democratic sweep of Governors' races in the Midwest. It might be doable.
8:18 PM: When I was signing the election register, I saw my sister's name listed as an active voter, even though she's been out of the state for almost 20 years. She hadn't voted today. I tried checking the Ohio Secretary of State's listing of registered voters. I was there, but she wasn't. All I could figure was that she was one of the voters who got purged in recent years for not voting, but maybe her name was restored because the ACLU won a suit against the Secretary of State for removing voters from the rolls. Either that or my county is just incompetent, which is also likely.
8:24 PM: Indiana is looking bad for Donnelly, and thus, for the United States. Geez, I can't stand Hoosiers or Donald Trump.
8:34 PM: Why do rural voters, who claim they don't like how their local economies are going, keep voting for Republicans who never, ever give them any help? I just don't get it.
8:35 PM: Well, I don't get it if I don't take into account bigotry.
8:36 PM: I see the billionaire challenger in Illinois beat the nearly billionaire incumbent. Unfortunately, Illinois residents will get four more years of dysfunction. On the plus side, Rahner will probably be one of the few recent former governors of Illinois not to go to prison.
8:40 PM: Goddamn Florida.
8:42 PM: If Democrats aren't working tomorrow to register voters for 2020, they are insane. Donald Trump and his idiot base must lose.
8:44 PM: In good news, felons may have voting rights restored in Florida.
8:48 PM: Indiana is a shithole. Braun and Pence win.
8:52 PM: Things are not looking good for Democrats right now.
8:57 PM: Going to have to speed up the beer consumption.
9:03 PM: I still struggle so much with the idea that rural areas keep electing politicians who have no interest in helping out their constituents. It is just like the Brexit abortion. Rural voters are committing economic suicide electing conservatives.
9:11 PM: Trump is going to be off the hook for the foreseeable future. The United States is going to be screwed.
9:13 PM: This is insane. Who are all of these GOP voters, and why do they hate rationality?
9:17 PM: County-by-county results do not show Ohio suburbs breaking for Democrats.
9:23 PM: Donald Trump campaigned with an insane freakout about the caravan, and mountains of lies. Why on earth do people support him? Are they as big of assholes as he is?
9:29 PM: CNN is currently building up Beto O'Rourke. I dread watching his lead slip away, too, as it is one of the few bright spots on the map right now.
9:36 PM: So far it looks like Republican voters in Ohio didn't find out who the GOP was pushing for state Supreme Court. One bright spot for Democrats so far.
9:43 PM: If Democrats don't find those 1.6 million felons in Florida and get them registered to vote, they do not deserve to be called a political party.
9:52 PM: I understand why Ted Cruz is so unpopular, but how in the fuck can anybody like Donald Trump?
10:00 PM: It looks like urban and suburban voters are going to carry Democrats across the line to gain control of the House, which is a very good thing. However, rural results are so depressing that I'm chalking 2018 up as a loss. Rural areas are going to suffer miserably in the future.
10:02 PM: I see Kris Kobach is projected to lose. Thank God.
10:04 PM: Dem candidate wins Michigan, but Scott Walker is leading. WTF is wrong with Wisconsin?
10:09 PM: Warning to Ohio: Kansas has discovered how fucked up Republican governance is. Are we going to have to follow them clear to the bottom before we get some goddamn sense?
10:18 PM: Ted Cruz wins. Today sucks.
10:31 PM: How in the fuck is Mike DeWine winning? His campaign was godawful.
10:40 PM: The rural/urban split keeps getting worse, and rural voters keep getting more and more wrong. Brexit 2.0.
10:41 PM: Republican plus third party vote is 55-45 in Ohio. What the hell is going on?
10:59 PM:
Truth, and dominating in rural areas, but getting crushed outside of them.
11:02 PM: Ohio really feels like Indiana tonight.Republicans aren’t running on taxes anymore. They’re running on bigotry. https://t.co/vXLXhm8ZOq pic.twitter.com/QmvC7hhLSC— Slate (@Slate) November 7, 2018
11:26 PM: Right now, all I've got is the hope that Scott Walker loses.
11:29 PM:
I needed that laugh.That's what he says about all of his bankrupt enterprises https://t.co/BS7FzikZkl— Daniel Larison (@DanielLarison) November 7, 2018
11:35 PM: Oh, I also forgot about the possibility Steve King might lose.
12:01AM: There are a lot of things going on tonight. Somehow, Republicans swept all of the statewide executive offices. Oddly, I didn't really see any campaign ads for state Supreme Court justices, and they lost both seats (it appears). That is one tiny bright spot in a very depressing bunch of electoral result in Ohio. Regionally, Indiana is horrible as always. Michigan looks pretty good, as does Minnesota. Iowa could go either way, but it looks to remain with a Republican governor, but they lost at least one Congressional seat. If Scott Walker loses, I'll be smiling. Nationally, our Constitutional dysfunction gets worse. We have a popular vote loser sitting in the White House, while a minority of the population holds the Senate. It also appears the Democrats crushed Republicans nationally in the House. This will allow the Republicans to continue to stack the courts with lifetime appointments, giving them a generation of control of the only branch of government that can prevent Executive overreach. Additionally, the rural/urban split worsened. Nothing good will come of this. I dread our political (and economic) future.
12:08 AM: Also, racism won where it normally wins. That saddens me.
12:12 AM: Why in the fuck is that useless sack of shit Rick Santorum on CNN?
12:20 AM: Would Rick Santorum please shut the fuck up?
12:27 AM: How does a complete dumbass like Rick Santorum dominate the debate on CNN? Every other person at that table is smarter than him and has more useful stuff to say. This is a perfect example of what is wrong with our political discourse. I'm going over to Twitter and drinking until I have to go to sleep.
Monday, November 5, 2018
Election Eve Links
Tomorrow is the big day. It is the chance, after two long years, to give Donald Trump, and the Republican Party which foisted him on us, a giant fuck you. I'll be going in first thing in the morning to cast my straight-ticket Democratic ballot. It might make a difference for U.S. Senator and the statewide positions, but it will be meaningless for Congress and State House and Senate. But it will be cathartic. It is already raining, so after work tomorrow, I'll get the animals fed, make supper, then crack my first beer and turn on the TV and start blogging the election results. Please tune in, and feel free to comment. In the time between now and then, here are a few stories for you to enjoy:
The Southernization of the Midwest - Benjamin Studabaker. I've resisted GOP efforts to turn Ohio into Alabama for a long time.
Wisconsin's $4.1 Billion Foxconn Boondoggle - The Verge
Rural America’s Own Private Flint: Polluted Water Too Dangerous to Drink - New York Times
Trump the Revealer - The Big Picture. Excellent post by Ritholtz.
The President's Lies - The Atlantic
Something's Happening in Texas - The Atlantic
Can the Republic Strike Back? - Andrew Sullivan
Vote against all Republicans. Every single one. - Max Boot!?
What the 2018 Campaign Looks Like in Your Hometown - Bloomberg
The Southernization of the Midwest - Benjamin Studabaker. I've resisted GOP efforts to turn Ohio into Alabama for a long time.
Wisconsin's $4.1 Billion Foxconn Boondoggle - The Verge
Rural America’s Own Private Flint: Polluted Water Too Dangerous to Drink - New York Times
Trump the Revealer - The Big Picture. Excellent post by Ritholtz.
The President's Lies - The Atlantic
Something's Happening in Texas - The Atlantic
Can the Republic Strike Back? - Andrew Sullivan
Vote against all Republicans. Every single one. - Max Boot!?
What the 2018 Campaign Looks Like in Your Hometown - Bloomberg
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