In Tenure Veritas: Libations From The Ivory Tower

 In 2019, Chief Justice John Roberts made the astonishing, and either brazenly dishonest or stupidly naive claim that there is no such thing as a "Trump judge."  Is there any such thing as an Obama judge?  Maybe, maybe not, but if and when Trump reclaims the White House, I'm calling it here and now.  Aileen Cannon just got herself a Supreme Court seat.  She is the very model of a modern mincing Trump judge.  Raymond Dearie ordered Trump's attorneys-- the idiots he could find to represent the lying-est liar who ever lied a lie, and never pays a bill-- to affirm the DoJ's document list, or provide evidence to the contrary.  Problem:  One of Trump's favorite lies has been that the FBI planted evidence, a lie so stupid and transparent that only a Ginni Thomas-level defective could fail to see through it.  Cannon knows it's a lie.  Moreover, Trump's lawyers won't go into the courtroom and claim the FBI planted evidence, because they'd get dis...

 I just listened to Frank Zappa's 1979 classic, Sheik Yerbouti .  If anyone needed an example of why Tipper Gore's PMRC went after Frank and dragged him in front of Congress to testify (yup, that happened), this album has many examples.  The songs are rude, crude, and then there's "Jewish Princess."  I made a few comments about the unhidden bigotries in Dostoevsky's The Brothers Karamazov  in Sunday's post, and if this is the first time anyone connected Zappa and Dostoevsky, then I am proud of that.  Nevertheless, I remain a fan of both.  Still, I was prompted to listen by certain other events around the world.  Note the title of the album, which is hardly a subtle pun.  The album cover features Frank in garb that would now get him attacked for "appropriation," and worse, appropriation that disparages the most protected of cultures.  In 2022, that image itself would probably be considered as high a sin as any lyric in "Bobby Brown Goes D...

 I would like to pick up where my commentary trailed last Sunday.  Much about modern discourse, in addition to my need to take some time thinking about literature beyond science fiction, has led me to reconsider Fyodor Dostoevsky, and most importantly, The Brothers Karamazov .  Last Sunday, I wrote a few scattered observations about Dostoevsky's ethics, but today, let us consider the importance of those ethics in modern discourse, particularly as they relate to my reasons for returning to Fyodor the author, rather than Fyodor the character (the latter of whom is a shit). The novel has been making something of a comeback lately, and those who are most fond of it are an interesting sort.  It was a set of comments by Douglas Murray, the iconoclastic writer and raconteur who has inherited the mantle of Christopher Hitchens, whose praise made me decide that I needed to go back for another perusal.  Murray is a contrarian, hence Hitch, but his acerbic rejection of wok...

 I have been unsparing in my praise for Liz Cheney since she came to lead the movement to save American democracy.  Will she succeed?  I am less than sanguine, but Cheney just demonstrated what integrity means.  In the face of Donald Trump's threats to the country, the Republicans who do not want to associate with him have done a little dance.  They have either declined to say how they have voted, or would vote, or they have claimed to vote for third parties so as to feel pure and clean and such.  The United States of America uses a plurality rule electoral system.  We complicate it via the electoral college, and various other means, but at the end of the day, we use plurality rules.  Maurice Duverger noted, many decades ago, that electoral systems with a plurality rule tend towards two parties.  (Recall yesterday's post about how Political Science has already basically done the big stuff.)  Proportional representation systems support mo...

 Political Science is bullshit.  There.  I said it.  This has been a long time coming, and I am not the only professor in the field giving the discipline the ole' stinkeye.  Let's do this thing. Some disciplines move forward in fits and starts, trying to tackle the next big question.  Consider Physics.  Physics is a real-deal discipline.  They tackle hard problems, and make progress.  Sometimes the progress is incremental, and sometimes dramatic.  Thomas Kuhn's model in The Structure of Scientific Revolutions  provides a lens for interpreting Physics, Chemistry and the other real sciences.  Once upon a time, I would have tried to defend Political Science as a real science, and I will still assert that the scientific method can be applied to discrete questions about politics, but as a discipline?  No.  Regardless, for those who have not read Kuhn, go read Kuhn.  Here, though, is the short, short version.  Wit...

 Dhafer Youssef, "Profane: The Wine Ode Suite," from Abu Nawas Rhapsody .

 Remember the basic rule for any potential trial with Donald Trump as the defendant.  You cannot block every Republican from the jury.  So, can you bring a complaint, civil or criminal, that will convince even Republicans to side against Donald Trump?  At best, you can weed out January 6-ers and QAnon-ers from the jury pool.  That's it.  You cannot block Republicans  from the jury, and the party is still basically a Trump cult.  So if you find yourself saying, "surely this  will convince them that Donald Trump is crooked and wrong," well a) stop calling me Shirley, b) stop making me make that reference, and c) when has that ever been right? I have claimed that the stolen documents recovered from Mar-a-Lago actually create real legal danger for the first time in the history of Trump's life, and the reason is that it is so cut-and-dried.  Did he take the papers?  Yes.  Did he refuse to hand them back, and lie about it?  Yup....

 I need a break from science fiction.  There.  I said it.  I am starting to look back at Fyodor Dostoevsky, whom I have not read in many years.  Dostoevsky returns to the top of my reading stack for a few reasons.  He is a reminder, amid a moment in history, that some good things have come out of Russia and that turning against anything Russian, including 19th Century Russian art reaches a point of absurdity.  Yet that is not the primary reason for turning back to Dostoevsky.  Dostoevsky had a clear-eyed moralism, but where many thinkers who might strive for such a description, particularly of Dostoevsky's religious mindset, wind up in the fire-and-brimstone category, Dostoevsky wrote about humility, forgiveness and the truly hard stuff.  His works are floating around again, then, as a perfect antidote to the hard lines being drawn.  I shall return to this, periodically, as I think through Dostoevsky for the first time in many years....

 As the midterms approach (the elections, not the exams-- relax, students), the time approaches for posts on what the hell will happen.  I do not know how many such posts there will be, but I think I want to begin by thinking back to that most traumatic moment in the history of mathematical political science:  2016.  So, yeah.  2016 happened.  My commentaries on 2016 were on The Unmutual Political Blog , which is no more, but here is the short version, along with what I said in the aftermath.  The polls got 2016 wrong, but unbeknownst to most, the political science forecasting models actually got it right .  Yes, that's right, the forecasting models were fine.  But, and as we say, everything before the 'but' is irrelevant... here's how it happened. Consider the model I reference most frequently for presidential elections:  "Time for a Change."  Abramowitz gets his predictive power from three variables:  GDP growth in the second...

 Lafayette Gilchrist, "Specials Revealed," from Now .

 The September 11 attacks are 21 years old today.  They are older than most of my students, and were they a person, they could drink.  Osama Bin Laden is dead, Ayman al-Zawahiri is dead, the planners and leaders are dead and scattered, and while there remains a thing called al Qaeda, few of us in the United States are in any way afraid of them. That was not the case, 21 years ago today.  We were afraid.  We did not know whether the attacks were the first stage in a series, whether the group had more in the works, or what came next.  Thousands died, many more lost friends and family, many more worried about our friends and family who worked in New York, and for all we knew at the time, it was just the start. The Taliban are not al Qaeda.  They harbored and aided al Qaeda, but they are not al Qaeda.  Their return to power in Afghanistan was probably inevitable.  The Taliban are not Putin's army invading Ukraine.  If Afghanistan is the Repu...

 In 1776, thirteen British colonies in North America declared their independence from England.  My ancestors were neither here nor there, as the turn of phrase goes.  I could guess where they were, roughly, but let me take a moment count the fucks I give about where they were OK I'm done.  Pop quiz time.  Write down your best guess about that number of fucks.  This is Fuck-count A.  I was going to say, "Fuck-count 1," but one is a counting number, and let's not mix up anything.  Fuck-count A shall be the number of fucks I give about where my ancestors were in 1776.  Got it?  OK, let's move on to your next question.  How many fucks do you think I give about where your ancestors were in 1776?  We shall call this, "Fuck-count B."  Why are we only counting the fucks that I give?  I'll give you a hint.  How many fucks do you think I give about how many fucks you give?  Write that down.  That's "Fuck-coun...

 Welcome back, for a new school year.  May your readings be joyous, educational, and never be thrown at the wall, particularly if you are reading them on your laptop.  I typically write something in recognition of the start of a new school year, and since I am actually thinking of delving into some heavier readings next, I wanted a bit of a palate cleanser, myself, in order to prepare the old eyeballs and neurons.  Terry Pratchett is good for that, so we return to the Discworld, and revisit an earlier book, focusing on the Unseen University. Alright.  Discworld, of course, is a flat world resting on the backs of four giant elephants, standing on the back of a giant turtle, swimming through space.  Magic is real, as is all other manner of lunacy.  Magic, however, has diminished, and the home of magic is the Unseen University at Ankh-Morpork, where wizards go to study and waste their time.  If you are thinking about a more culturally famous wizard's...

 Listening to Biden's speech about what we may as well call "The Troubles," I cannot help but recall a forum in which I participated after January 6.  A fellow faculty member and several audience members insisted that the January 6 insurrection was about this newly redefined thing called "white supremacy."  Of course, I attempted to correct the record.  It was about a much more simple thing.  Donald Trump lied.  He lied about the 2020 election.  He told his followers that he won.  Yet, there was fraud on an unprecedented scale, and the election was stolen in a massive conspiracy.  His followers believed him.  They believed that a presidential election was stolen.  That democracy  was stolen.  That this most precious thing, that which defines America, was stolen.  What would you do if you believed that an election was stolen so brazenly?  Bake some cookies? There is nothing so dangerous as people duped into believ...

 One of the great players of the Hammond organ passed away.  Joey DeFrancesco.  He leaves a recorded legacy of his own, along with a legacy as one of the great accompanists, and while the glory does not always go to the accompanist, it is a very difficult job.  DeFrancesco played with many of the greats, and I will shine a light on albums with two of the greatest guitarists ever to pick up the axe:  Pat Martino, and Danny Gatton.  Martino was not just a marvel of a player, but an inspiration.  He rose to prominence in the 1960s as one of the hard bop leaders, but was felled by an aneurism.  He completely lost the ability to play, and retaught himself, from square one, by listening to his original albums.  He came back, better than ever.  Danny Gatton was a stylist of such range and virtuosity that he made others want to quit the instrument.  A bandleader fortunate enough to have Gatton in his band bestowed upon him the greatest nick...

 Poor Sarah Palin.  As it turns out, she shall not represent Alaska's at-large district in the House of Representatives.  On cue, the voices rise up from the ranks of the Republican Party that the voting system adopted by Alaska is unfair.  Let us consider. Alaska recently adopted the ranked choice voting system, as opposed to the simple plurality rule, the jungle primary, or any of the other voting systems one might concoct.  If you were to ask me, "hey, fuck-o, what is the ideal voting system?"  My response would be, "that's Professor  Fuck-o."  You may also address me as Dr. Fuck-o.  As the new school year starts, it is always fascinating to see how many incoming students think that one addresses a professor as "Mr./Mrs."  I mean, just plain "fuck-o" is fine.  But really.  A little respect. But anyway, let's talk political science and fuckery, because there are those who are in the thinking that one is looking at those good ...