The rise of Donald Trump has seen a whole lot of people in the Republican party and conservative movement suddenly realizing that divisive rhetoric and xenophobic attitudes and bigotry are bad things, even though they were advocating those very same things for decades except using coded language. They seem outraged that he is openly saying what they were covertly advocating.
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In a comment to an earlier post on cricket, Marcus Ranum asked an interesting question about sports that I thought deserved a thoughtful answer.
I am interested why an otherwise rational person such as yourself, Prof. Singham, feels concern about a professional national team’s performance. What makes you feel connected to their defeat or victory?
It never made any sense to me why anyone cares about professional sports, other than tribalism or nationalism. How do you make an emotional connection between the little guys in the pictures, who are being paid to play a game, and “my team”?
I do enjoy occasionally watching professional sports because they are so super darned good. And all the weird musculature from the performance-enhancing drugs is kind of fun to look at. It’s the emotional connection that makes no sense to me at all.
Last night’s Republican debate followed the familiar pattern, and even more so, of insults and endless crosstalk with the candidates and moderators talking over each other so much that often it was hard to figure out who was saying what. It resembled nothing so much as siblings arguing, with repeated “No, I’m not” “Yes, you are” types of exchanges. Adding to the cacophony was that the audience was even more rowdy, whooping it up even before the candidates were introduced, maintaining a constant background chatter accompanied by boos and cheers and repeated calling out of things that I could not make out. The event can only be described as an embarrassment.
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First up is The Daily Show where I like the way that Noah exposes speaker Paul Ryan’s hypocritical statements that the Republican party should not be a home for prejudice, when in reality appealing to people’s prejudices is what the party has long been about.
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In the US someone can set up a bogus church and proceed to fleece people by getting them to donate money, even what they cannot afford. Those donations are tax deductible and the pastors get to live the high life with fancy houses, private jets and the like at our expense. The government will not touch them because as soon as they do, people will scream ‘religious persecution’.
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I am not a big fan of the T20 format of cricket where each side gets to bat for only 20 overs. Sure, it is very popular because it lasts only about three hours and thus is more commercially viable but it encourages batters to be hyper-aggressive and hit at pretty much everything, rather than play the judicious strokes that are the essence of the game.
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Super Tuesday on March 1 was supposed to be the day when the primary races were largely settled with a clear winner emerging, with all the other candidates acknowledging reality and dropping out of the race and throwing their weight behind the party nominee, enabling that person to focus for the next eight months on uniting the party and crafting a message that would win the general election in November.
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I went to see the film Where to Invade Next yesterday and it confirmed my view that Michael Moore is one of the most important American makers of documentaries. He is unabashedly political but manages to mix his messages with humor and that is what makes him different. The film is very cheerful and hopeful, that we can do better than we do.
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I have been reading about the increased number of incidents in which pilots of planes report that they have been blinded by laser beams aimed at the cockpit from the ground. I was surprised by this since the lasers one uses in everyday life are quite low in power and it is not easy to aim them. But it turns out that these lasers, which can be easily purchased online, are more powerful than the ones used in meeting presentations and are getting even more powerful. Authorities are treating them as dangerous practices and urging a crackdown.
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The Girl Scouts of America are a great organization, very supportive of diversity and inclusion, and welcoming members of the LGBT community into their ranks. Unlike the Boy Scouts who had to be dragged kicking and screaming into the modern world by threats of boycotts, the Girl Scouts have been very forward looking.
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