Gina Harris's Blog, page 89

On this National Cat Day

There are multiple days commemorating cats. This one - National Cat Day on October 29th - was created as a way to bring awareness to the number of homeless cats. Of course, our cats all have homes, but there were times when they didn't.

We are pet people. You may already know that. We are neither dog nor cat people, but both. (A few other species have gotten in there from time to time, but it's really mainly a cats and dogs thing.) I have memories of pets we had before I was born, because their places in the collective family love were so strong.

Today is going to be about the cats. I will not name every single cat we have had (though I could), but I will stick with mostly our current clowder of five.

This is not the first time we have had five, but I will say that we have never had more than five of any species - cats or dogs - at one time. (Though since we have had both cats and dogs, there were clearly times when we had more than five animals in the house, and also when we had five dogs of our own we were also doing dog-sitting.)


On our last trip to the vet I was talking to the office manager about how we ended up with so many, at least partially related to knowing a lot of people who run cat sanctuaries. He asked, "Do you have a sanctuary?" "Not officially," I said, feeling embarrassed. At the time, we only had four.

Then Big Boy needed a home. That was fine, but so did another cat. We ended up finding a different home for that one, but then there were another two that needed homes (still do), and we have asked a few people with no luck. Plus, the place we got Big Boy from has about another seventy they need to place.

I love all of our cats, and we will take care of them. I want all of the other cats to have good homes too, though, and we can't take them all.

My overinflated sense of responsibility could be a topic for another day, but today is more about wanting people to do better. With all but one of our current cats, there are holes in their stories. We know where they were found wandering and how long ago, and approximate ages maybe, but not how they got there or why.

We had a boy Cody whom we lost to a fast-growing tumor just about a year ago. Big Boy reminds us so much of him that we can't help but wonder if they are related. There's no way of knowing. A few weeks ago I was walking and saw a tabby near some brambles; our tabby Ashley was hiding in our blackberry bushes for a few weeks before we could start getting close to her. I don't know that it is even that likely that they are really related, or at least closely related, but how many poor cats do there have to be out there?

Human carelessness is a big problem, but there are other problems. Two of the cats that I am worried about are because of a move into assisted living; I can't help but think a lot of seniors would be happier keeping their pets.

I have plenty of scorn for people who claim their animals are emotional support animals when there is clearly no training for being safe in various situations, but I also have some sympathy for wanting to be able to keep an animal with you.

I have heard many people say that you shouldn't have an animal unless you can afford to take care of it, especially in regards to the homeless population. It sounds logical, but should we make it so hard? And if the answer is more people giving pets up, when there are already far too many in need of a home, that can't be the right answer.

I know there are plenty of human problems out there. I am willing to prioritize them over animal problems, but for us to be good, compassionate people we will care about animals too, wild and domesticated. We will want good things for them. I know we can do better.

And if you can make room for another cat or two in your lives, I can probably hook you up. We have connections.

Band Review: The Plastic People of the Universe

I finished reading Vaclav Havel's The Power of the Powerless in July. I wasn't expecting band references.

The Plastic People of the Universe formed in 1968, influenced by both the Velvet Underground and Frank Zappa and the Mothers of Invention. That old saying about the Velvet Underground only selling X amount of records, but every one who bought one of the records started a band? May actually be true.

However, most of those bands did not end up being illegal. The Plastic People did. The Czech government revoked their license in 1970. As weird as it sounds to think of musicians being licensed in the States, in Czechoslovakia it was a thing. The band continued to exist underground, and dissidents rallied around them.

The band was really just focused on their music, so it seems unfair to focus on that aspect too much. As a reviewer, I should also be focusing on their music, which I don't like that much.

Well, I don't like a lot of it. There are other songs that work for me. (I rather like the title track to Co znamená vésti koně.) I am not a huge fan of experimental rock in general, but I think there are other factors at work here.

I also am not familiar with Czech music or the Czech language in general. I have not listened much to either Frank Zappa or the Velvet Underground. Those things could have provided entry points into the music for me. Sometimes difference is enough for an initial recoil, even though you can still learn to appreciate it later.

Even if I never learn to love their music, I will love their story. Loving music and needing to play it - even in the face of political opposition - that's something I get. I have a sense of their need to play, and why it would inspire others so much that they would take a stand as well.

And I totally see a connection between samizdat and zines. I see why being subversive - whether intentionally or not - necessitates DIY.

The Plastic People of the Universe don't have the tempo and energy of punk, but they are not strangers.

http://plastic-people.cz/

https://www.facebook.com/plasticpeople.cz/

https://www.youtube.com/user/plasticpeoplecz

Band Review: Dead Now

Dead Now is a new rock band debuting on Brutal Panda records.

I checked them out because Andrew Elstner (formerly of Torche) is in the band, and that is reason enough. (Also, it's a good band name for a review going up the week before Halloween.) Here Elstner joins Bobby Theberge and Derek Schulz, both of Day Old Man.

With that amount of sludge background, it was deliberate on my part to refer to Dead Now as a rock band. There is still some pretty ponderous guitar - the music is heavy - so I don't think sludge fans will be disappointed, but I could also see Black Sabbath fans really enjoying Dead Now. This is heavy rock.

The other thing that strikes me is a subtle humor to band photos. You can't tell from the album art, but having seen just a couple of photos of the band, I sense that they are having fun, while probably not admitting it. Something about that seems right.

Dead Now has a handful of performances coming up in November and December - currently all in Georgia - but recently wrapped up touring with Red Fang.

https://www.facebook.com/DeadNowBand/

https://deadnow.bandcamp.com/

https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCRjasWep6Qz0bQRdGmA9gdg

https://twitter.com/DeadNowDudes

Oregon ballot measures, November 2018

In my original conception - which seems silly now - I was going to go through the pros and cons of each ballot measure with great precision and clarity that was just going to be a delight to read.

Then I started looking at them, and it was like "Uh... really... no way... ARE YOU KIDDING ME? NO!"

So the short version is just that all of the statewide ballot measures are terrible; please reject them all. The end.

But I will add some detail beyond that.

I was most conflicted on Measure 102, largely due to some good organizations supporting it, and some potential for it to do good.

Measure 102 moves to amend the constitution to allow local bonds for financing housing with nongovernmental entities. Housing is an issue, and I can imagine there being enough desperation to grasp at straws, but I don't believe this is a good straw.

Part of that is Paul Allen's death. I do not doubt the sincerity of the grief and lionizing, but I keep remembering him insisting on an unsecured loan to get an arena built (because he wanted better terms) and him defaulting on that loan (and being pretty petty about it), thus losing the arena to the city, but somehow getting it back through undisclosed terms which probably sucked for Portland. The private sector is really good at crushing hopes of doing some good.

There may be potential for good things here, but I believe there is even more potential for non-governmental entities to soak the government. That will not help homeless people, or anyone else.

I did vote yes on Metro measure 26-199, which is also for affordable housing. I'm not always completely cynical.

The biggest lesson of this year's ballot measures is that the strongly conservative bent may indicate that some groups have been heartened by the 2016 election. That is most disturbing for measures 105 and 106, but I have more to say about 103 and 104.

The two measures are both tax-related. Based on their ads they didn't sound like something I would support anyway, but 103 seemed oddly unnecessary. It's not that sales taxes are never proposed, but Oregonians have been really good at turning them down. We even turned down a tax on business sales because it was phrased as a sales tax in the ads against it, though it was actually a way of trying to prevent large corporations from finding reasons why none of their income counts as profit.

Here's the thing: if we want to improve funding - and we should - there are two much better priorities.

One would be undoing the damage from Don McIntire's original ballot measure 5, from 1990. Yes, there were other measures that were a part of the problem, and enough time has passed that maybe it would take multiple well-crafted measures to get a good solution in place, but the man is dead; let's try and fix his damage.

And granted - regarding my previous mention of a tax on business sales - that campaign showed that businesses will fight really hard to avoid contributing to the state coffers. But their own actions (and Kansas) have shown that catering to business does not create an economic utopia of well-funded public services and living wage jobs. A sales tax on consumers would be progressive, but we had better funding once and we can do it again.

In addition, we need to ditch the kicker.

I understand the reluctance. Any time there is a chance for a little extra cash, it feels like a blessing. The state being required to have a balanced budget sounds like a good idea too. However, forcing the state to try and forecast how much it can bring in and underfunding necessities if it won't be enough is already pretty restrictive. Adding the provision that any time people in the state are doing well enough that there is extra, and then dictating that surplus can't roll over to next year, can't buy anything necessary, can't improve anything - that's begging the state to just lose at everything. (Which will then be blamed on the governor if she is a woman and a Democrat.)

We can do better than that. Instead we are tying the state's hands, and 103 and 104 attempt to add extra ropes.

Reject them. Reject them all.

Knute Buehler: in moderate's clothing

Knute Buehler is running as a moderate. The first ad I saw shocked me, and I wondered if he were running a different ad in the Willamette Valley than in the rest of the state.

It appears to be more of a calculated risk. One of his primary opponents openly bragged about being the first candidate to come out in support of Donald Trump. There are many states where candidates have to be careful to not put down Trump, but apparently even Republican Oregonians didn't like that guy. That probably made running as a moderate more appealing.

It's also really dishonest.

(Note:  Buehler has not completely distanced himself from Trump, cheering Trump's pardon of the Hammonds, who slaughtered deer and committed arson on federal land: https://www.wweek.com/news/2018/07/10/knute-buehler-cheers-trumps-pardon-of-eastern-oregon-arsonist-duo-they-are-good-people-not-terrorists/ )

To be fair, on a national level the Republican party has been producing media about Democrats who left - switching to voting Republican - and about persuadable voters who could go either way but end up being swayed by Republicans. However, on looking further into it, a lot of the persuadable voters were actually local Republican leadership, and a lot of the "Why I left" people are stock photos, so perhaps one should not expect that approach to be implemented honestly anyway.

Regardless, there are a few issues that stand out to me.

One is Buehler's stated support for a woman's right to choose, when he is on record fairly recently as wanting to increase abortion restrictions. Elected leaders are free to change their minds. They usually have a story about why they changed though; they can explain why they feel differently.

There is none of that here. I suspect the issue is that he is leaving support for contraceptives on the table while still wanting to restrict abortion. I base that on the vague wording of some answers and on his voting record. Granted, allowing women access to birth control is still better than some Republicans, but the sneakiness is not reassuring. Tim Kaine did better at navigating the ground between personal beliefs and honoring other people's rights and needs. Of course, Kaine is not a Republican.

Buehler is a bit more open on the environment, but that mainly comes down to saying the environment needs to be protected and then criticizing various plans for doing just that. That's the kind of attitude that might lead to a lackluster legislative record.

That is a common thread. Buehler acknowledges the importance of access to health care, but voted against Medicaid expansion, and now makes it a cornerstone of his plans. Again, you can change, but there should be a mea culpa of some kind. Beyond that, there should be some time demonstrating the change before we trust. If he is truly committed to bipartisan reform, perhaps he could demonstrate that as a state representative for a few years and show his sincerity.

I could write similar things on all of his talking points (attacking PERS as the problem with education funding is not even creative), but I want to focus on Buehler's plan to fight homelessness.

Buehler's plan involves curbing fees on developers and turning over state lands - ideas nodding to supply side economics and privatization of federal lands. That's pretty Republican.


https://www.opb.org/news/article/oregon-homelessness-housing-gubernatorial-candidates-2018/ 

The article doesn't mention his interest in sit-lie ordinances, probably because they have been ruled unconstitutional, though with Kavanaugh's confirmation that may mean less. I have heard the ad mentioning "tough love" since the ruling, and I interpret that as what he means. Solving the homeless problem by driving homeless people further into hiding and sheer exhaustion sounds pretty Republican.

Finally, I am not against increasing beds, but I have read that the budget he has allowed for it is only a tenth of the amount that would actually be needed. Underfunding a needed service so you can then claim government is the problem and cut services is pretty traditionally Republican. Thomas Frank wrote a whole book about it, The Wrecking Crew. Mitch McConnell would be proud.

Knute Buehler is a very traditional Republican. If you are conservative, you may very well choose to vote for him. That is your right, but don't do it because of him being moderate, because that is really just him being a shameless liar.

And it is amazing how many people fall for it. When I saw ads blaming Kate Brown for literally everything, regardless of whether there was adequate funding or other resources available, and failing to acknowledge any progress, I was reminded of the glass ceiling's partner, the glass cliff.

I am glad I was not the only one to see that. I shared this from a friend, and am linking to it now for your reading pleasure: https://www.facebook.com/sporktastic/posts/10156872397264074

I endorse Kate Brown for governor.

You know enough to vote

You may see a lot in the next few days trying to shame people for not voting and guilt them into voting.

I suppose the mindset behind it is that while it is certainly worse to vote for harmful policies and people than to not vote, the people who didn't vote are more likely to have a conscience that can be worked upon.

I don't even disagree with that, exactly, though I do question the efficacy of shame as a motivator. It could easily just breed resentment instead. Beyond that, it ignores two important factors.

A gigantic factor is voter suppression. Georgia has some shocking examples this year, apparently bent on even teaching neighbor Florida some new voter suppression tricks. That is something that should be fought, and that people are working on. If you get an opportunity to help with that - whether it is giving people rides to polling places, helping people obtain state ID. or petitioning the government on essentially disenfranchising every person on the reservation by disallowing post office boxes for addresses - do it.

Today's post is about another significant issue. There are people who refrain from voting, not due to apathy, but from concern about their ability to make informed choices. They worry that they don't know enough, and want to leave the decision-making to more knowledgeable people.

If this is you, you are gravely overestimating the people who vote.

I admit that often the opportunities for voter education are less than ideal. I am grateful for our situation in Oregon, where we receive a voters guide and can fill out our ballots while looking at the guide before mailing it in. Even with that, time can be an issue for studying things out, it may be hard to predict the outcomes for various options, and you will never really know all of the candidates for some of the lower offices, which are still important.

It is good to know that our choices do make a difference, and to care about making good choices. With all possible compassion and sympathy, I must tell you that there are people voting from malice who have no doubts about whether their knowledge is adequate. Allow me to also reassure you that you can be informed enough.

There will definitely be things going on that you don't know about. When some of the more obscure white supremacist ties were coming out in Trump's campaign, I did not immediately recognize them, though I was reading enough that I learned about most of them before the election. It was only years after his election that I learned that when Bush used the term "compassionate conservative" that it had specific connotations for the religious right.

Although it was possible to know more, those specifics did not change my feelings about either of those two candidates. Yes, things went deeper than I knew, but there was enough in what they said blatantly and in their past history that I knew they were terrible candidates who would be terrible presidents.

There have been times when I have been more reluctant to vote strictly along party lines, but that is not an issue today. Yes, some Republicans still pay lip service to decency, but given the way they are voting, whether they like Trump or not they are going to support his policies, if for no other reason than that it works well for their policies. For some time now, that policy has been to favor corporate greed via stirring up contempt for poor people, people of color, and immigrants, plus getting the people who are less comfortable with open racism by condemning abortion, even though fewer abortions happen under Democratic administrations because of improved access to health care and options for making a life.

Really, that's what it comes down to. It shouldn't be that simplistic, but the more you look, the clearer it becomes. And it will keep becoming clearer because the more Republicans consolidate power, the less they will need to hide. The people who are voting for fascism and authoritarianism aren't worried that they don't know enough. (They should be).

And I still want them to vote. I want everyone to vote. But today is for people of conscience who are letting insecurity hold them back from what is most needed. We need you, and you are enough.
Vote Democrat.

And it can be completely reasonable to listen to others on how to vote. Consider if they are more informed, and if you trust their values.

With the races where there are more unknowns, I look at the endorsements of people whom I do recognize. I don't always follow them, but it fills out the picture.

I get if that does not feel like enough. It may also be questionable if one candidate is running as a moderate. Tomorrow I will post about Oregon's gubernatorial race, and Wednesday we will look at ballot measures.

I know that doesn't help people in other states (and countries), but there are information sources out there. Keep looking.

Be careful about trusting newspapers though. Often even the ones that you expect to be kind of liberal are really more conservative. I'm looking at you, The Oregonian.

Band Review: Camille Nelson

Camille Nelson plays guitar and violin beautifully.

I am more aware of it because in listening to her music, I found myself much more moved by the instrumental pieces.

There is nothing wrong with the vocals, but the lyrics seem to fall short. I suspect it is that by simply eliminating words - even with familiar tunes that have well-known words - it sets the instruments free.

Therefore, I like Lead Me Home better than First Words, but on First Words, I love "Reminiscence". To be fair, Lead Me Home is also more spiritually-themed, so the two albums would be different experiences regardless.

Very uplifting.

https://www.camillenelson.com/

https://www.facebook.com/camillenelsonmusic/


https://www.youtube.com/user/CamilleNelson

https://twitter.com/camillenmusic

Band Review: Dre Prada

I was followed by one Twitter account, https://twitter.com/CEOBigMov, which points to Dre Prada, who has a separate Twitter account, listed with the other links. The CEOBigMov account appears to be more active.

I may not be sure about the Twitter accounts, but I can confirm that Dre Prada is a young rapper from Toronto. It was interesting seeing a video flashing the flag and money, but that meaning a red maple leaf and images of young Queen Elizabeth II.

Unfortunately, that was the most interesting thing about the video. This flavor of hip hop is pretty typical, of the overproduced kind. Voices and instruments sound auto-tuned like a J. G. Wentworth commercial, and it saps all of the energy and authenticity.

I do think that Dre Prada's youth may work in his favor, in that as he matures and gains experience he may want to do something more and find the skills to do so. There are older people (he is listed as 16, though I am not sure how current the profile is) whose output sounds exactly the same.

Nothing terrible, but not memorable either.

https://www.whoisdreprada.com/

https://www.facebook.com/DrePradaBloomin

https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCNsCPeG3A7d91wNlxOOkaAQ


https://twitter.com/dreprada85

Taking time to think

Building on yesterday's post, speaking differently leads to thinking differently.

After the revolution in Cuba, you were a Communist or you were a "gusano". A worm. You could do a lot of terrible things to a worm. Some examples for school children included grading them down, not letting them go to the bathroom (no matter how desperately they needed to) and allowing other kids to beat them up. That's for school children. When you use words to transform people into "other", it opens the door for abuse.

I believe that if you decide that you will not resort to "libtards" or "snowflakes" as insults for liberals, that is an important step in closing the door. The word "liberal" may still have negative connotations for you, but not relying on easy labels forces you to think more. That matters.

Russia interfered in the last presidential election. That involved spreading false information, but it also involved stoking the fires of bigotry. (To be fair, that was a central part of the candidate's platform.) It has been interesting to see two other areas of Russian interference: vaccines and Star Wars.

https://www.usnews.com/news/healthiest-communities/articles/2018-08-23/russian-trolls-targeted-vaccine-debate-to-sow-division-researchers-say

https://www.hollywoodreporter.com/heat-vision/star-wars-last-jedi-was-targeted-by-russian-trolls-study-says-1148475

Those were not random choices. People have strong emotions about both of those issues, and can be very passionate about those topics.

Those passions can also work out in specific ways. Much of the negative response to The Last Jedi pertained to the casting of women and people of color (and even a woman of color) in starring roles. You can see that as a nice nod to the reality of a universe where women and people of color do things, or you can feel threatened, see it as Social Justice Warriors (SJWs - another slur, but possibly one that's being replaced by NPC for Non Playing Character) ruining everything, and lash out in racist and misogynistic ways.

Given the current political climate, that is a target area that works better for people drawn to the right. What could be good for people drawn to the left? Enter stirring up controversy about vaccines.

It is an interesting gambit, because it is anti-science which normally veers more right. However, progressives who are against vaccines tend to be easily seduced by purity, which is the kind of thing that can get them to reject a reasonable candidate with normal flaws and be very self-righteous about it. It gets emotional.

That sounds like a criticism, but I value emotion. When people find it useful to talk to me, I know a lot of that is simply that I support feeling the way you feel. The instinct is to comfort grief and silence fears and do away with all of those negative things, but they are real, and they need to be felt. Trying to silence the emotions does more harm than good. It is part of our humanity.

However, no matter how important acknowledging and feeling your emotions is, said emotions are usually not the best basis for making a decision.

A few months ago I read a book, You Are Now Less Dumb, by David McRaney, which focused on bias. Humans have a lot, and that is natural, but you don't have to get stuck in it.

One of the early examples was how you can use a soda vending machine without knowing how it works, and various suppositions you could make about how it works. You could believe there is a small person in the machine, but that is also something you can look up. There are online videos showing how they work. You can buy them for cheap as a business opportunity (I have recently learned via Judge Judy), but you could then take it apart and put it back together. (I'm just trying to not encouraged vandalizing someone else's machine in the pursuit of knowledge.)

So you can find stuff out, and not be mystified or caught up in a myth.

For example, with vaccines, you could research Andrew Wakefield, and why his work has been invalidated. You could research mercury and thimerosal, and you could see how it was removed from the scheduled vaccines in 2002 and it did not cause a sudden plunge in autism diagnoses. Yes, the anti-vaccine movement has responses to that, but it would still help your brain to at least do some research and branch out.

One reason it is safe to sit with your emotions is that they can change so easily, especially as time passes and more information comes. Of course, that is also why they may not lead to the best decisions. Taking that time to learn more and understand more becomes a wonderful thing that you can do for yourself and others.

Next week I will be posting about this election.

Becoming a bad word

I am amazed and disturbed at the ubiquity of "libtard" as an insult.

On the one hand, as much as I know the right hates political correctness (i.e. speaking respectfully), I still know enough conservatives who have relatives with disabilities whom they love, where it should make that suffix unacceptable.

It's almost as if proximity to someone in danger of being marginalized does not automatically confer recognition of existing harmful structures.

There is kind of a separate issue here, where in our patterns of prejudice we can always make exceptions for the ones we like. This can be dangled as a reward: "You're not like those other women." "Of course we don't mean you."

It can also be used as a way of justifying one's alignment: "They're all nice to my child, so they can't be that bad."

But it is all connected.

Having totally bought into being respectful (political correctness), I have a hard time using this word and its variations, but I am going to make myself do it here to make a point.

Mentally retarded. MR. Various abbreviations of that last word. It referred to something intellectual - at least cognitive - but it wasn't used that way. There was a kid with ADHD who got called "Retarda" at my sisters' school, including by the gym teacher. I'm just saying, even if there were valid uses for the label, those were not the most common uses. I'm not sure the intended use was ever that helpful, making it for the best that it has fallen out of favor.

That pattern holds. A phrase will be used that is supposed to mean something, but it isn't being used accurately, and the use spreads as it becomes a tempting catch-all. I have heard "snowflake" justified as something specifically for today's young people, because they are raised with all the obstacles removed and are therefore weak (and apparently they think they are special).

There are problems with the logic of saying that kids that have to worry constantly about school shootings, cyber-bullying and and food insecurity have it too easy, but I can't help but notice that the slightest disagreement draws the term upon people my age and older.

If the point is being able to ignore people who say things that you don't want to hear, painting with a broad brush is perfectly logical.

It's wrong - not merely wrong but reveling in the wrongness and rolling around in it until it is completely absorbed. It's uncharitable, which is odd because a lot of people who think of themselves as religious and good do it. It's ignorant, so I guess it's blissful, but I think that's a false bliss.

And it is being used pretty hard on liberals.

I have to take that seriously. Most of what the president says has been pretty disturbing for anyone who has issues with fascism and authoritarianism anyway, but the comments lately about Democrats being ungovernable, that's a concern. It is more of a concern with government that has set up a process for re-examining citizenship.

History is my thing. I have... not exactly worried, but been aware... that in the direction we are going, academics always end up under attack. For all my reading, I am not really an academic; I have a BA from 22 years ago.

I am wholly liberal. That has not had anything remarkable about it for decades of a fairly normal political process, but that is changing. This is a change that looks similar to a lot of places that have ended in death and re-education camps.

If you don't have liberal values, that is your prerogative. However, if you have any value for democracy and representative government, you had better start respecting other voices.

One potential starting place is how you speak of those with whom you disagree.