Wednesday, November 9, 2016

Lessons from the middle part V

or...

What the Democrats should learn from the election of Donald Trump

or...

How to Win -- not just the next election, but Every Election!

Another lesson from the middle...

This lesson is for the Democrats.  You Republicans can go have a beer.  Or if you're a Baptist Republican you can go have a nice glass of "sweet tea"*.

You're sitting there all sad.  You're thinking "How can our country have elected this ridiculous, stupid monster?"  Well, buck up sissypants, that's how Libertarians feel after every fucking election.   But, it's still a good question.  How DID we elect him?

The simple answer is: You did.  Yes, you. 

But I digress... let's go back a few months.  Democrats basically fielded 2 candidates: the Socialist and The Most Hated Woman in America.  Oh, sure, there were a handful more, but how many people can name them without the help of Google or Wikipedia?  Now, when you put these candidates up, The Most Hated Woman in America beat the Socialist.  The conclusion was, of course, "Hey, look we've got a real contender there!"  But there's where you are wrong.  What you should have gotten from that is that -- even though he had a lot of very strong support, America would take The Most Hated Woman in America over pure socialism.

But let's keep going, shall we?  You then put The Most Hated Woman in America up against the pussy-grabbing reality show buffoon.  Now, let me tell you a little something about what went on out here in the trenches.  There were some seriously red Republicans that were sneaking off to voting booths to vote for The Most Hated Woman in America because that buffoon was such an awful choice.  AND SHE STILL DIDN'T WIN

Why?  Because, dipshit, she was The Most Hated Woman in America.  When you give people nothing but awful choices, they are ever so likely to make a awful choice.

Now: I know what you're thinking already.  You're going to sit tight and wait 4 years and then point to the catastrophe that occurs.  You're going to put up Lefty McSocialinstein.  And there is a likelihood that this will work.  You'll have elected a Democrat and will have recovered much of the House/Senate.  But... what if you could do that and win EVERY SINGLE ELECTION THEREAFTER?  Interested?

Here's what you do:  Don't run Lefty McSocialinstein.  Instead, put in a reasonable, moderate candidate.  Put in a candidate that is pro-choice, pro-marijuana, pro gay marriage, pro 2nd amendment, against welfare for rich people and DOESN'T WANT TO EXPAND THE FEDERAL GOVERNMENT. 

Let me tell you:  You'll win in a landslide.  And you'll win in a repeatable fashion.  You will win so damn much we'll have to use the Googles to remember what that right wing party used to be called.



*which we know is a euphemism for "beer, except my friends can't know."

Tuesday, October 27, 2015

Whose report? WHO's report.

I am not a scientist. I am not a researcher. I am not a statistician. Hell, as often as I scribble something down, I don't even think I can call myself a blogger. But I would like to attach some numbers to the WHO's recent "Bacon is meaty death" study that seems to be getting press lately.

If you are to read some of the articles about this study  you'd be prepared to start injecting liquefied Brussels sprouts straight into your veins to fend off the evils of delicious pastrami.

"A research division of the World Health Organization announced Monday that bacon, sausage and other processed meats cause cancer and that red meat probably does, too.... In reaching its conclusion, the panel sought to quantify the risks, and compared to carcinogens such as cigarettes..."

OH MY GOD.  My smoked s'pork ribs are nothing but carnivore Marlboro's!

But I wonder...  what is the mathiness on this?

It appears the chances of me getting colon cancer in the next 30 years are about 3.39%.

BUT... If I were to throw caution to the wind and act like the daredevil I sometimes can be and consume a serving of red meat a day, I have a scary 17% increase!  That means I have a 20.39% chance of getting cancer!  Right? .... um... no.  It means my chances are 17% of 3.39% higher.  It means my chances just sky-rocketed from 3.39% chance of getting colon cancer to a 3.96% chance of getting colon cancer.

But Satan lives in a bucket of nitrates.  The bacon weel keel you.  Because if you dare smoke that meat... or pickle it... or cure it in any other evil way that Hitler obviously invented, you're going to get an 18% increase in risk.  Or, in other words, I would have 4% risk of getting colon cancer.  That extra sprinkle of salt got you an incremental 4 out of ten thousand people that might get cancer over the plain old red meat eaters.

And this is why I detest observational studies like this.  You ask a few thousand people what they ate last week.  They lie.  They guess.  They approximate.  (Tell me, measured in grams to the nearest tenth, how much of what food you had last week.)  And then you average all that together.  You then take 799 similar studies and try to pull meaningful data out of them.  When you find some small anomaly, you then rush to the press and scream "DEATH!  MURDER!  MAYHEM!" from the highest mountain top... even though the evidence is based on shaky data and at best affects 6 people in a thousand.

The real kicker comes when you lovingly tie this to smoking cigarettes as a cancer risk, as has been done in the press.  Now, our delicious salami gave us an 18% increased risk or 1.18 times the chance of getting colon cancer.   Smoking cigarettes is associated with a 2500% increase in lung cancers (25 times! Not 1.18 times!)  These numbers do not compare.  We're not talking apples and oranges here.  No: we're talking English peas and wrecking balls.

So please:  Step away from my barbecue pit.  There's nothing to see here.  And if you want to do an actual randomized, controlled clinical trial, I will volunteer to be in the group with the smoked ham.

Epilogue

Just for fun, let's list some other items on the Group 1 carcinogen hit list that you'll need to give up in addition to processed meat:
  • Oral contraceptives
  • alcoholic beverages
  • outdoor air
  • sunlight

And the list of Group 2A things you'll also want to avoid in addition to plain old red meat:
  • frying emissions (just being near it... not even eating it)
  • a nice warm fireplace
  • working nights

So as long as you are a sober, celibate, pasty white, vitamin D deprived individual that has regular sleeping hours and remains shivering indoors with no fireplace and no french fries... You'll be fine.

Sunday, May 31, 2015

Just to make it official...

Too many hands on my time
Too many feelings
Too many things on my mind
When I leave I don't know
What I'm hoping to find
When I leave I don't know
What I'm leaving behind... 
-Neil Peart, The Analog Kid

In the current Internet climate, it seems nothing is official until it's "Facebook Official."

It is in that spirit that I announce: I'm going to retire.  This is now, once again, a Quitter's Blog.  Much like my initial pretirement in 2006, the reactions seem to range from "congratulations" to "you are a dumb sumbitch."  I guess I should expect as much.  So, with little fanfare, I will address some of the common questions that aren't already answered in the wtf.  I'll probably eventually fold them in there in some form or fashion.

Why the hell are you retiring?

Short answer: because I can.  If you had the option, would you? ("No" is an acceptable answer.)

Longer answer: There are all types.  Some people love their jobs and will work up until the point they are dead-at-desk*.  While I enjoy doing things, they're not always the same things that I get paid for.  Human life is ridiculously short.  The idea of getting up, sucking down coffee, driving an hour, then spending the majority of a beautiful day in an 8x8 cube with no view of the world... Well, as glamorous as it sounds, it loses a little of it's gleam over the years.  Tag.  You're it.  It's your turn.

What the hell are you going to do all day?

Whatever the hell I want to.  This isn't really a question I even understand.  For years, I hear people complain of their busy lives and what they'd do if they just had time.  Well: I have time.  I have a workshop that needs to be fully set up and a house that's been 80% complete for a long time.  Just tying up those ends will entertain me for the short term.

Won't you be bored?

Are you bored at work?

How long have you been planning on this?

Almost since the beginning of work itself.  I have a much beloved uncle that punched out for the last time at age 48.  While I missed the bar by a couple of years, the idea has been there for as long as I can remember.  But I've been mostly** working on it for the past 20 years. 

How in the world did you do this?

The really short answer to "How?" is: you spend less than you earn.  I know that sounds like a cop out, but it really is just that simple.  Drive an older car.  Live in a less expensive house.  Eat out less.  Buy less stuff.  Don't pay $5 a day for a 15 cent cup of coffee.  And that isn't just a way to save money now while compounding interest does awesome things.  That also means you'll need less to live on later.  That $100k of expenses you had this year might last you 3 or 4 years if you just looked at it from the right angle.  (And this doesn't mean your way of spending is wrong...  But it might be wrong if you want to retire early.)

But I'm just a snarky sonofabitch.  I'm not really a good teacher.  If you really want a nuts and bolts approach, you should probably take a look at someone like Mr. Money Mustache.  It turns out that the math is shockingly simple.  I happened on MMM well after I was on the road.  And I by no means took an extreme approach.  While I brag about being a Cheap Ass Bastard -- compared to Those of the Mustache™, I am probably a Spendy McSpenderson. 

This wouldn't work for me.  My situation is different...

That's not a question.

Dammit.  Okay.  How in the world would this work for me in situation X?

I'm not a financial analyst and you probably don't want to pay me to become one.  Are there people that just have oddball corner cases or lots of dumb, stupid luck?  Sure.  But there are quite a few cases of people making almost nothing, with a house full of kids that managed to retire MUCH FASTER than me.  If you really want advice, I'm quite sure one of them could offer it better than I.  If you're serious about it, post your details on the MMM forum and let the math geeks play with it.  But if you want to argue that it cannot be done in your situation, you've come to the wrong place.  If you don't think you can do it, you're destined to be right.

Will you ever work again?

I don't know.  I'm relatively sure I won't ever work again in the same capacity that I do now.  I'd be more interested to take lower paying jobs where I could learn a skill (cabinet shop anyone?) than leverage my existing skills.  And I might do little bits and pieces of what I do now for grins -- but at a significantly higher rate.

When's all this happen?

Both seriously and tongue in cheek: Independence Day.

---

*One place I worked had a database of everyone that had ever worked there across decades and their employment status: current employee, retired, fired with cause, etc.   One entry in that very large database had the status "dead at desk."  That will not be me.

**Mostly meaning: not including 2006-2009, when I felt the urge to take my ball and go home for a little while.  Again: because I could. 

Saturday, April 18, 2015

P&T: the Unreview


Three years since last post?  Yeah, I've been.... um.... busy.  I know the world weeps for my wisdom.

If you're looking for a review of the travelling Penn & Teller magic show, you're probably in the wrong place.  What you're more likely to find here is just me being a big kiss ass toward the dynamic duo.  It's not really fair for me to ask if I liked the show.  That's like asking if I like ice cream.  Or steak.  Or bacon.  You see: I've been a fan since my late teens (and I'm an old fart).  But I never knew how much of a fan I was back then... I just knew their humor and style appealed to me.

What I came to discover -- and hope to impart here -- is that their magic matters.  Oh, sure, it is a silly show full of all sorts of chuckles, lies and trickery.  But it is more than that as well.  It is true art.  And it's art with a purpose.

To really understand their impact, you'd have to understand the town I grew up in.  When I was a child, it was a sleepy little town fully entrenched and ruled by Baptists.  And I mean seriously ruled.  It was "made safe" by continuing alcohol prohibition well up until 2013.  I remember the religious leaders up in arms protesting -- successfully I might add -- to keep the heretic ideas in Monty Python's "Life of Brian" out of the cinema.  I remember city ordinances that shuttered dangerous pornography like Playboy magazine and kept it safely outside the city walls.  And all I could think at the time was how bassackwards the town was and how much I wanted to escape it.

And escape I did.  Roughly about the same time I first saw P&T's blood and cockroach infested appearances on Letterman -- I also was dabbling in that evil that we know of as Rock and Roll.  In particular: Rush -- which also had quite an influence on my young mind.  I found their intriguing ideas on art, self interest and philosophy really melded with my own forming opinions.  When I found a one-liner in their liner notes: "with acknowledgement to the genius of Ayn Rand"... I dug through bookshelves and started reading.

It was probably about 10 years ago I realized that Penn & Teller were outspoken libertarians and atheists -- well, one of them was outspoken anyway.  I stumbled upon their Bullshit! series and was hooked immediately.  And it was just a little more than a year ago that Ellie May pulled out her phone with Penn's podcast loaded and said "Spork: you've GOT to listen to this."  Just like that, I became a member of Penn's congregation.

So why do silly magic tricks matter?  They matter because I saw a room full of old Baptist geezers listen while Penn trivializes religious thought -- and they laughed and applauded.  They matter because many of these same people patiently waited 45 minutes for a 10 second photo op with them, grinning with insane childish joy.  You can tell the magic tricks matter when you hear a stranger in the crowd say "I really don't like their world view, but MAN that part with the Constitution was powerful!"

They matter because men can express their love of individual rights and their distaste for religion all wrapped in laughter and wonder.  A group that's usually thought of as lunatic fringe is the star attraction for 2 whole hours.

And maybe most of all it matters because they somehow symbolize that the backwards town where I felt oddly out of place seems to have grown up -- just a little.