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Beauty-Pageant-Style Tariffs
We are going to have a beauty-pageant-style announcement for the new tariffs, mostly on our ally countries, on the “liberation” day, April 2nd. That’s pretty much all Mr. President understands; a competition in a TV show, be it the Beauty Pageant which he owned for a while, or the Apprentice show, in which he actually…
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A Government “of Narcissists”, “by the King’s Cronies”, and “for Retribution”
In his Gettysburg Address in November of 1863, Abraham Lincoln famously articulated a core principle of democracy, the emphasis on citizen-led governance and representation, as a “government of the people, by the people, for the people.” Through all the variations in the policies and ambitions of administrations from different political parties since then, and the…
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Fixing the Elections, or Voter Suppression?
In the last post, I discussed the magnitude of potential errors due to ineligible voters in the election results in the US, and proposed a very generous confidence interval of 0.01%, based on the results of a recent investigation from the state of Georgia, a with substantial amount of overestimation and scaling to be applicable…
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Elections, or Statistical Experiments?
As you can guess from the title of this post, I am trying to pose elections as statistical experiments. I know there is a big difference; unlike polling, elections do not involve taking a sample of data to make a decision. Instead, every single vote is expected to be counted in every election. So, yes,…
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The Glass Is Half Full
It has been about two weeks since President Trump has taken the oath of office (mind you, without placing his hand on the bible; not that it bothers me, nor is it required by the Constitution, but something that may be of potential interest or significance to the vast number of Christian and especially evangelical…
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Which Countries Released Their Criminals into the US?
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Preemptive Pardons
Yes, they do sound somewhat strange or even unreasonable or unjustified, especially when, contrary to common understanding and the legal precedent that acceptance of a pardon is itself admission of guilt, these pardons come with a statement that their issuance is not an acknowledgment of any wrongdoing, nor should their acceptance be misconstrued as an…
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Taxes, Tariffs, and Prices
It’s no secret that the lawmakers and administrations that cozy up to the billionaires and corporations promote reducing or removing the income and corporate taxes and replacing them with increased sales taxes. If one’s goal is to protect the financial interests of the wealthy at the expense of increased taxation on the working class and…
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Power to Exercise One’s Freedom of Speech
I have already written about the First Amendment to the United States’ Constitution, and that, contrary to common understanding or attempts by those who have always wanted to abuse it, it is not just about the freedom of speech, and even the part that is related to the freedom of speech, is not a blanket…