Month: April 2021

The Census Results

The U.S. population is now 331,449,281.

Texas is gaining two Congressional seats.

Colorado, Montana, North Carolina, and Oregon Florida are gaining one.

California, Ohio, Illinois, New York, Michigan, Pennsylvania, and West Virginia are losing one. I feel bad for West Virginia since this means they’ll now be down to only two members of the House. Of course, whoever loses their seat can always just run to succeed Joe Manchin whenever he finally decides to throw in the towel.

Now, we move on to redistricting. At this point, all I care about is getting out Colin Allred’s district. Hopefully, once the news maps have been drawn and approved, I’ll be a Van Taylor constituent.

This Has Been A Good Week

Lisa and I finally got to go up to Lake Texoma this week and it’s been great just to get away from it all. We’ve observed a no-TV rule with a few exceptions. Tonight, we’ll definitely be breaking the rule so that we can watch the Oscars. I haven’t seen many of the nominees but I’m still looking forward to seeing how the ceremony is going to handle giving out awards during the final days of a pandemic.

Plus, there’s always the competition to see who will give the worst acceptance speech. I’m going to guess Sacha Baron Cohen if he wins for Trial of the Chicago 7 or for writing the Borat movie.

Senator Herschel Walker?

Is Herschel Walker serious about running for the Senate in Georgia and could he win? I attended a Herschel Walker book-signing back in the day and I saw firsthand that he’s a charismatic guy. He’s someone who I can easily imagine on the campaign trail. But he’s also written extensively about suffering from dissociative identity disorder. He deserves a lot of credit for being honest about his mental health struggles and for serving as an advocate. But anyone who thinks that the Democrats won’t use this against them isn’t being honest about politics.

I hope the best for him, whether that means serving in the Senator or not.

Derek Chauvin Has Been Convicted

I watched the Chauvin trial and it was obvious to me that the was guilty. I was worried that, for whatever reason, it wouldn’t be obvious to the jury but, earlier today, they found him guilty on all three counts.

He’ll probably appeal. They’ll say that the jury voted to convince Chauvin because they worried of being retaliated against if they didn’t. I’m sure that some members of the jury were concerned about that and that’s not a good thing. At the same time, the evidence overwhelmingly showed that Chauvin was guilty.

He’s due to be sentenced in June. He faces up to 40 years in prison.

Walter Mondale Has Died

By most account, he was a decent man. It seems like most of his political career was spent being a good soldier and getting promoted to higher office as a result. He was appointed to the office of being Minnesota’s attorney general. He was appointed to the U.S. Senate. He was selected to be run for vice president. In 1984, he ran for president and was the choice of party insiders. He still nearly lost the nomination to Gary Hart before then losing to Ronald Reagan in a historic landslide. Later, he was appointed to be ambassador to Japan and, in his final political race, he was selected by a committee to run for the Senate in 2002 after Paul Wellstone’s tragic death. (In retrospect, his defeat in that race was an indication of both the passing of the old political class and of how much politics was abut to change as America entered a new century.)

He outlived his 1984 running mate, Geraldine Ferraro, by nearly ten years. With his passing, there are now 5 former living Vice Presidents: Quayle, Gore, Cheney, Biden, and Pence. Biden is currently president. Pence appears to be making moves to run in 2024. In fact, of that group, Cheney is the only one who hasn’t ever run for President.

Walter Mondale, R.I.P.

Lori Lightfoot Resigning?

Twitter is full of rumors that Lori Lightfoot is going to resign as mayor of Chicago tomorrow. Apparently, it’s not going to be because of the Austin Toledo shooting or the crime wave that is currently destroying one of America’s great cities. Instead, it’s because of a scandal involving an extramarital affair. That’s the rumor, anyway.

I’ll believe it when I see it. Do politicians even resign anymore? It seems like they just ride it out. Andrew Cuomo is still in office. Matt Gaetz is still in office. Ralph Northam is still in office. Donald Trump never resigned. Bill Clinton is still treated like an elder statesman. Joe Biden’s support actually grew after he was accused of assaulting Tara Reade. Al Franken resigned and now spends all of his time talking about how he wishes he hadn’t. Resigning hasn’t been cool since 2018.

If I was betting money, I would put it all on Lori Lightfoot not going anywhere.

Is Yang Too Strange To Be Mayor of New York?

I’ve seen a lot of people asking this question on twitter and it is true that, compared to most people running for office, Andrew Yang does sometimes say some strange things.

I think that’s a huge part of his appeal. Andrew Yang is authentic in a way that most candidates are not. He’s got that ability to say whatever pops into his head and to get away with it. That makes him an attractive candidate. It will also probably be his biggest handicap as mayor but, after eight years of Bill De Blasio, Andrew Yang’s cheerful weirdness might be a relief.

For a few months, anyways.