Use Your Words

Lately, I've found myself telling the kids to "use your words" when they are crying or whining or being generally unclear of what they mean. Further, I saw this excellent video by the Vlog Brothers (John and Hank Green) about the history of the "Non-Denial Denial" in our politics.

And that's brought me back to the tools of my trade: Words. Words and their meaning are incredibly powerful. Words can build up or tear down; words can be crafty, clever, hurtful, damaging, insulting, rude, insightful, uplifting, frustrating, and generous. But let's face it: in the political season, most of the time words are weapons. And if we're going to use words like weapons, then we need to make sure our tools are refined and not clumsily wielded. If we're going to use name-calling as political statement, I want to know why we choose that word.

Let me give one example, not because he's the only one throwing accusations, but because he's the most prominent. I've been trying to find why exactly Donald Trump believes Hillary Clinton is a "liar" and "crooked." For starters, I googled "Why Trump Calls Clinton a Liar" and went until the 10th page to find specifics. One linked to a story in which Trump called her "guilty" and "Everything about her is a big, fat, beautiful lie." The reporter inferred it was a reference to Benghazi and her email scandal, but Trump's actual words were not specific.

As far as I can tell, Trump has only personally given two specific instances of Hillary (not Bill) lying: 1) Whether she carries hot sauce in her purse 2) Whether Trump's words were used in an ISIS recruiting video. And if those two are your only stated reasons why she's a liar, they're pretty weak.

On the former issue, Hillary has said (in interviews dating back to at least 2008) she's carried hot sauce with her since her husband's 1992 race. A 2012 Wall Street Journal piece mentioned that she used Tabasco sauce on her food. If she's lying, then she's been planting the seeds of a long con for at minimum 8 years — and all for the added benefit of ... winning some African-American votes, I guess? That she was probably going to win anyway? Occam's Razor tells me this probably isn't a lie.

The second issue is more straightforward. At the time Hillary made her statement, that Trump had been used in ISIS recruiting videos (Dec. 2015), he was right — she lied. There was no evidence at the time she made the statement of his words/image/video being in ISIS recruiting videos. However, that's no longer the case. A few weeks later and again in March, ISIS used Trump clips in recruiting videos. So although she was wrong at the time of her statement, she ended up being right.

So of his two specific claims of lies, one probably wasn't a lie, and the other was at the time but now isn't. If you want to believe that Hillary Clinton lies, that's fine — most politicians do, and there are plenty of reasons to back up your belief. But use your words and be specific. Because if words are like a sword, then a sharper weapon is always better than a dull one.

Electoral College Update

This week, polls have given both the GOP and the Democrats reason to be excited about their November prospects. Anyway, while the usual caveats for polls being too early and all before I get into this: One Fox News poll showed Trump slightly ahead (though a New York Times/CBS poll shows Clinton ahead by 6). Certainly, there's been a bit of a bump lately for Trump, but that's also because he's locked up his nomination — candidates tend to get a bump after they secure the nomination. Clinton hasn't quite locked it in yet, so she has yet to see the bump. The good news for the GOP is that Trump has seen a bump and appears in striking distance. The bad news for the GOP are the two new battlegrounds: Arizona and Georgia.

Arizona and Georgia should be strong GOP states, but their demographics are changing. Arizona is becoming more Hispanic, and Georgia is becoming more African-American. Trump is strongly unpopular among those two demographics. The latest polls from those two states show that Trump has a lead, but it's slight and within the margin of error. As I mentioned in past posts, Trump has to win several "blue states" in order to win the presidency — but that also means retaining all the "red states." Arizona and Georgia may signal some trouble on the retention front.

If you start with the states ranked "safe" or "solid" according to Cook Political Report, then Clinton leads 217 delegates to Trump's 163 in the race to 270. That means everything else (CO, FL, NV, PA, VA, WI, IA, NC, NH, Nebraska's 2nd district, OH, AZ and GA) is a "battleground." If you add in any of those that have voted the same in every election after 1990, add another 30 delegates to Clinton's total (Pennsylvania and Wisconsin).

And if that's the starting point, Trump CANNOT lose Florida and its 29 delegates or the race is over before you look at any other battlegrounds. If a Trump presidency scares you, then don't worry yet — he has a long way to go.

Summary Judgments

I haven't been running lately because of my cough (earlier in the week) and then taking care of kids sick with hand, foot and mouth disease (later in the week). I'm going to resume running next week, and that'll keep my on track with my June 11 race. I'm going to repeat the week of 2.5 mile runs, because I don't feel I did well that week because of coughing and because I haven't run for two weeks.  •  •  •  I've spent a lot of time building block towers lately, mainly so Evie can destroy them. I like to imagine the towers are built by the poor people of Tokyo, who keep having to rebuild after Godzilla-Evie destroyed their last building. So they try architectural changes and different approaches to see if they can avoid the wrath of the Destructor. Yet it never works. In my obviously overactive mind, the people of Tokyo are some resilient folks.