My Last Post Before the Election

....I promise!  I was working on a sport-related post (see below, in abbreviated form), but I must comment on the political issue of this moment. I'm struggling to keep calm here on Election Eve, so maybe this will be a useful distraction during the day, that and the draw of Sadistic Whist tonight. (topic for another day)

Election Night we plan to go to an election watch party.  It will be a late night for us, so I probably will not be back to share my thoughts on the emerging results until Wednesday afternoon (Mountain Standard Time) at the earliest.

I will say that I did warn that this could happen, back before the Michigan Democratic primary, with these words:  It's the responsibility of the candidate who loses today to give full support to the winner.  For months, Haley Stevens, who lost the primary nomination by only one percent, satisfctorily performed this responsibility to her nation--she endorsed the winner immediately after the conclusion of the primary. 

In these last days, though, it was apparent that there was a great deal of friction between nominee Abdul El-Sayed and Stevens, largely around the issue of relations with Israel.  She sought some concessions from El-Sayed in order to appear with him in a unity rally over last weekend, and he was not buying it.  Apparently she felt disrespected. 

Her decision over the weekend to switch and to endorse El-Sayed's opponent, Mike Rogers, was unforgivable and an act of political suicide.  She could have simply announced her withdrawal of the previous endorsement, based on whatever personal or political disagreement, and it would have been regrettable but even somewhat comprehensible.  This was not that.  Rogers has morphed in this campaign from a relatively responsible conservative Republican to a bigoted Trumpist, with one of the scummiest, most destructive campaigns across the country, and that is saying something.     

It is fortunate that the campaign has unearthed a number of states with the opportunity to flip Republican Senators, so that holding Michigan's seat for Democrats is not an absolute necessity, though it remains urgent.  El-Sayed's lead in polls was small--much smaller than that of Jo Benson for the governor's job there--and I would say his chances are no better than a toss-up. Stevens' betrayal may make a difference, particularly for some pro-Israel voters who are not following the facts of El-Sayed's campaign and his efforts to show that he is not, in fact, anti-Semitic

Reasons Why I Only Play on PredictIt

1) I continue to find their disclosure of the terms of play acceptable; they have recently removed the fee for removal of funds, in an effort to attract more flight money. 

2) Kalshi and Polymarket are spending the profits they make off their bettors to promote themselves with expensive TV ads.  I find the ads well-done, clever, but just battling for commercial brand superiority, nothing more. On the other hand, PredictIt is nominally a product of an academic institution in New Zealand that does little or no advertising.   

3) I considered going into Kalshi but stopped when the required initial deposit was proposed to go through something called Plaid, which disclosed its intention to sell the information I would give it.   Polymarket was not legal for my participation at that time (the opposite of PredictIt, which is only for US residents). My betting data is studied on PredictIt by those who put it out there to understand how crowd behavior could be predictive in politics and elections. 

4)  I believe Polymarket now has a second market legal for US citizens, given the lax regulatory environment.  The body entrusted with regulation of these entities is the CFTC**, which now is a Trumpian rubber stamp,  but it performed a thorough review of PredictIt during the Biden administration. 

 5) PredictIt cleaned up its act and now stays on its topics of politics, government, domestic and foreign,  and nothing else.  Those other guys do most anything, which subjects them to being targets of big whales. Worse, of those wannabes who have inside information.  Betting on sports is a whole other thing, one for a different post at a different time. Nate Silver, please note. 

6) PredictIt's supposed vice of insufficient trade volume is a virtue for me.  I can generally take any bet  positions I want  (for small stakes, mind you), often at the front of the line with the bid, and most of them get taken up sooner or later.  Less volume=more volatility, and volatility in prices is where I make my money, apart from pure guesswork.  (Needless to say, I believe my guesswork is better than most, but a) that's what everyone thinks, and b) I probably don't have enough confidence in my guesses and often sell before my ideal rule-based sell strategy.+) 

I have played on PredictIt for over 10 years; but even before that, I was on Rasmussen Markets until just before it went belly-up  As I recall, I lost most of my stake there on the Obama-Hillary primary of New Mexico, believing its winner to be a sure thing halfway through the evening. Rasmussen, bleah!

I say "play" on PredictIt because I follow strictly the reasonable gamblers' guideline:  put in no more than you are comfortable losing entirely.  I didn't put in a lot way back then (less than $1000), and I'm basically still playing with that money.  Not that I haven't had a couple big loss evenings along the way (2016 and 2024 come to mind).  I do have a few strategies now which have allowed me to sujpport most often the outcomes I want to see win without losing it all.   

 Rulin' and Brewin' 

I tip my cap* to the Milwaukee Brewers for their impressive World Series championship.  Not only did they answer my question from a previous post by defeating the Dodgers, they swept them, setting records along the way.***

They were a classic type of team with strength "up the middle"--(catcher, the middle infield, center field)--which means good defense, which in turn assists the pitchers' efforts.  On offense, they had all kinds of good habits, from the pitches they chose to swing at, to the launch angles they chose,  to the behavior on the basepaths. 

I see this World Series to be a significant, memorable one for a few reasons: 

It was a showdown between the two teams that were clearly the best in each league during the full season.  This used to happen every year (before the split of the leagues into divisions in the Sixties), but with the expansion of the wild cards has become a rarity. 

It was a finals matchup of franchises with long histories of not making the World Series, and of being teams that had never won it.  This is also rare these days, and has a different flavor, one that is fresher than the norm.. 

It is the last World Series before the coming owner lockout, and it will be remembered fondly in the future, after the lockout someday ends.  The upcoming battle at the end of the previous contract will be an entrenched struggle between the owners, who want to restrain their colleagues' excessively free-spending ways (not their own, of course, the other guys), and the players association, which refuses to give the ground the other major sports' money-generators (the ones who play) ended up having to do.  I feel this can only end one way, but it may take awhile, during which there would be no "baseball"****activity.  

I"ll cover some other sports separately in the near future. 

NOTES 

 * Let's be clear:  my cap is a Reds one (though I had a Padres cap, recently used in a post, which I had found around and given to my wife.

**Commodities Futures Trading Commission.  Go figure. 

*** But not breaking the record closest to my heart of the longest run of perfection in winning the Series, which is held by the 1976 Cincinnati Reds' Big Red Machine.  Yes, I must repeat that.

****I forgot to include the lazy, inaccurate conflation calling Major League Baseball' as "baseball" in my recent post about my "Bugaboos" .  The sport will continue without MLB games, in other places than the US and Toronto, too. 

+ In a nutshell, it's to sell when you have reached 80% of your potential profits (a Pareto principle).  It reduces risk of regret in those cases that you lose. This means to hold onto your most profitable bets until nearly the bitter end, and I frequently have not had enough courage to do that.  My current approach is to gradually shed some of those not-fully-realized  gains to free up some cash from my limited stake (almost always fully invested) for new markets of interest, which often emerge. 

History Can't Wait

 It's only eight days until joy, or else a gloom unto doom. Not Tuesday, Election Day, but the Day After. 

In one sense, it's not the right time for the Kill Strike against Trumpism.  The President will survive this humiliation and will remain in office, it seems no matter what, for two more years   He will be wounded--privately, though publicly he will not own up to the personal nature of the defeat--and angry. Though he avoided it, showed little focus on it, and pursued policies ignorant of the effect upon it, it is still his, and he has delivered himself personally to his side in the end. 

I think that it may work, to some extent.  He is like the one with the whip hand herding his MAGA sheep into the voting booths. And some of those who were confused by the betrayal to their cause that his 2026 persona has brought will show up grumpily and help salvage a few of the races in play. 

If that moves the national margin from 8-10%, where it has polled recently, to "only" 6 percent, there will be gloom.  The key outcomes will not be settled yet--even in the House, though the Democrats will surely prevail there--and control of the Senate will be mired in a set of several too-close-to-call races which will decide it.  Doom would not necessarily follow, but there will be no relief. 

The argument for Joy, though, insists that this is the right moment, and this midterm and Donald Trump the right targets.  As has been noted, the battle for Congress has become a "target-rich environment"* for the Democratic party.  The Republican defenses have been softened by grassroots dissatisfaction among their supporters, both the temporary ones of 2024 and longtime cultists who see that their needs were betrayed by Trump policies exacerbating the difficulties in their lives. Even more critically is the cratering of support for Trump and his policies among Independents--this group increasingly decides all close elections. Democratic attacks have come from a number of angles, but the ones focusing on Trumpist grifting and outright theft and on the negative effect on cost of living arising from the unsuccessful Iran military adventure seem to have bit most broadly and deeply.  

If we are to be joyful next Wednesday morning, we will need to see a couple of clear victories in Senate races to feel confident about it.  I name Sherrod Brown in Ohio and the wins we should expect to see in in Michigan, Maine, and North Carolina. After that, we will win some and lose some, but hope would be justified. 

Personally, I find the rejection of Trumpism apparent in this election to be insufficient.  Even if the results meet my most optimistic hopes (240+ in the House, 53+ in the Senate, defeat of both Paxton and Greg Abbott), it will be because of economic weakness, a condition that can easily reverse and bring a political reversal as well, and not because of the many, serious areas of damage Trumpism has caused and may continue to cause for at least two more years, nor because of the demonstration, once and for all, that this Republican party can't govern.  Even if Democrats win clear control of both houses of Congress, this win is not going to mean permanent defeat for the party of Trumpian losers, just yet.  

I hold by my predictions of two months ago, though now they look to be on the pessimistic side.  

 *Reference to former Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld, always done ironically.  Rumsfeld felt Iraq was a target-rich environment and Afghanistan was not.  So, I guess it wasn't just about 9/11. 

It's Elections Season

 As we go to the polls in the days to come, or we wait for our vote to be tabulated with all the others in the USA, we should also be cognizant that our election is one major part of a series of elections in these months that are going to have major effects on the global issues before us all. 

This wave of elections has started in some nations. I want to start with  a significant result easily overlooked, in Serbia.  A movement arising from students and faculty recoiling from a culture of rank corruption formed a party--one without identified individual leaders!--and defeated an entrenched, autocratic incumbent (Vucic) and his party.  There are a number of academics qualified in various fields among the winning party, but there is not a clear plan apart from cleaning house.  Serbia is very influential in southeastern Europe, its influence until now in a Russia/Putinesque direction, and it will be very interesting to watch developments.  I mention also Bulgaria, a nation on the Black Sea and thus involuntarily involved in the Russia-Ukraine war, and one that has had much political upheaval in recent years. It had the first round of a presidential election: the runoff will be between a Western-leaning challenger (man) and a Russian-leaning socialist incumbent (woman). 

In Brazil, the contest in its runoff between a radical challenger and a socialist incumbent had a surprising result yesterday.  Surprising in the sense that it completely upset the betting odds:  Javier Bolsonaro had a lead of a couple percent in the first round of the contest, which was already primarily a head-to-head challenge to President Lula, who was defending a pretty poor picture, partly the result of confrontation on tariffs and policy with US President Trump.  Lula and his allies successfully rallied a surge in turnout, again with heavy youth involvement, and won by four points.  Bolsonaro followed the script of Trump and his own father's actions and immediately disputed the result.  The outlook is not too promising for the next term of Lula's government (his fourth), but at least the Amazon rain forests should benefit from the result. 

Israel votes today in a hugely important election for the Knesset, their parliamentary organization.  The key vote is for parties:  with Israel's national proportional representation system, there is now a fractured political environment with a dozen or more parties going to exceed the minimum of 3.25% to be represented, and the parties typically feature a single leader.  The two largest parties in the polling, Yashar headed by a political novice, former general Gadi Eisenkot and Likud headed by Benjamin Netanyahu, witll each get less than 30% of the seats.  

To get to 50% (technically, 61 of the 120 seats) and form a government, then, a coalition is an absolute necessity, and the coalitions going into the voting have been identified months ago, complete with a lot of the usual switching around and maneuvering. The coalitions are organized around a simple question:  will Netanyahu continue as Prime Minister?  There is a lot of uncertainty on the margins, but the essence of the polling is to expect Gadi's party to edge out Bibi's and his coalition to have a few more seats than Bibi's, but not enough to get to 61.  It would be difficult, though not impossible, for a leader of one of the smaller parties to switch sides after the election and throw the balance.  

In the absence of that, the key to power would then be the parties not committed to the coalitions. The so- called "Arab" parties, the support for which comes from within the 20% of Israeli citizens who identify as Arab or Palestinian.  Their parties range from one somewhat cozy with the Zionist government to ones espousing radical leftist programs.  All call for a Palestinian state for their brethren in the West Bank and Gaza.    Though one of the parties was briefly in a non-Bibi government before October 7, only one of the Zionist parties has a policy that could align with their participation in the government--the Democrats (formed out of the desperation of the two left parties, Meretz and Labor, which merged).  I will be watching that party's result as a signal of the potential for a rebirth of sanity in the Zionist polity. 

In the meantime, though, the Arab parties are likely to be in a position of real leverage.  This may end up producing record participation from Israeli Arabs, which is usually low due to boycotts, as many of them feel there is no hope to influence Israel's policy, which discriminates against them in many subtle ways. 

The eventual likely outcome will be impasse, apparent stalemate, and then an effort for the anti-Netanyahu side to form a minority government with the support, from the outside, of a sufficient number of members of the Arab parties to reach the bare minimum.  This will likely be a fragile government, but if it gets Bibi out of the office, some progress is possible. Two results might be an investigation of the security failures which allowed Hamas to invade Israel on October 7, 2023 (something Bibi has furiously avoided, as it will likely ruin him) and some toning down of the tacit support for Zionist settlers attacking Palestinians. Expectations should be low, though. 

In coming months, there will also be critical votes in France, in Spain, and in Italy, among others.  More about these later, but we must now turn to the status of our own case.  

 

Bugaboos

Meta Doom

Watching the World Series game, I just saw an ad that I had seen before, but I thought it had been shelved, as it should have been, or at least modified. 

It is a series of people doing all kinds of things, a very lively, update tone, and it ends with something like "we're betting on people".  This ad is of course to address the common conception, recently framed nicely in the new movie "The Social Reckoning", that Meta is a company that has gone over to the robots, as personified by its head. 

The problem for me is the music in the background.  You can hear the lyrics, "all the fat, skinny people, all the tall short people. Never seen so many people" etc. Again, sounds very "Up with People".  

However, that music is David Bowie's "Five Years".  The song is about the announcement of an imminent doom of the human race.  It includes also these lyrics--"We got FIVE YEARS!  Five Years!  That's all we got!"  The focus of the lyrics is on the reaction to the news of a civilization-ending event. Almost something someone could write today about the "singularity" when AI cleans our clocks, if they were scared of such an event.

So, it is too discordant to me, and I wonder if this is a sly joke by their PR on the stupid masses, to include this contradictory message in plain sight.  

The Omnipresent Vibe

There are certain words that I am sick of seeing "all the time", i.e. too often for me. The one I'm talking about now is "vibrant", an adjective that is being applied to all kinds of things these days, often found in the text of smarmy marketing brochures.  I'd say it's pretty much never heard in conversation. 

There are uses when the use is accurate and vivid., I'll grant it might be appropriate to apply to a nightspot, a neighborhood which greets you with a pounding beat, a painting's colors, a gong ten seconds after it's struck, or a molecule (more on that later).  I've run across recently the following uses: "Vibrant text", "vibrant island", "vibrant pottery", 'vibrant argument".   This isn't about the object that is seen to be vibrating, it's about the observer's brain in a tizzy. 

 I'll admit that, technically, and according to what I've been taught in physics, any matter, or any energy, is vibrating, unless it is at absolute zero.  But then that word provides only that the vibrant thing exists. I notice that it is not used to describe a musical instrument--that would be redundant.  It is most important, then, to describe the type of vibration, or as we say in conversation, the "vibe".  I recommend the use of that phrase instead, because then one can add "the kind of" and make a comparison or description.  "Vibrant" itself is not really very descriptive. 

Adhesives

 I am not opposed to new technology, being the fruit of our search for ways to apply our knowledge.  As such, it is presumed OK; it all depends on how it's used and of knowing the full range of results of its use. 

There has been great progress in the capability to make two objects adhere to each other.  Although there remains some use for the peg, nail, screw, rivet and solder, today's glues leave those methods in the sticky muck like that which they employ. They are stronger bonds, less dependent on the nature of the two items being stuck together. The quantity of glue needed is so tiny for plastic packaging that it is undetectable.  So the packaging must tell us how to get any leverage, so not to pull directly against the counterforce holding things tin place, which would be a way to strain a muscle..  It's a struggle.

And then when the thing breaks, when you complete the tear and still cannot open the package. Forget about trying to overpower the adhesive with brute force. What I do, and I recommend its use, cautiously applied, is a tool we acquired in a seasonal package to cut up Halloween pumpkins.  You may know the product; it could easily poke one's eye out, or worse.  The thing is small (handle 3-4 in. and not thick), with a narrow, serrated edge on both sides about as long.  

I call it "The Tearer".  Though one could also easily describe it as "the Terror".  It's little, but plastic fears it, and the glue then has nothing to say. It's the nemesis of many a plastic top.  It, or a pair of sharp-pointed scissors with a serrated edge has become the single most necessary kitchen tool

 The Terror

 

I may add to this post over time.  

Can Anyone Beat These Dodgers?

 I'm watching the Padres-Brewers, the most appealing match-up so far in the playoffs, as they vie for the opportunity to challenge the two-time defending champions.  The Dodgers have all stars at most positions and plenty of pitchers, so there is reason to doubt.  

The Milwaukee Brewers are leading in the series, 2-1, and so the odds clearly favor their chances in this round, but I'm not convinced the San Diego Padres are going to lose it.  In my view, they could have won either of the two games in Milwaukee, losing both by a single run, before winning game 3 by the same margin.  

The first Brewers-Padres game turned on a freak occurrence:  down 3-2 but with a runner on base, Ty France of the Padres hit a moonshot.  It had all the characteristics of a homerun (launch angle, exit velocity), but it was unusually high and hit the rafters of Milwaukee's ballpark, and dropped straight down into the glove of Jackson Chourio, waiting near the wall.  By the "ground rules" of the park, a ball hitting the rafters in fair territory was in play. A homer would have put SD up 4-3 in the final inning. 

In the second game, Padres led 3-2 in the ninth and they brought in Mason Miller to finish the game.  He was by far the very best closer (reliever to finish games) of the regular season in either league.  On this occasion, he was "tight"--looked nervous, wasn't finding the strikezone enough.  He loaded the bases while getting two out, but then the same Chourio hit a liner just past Miller and the diving second-baseman, knocking in both the score-tying run and the winning run. Turns out Miller had reason to be stressed:  his wife went into labor the next day and he skipped the game.

The Brewers do not follow the current trend in building a team, as epitomized by the Dodgers: pursuing the expensive power hitters mixed with savvy veterans.  The Brewers don't have a real power hitter  but score plenty of runs, often putting together several in an inning without extra-base hits.  They supplement that with quality pitching, especially their deep relief corps.

 Pitching is always a key variable in the post-season, and games tend toward being low-scoring.  The Dodgers' pitching, led by Yamamoto, seems to have come together well at the right time of the season.  They coasted to 100 wins, overcoming plenty of injuries.  They had the second-best record in the regular season,  a couple games worse than the Brewers.  

The Brewers would seem to be the logical ones to de-throne L.A.,, but I'd like the Padres' chances better, if they can get past Milwaukee. The Padres and Dodgers are legitimately rivals in the N.L. West Division, and Fathers are the only team to win the division over the Dogs in the last 14 years!  They know them intimately from playing so many games against them..They have a chip on their shoulder and two superb stars in Manny Machado and Fernando Tatis, Jr.   Let's avoid the question of whether it would be OK if we didn't have LA or SD anymore... 

There is another league, and the winner of the American League gets to face the Dodgers if none of the above are able.  The best team in the AL this year was the Tampa Bay Rays, which took the place of last year's Toronto Blue Jays as the surprise winners in the AL East, over the perennially contending Yankees and Red Sox.  (Those latter two met in the pre-playoff round, and the surviving Yankees were then ousted by the Rays tonight.)  Let's not talk about the AL Central or West except to say they got three of the six postseason spots, all on one side of the AL elimination bracket.  I'm rooting for the Chicago White Sox to come through.  They turned around a string of terrible seasons this year by pulling away from a pack of mediocre teams in the final weeks. 

Something seriously wrong there, I'd say.It took 87 wins to make the postseason tourney in the NL but only 81 in the AL. Perhaps they could consider, now that interleague play is so prevalent, seed teams 7-12 with the best records in either league as the opponents in the first round against the six division winners. I've heard the NBA considered it, because its Western Conference was so dominant, but it never happened and the disparity has decreased--a little. 

 

The cap I've been wearing: 

 

 

 

Learning to Move Again

 I assure you my absence from posting for two months was not due to laziness.  I have been through it, since July, really, but more intensely the month of September.  Getting ready to downsize, and after 20+ years in our house, it has been a real challenge. 

Let's just say that whereas my measure of success was previously freeing up some square footage on the floor of our walk-in closet (my wife insists every woman wants one), it became a question instead of volume reduction; but now that it's done and we are in our new apartment, it is once again about surface area. Not to say that we have changed the basic issue of simply having too much stuff.

I have moved many times, so it was not the actual change of location (not completed yet, in the formal sense), but the sense of giving up something big.  That recalled my first move, when I was 10 and at the height of my fourth-grade prowess.  Then I learned that home is a matter of circumstance to some extent. 

Twice this year I have had a conversation with a European remarking that one way that residents of the USA (those we refer to as "Americans") differ from Europeans is that we move a lot more, and further away.  Though their perception may be somewhat biased by principally having encounters with the more mobile of us, I feel that the conclusion is accurate.  We talk about the lack of vertical mobility in today's society, but there is no lack of the horizontal one. 

In this case, it was just across town (and here, that's a five-minute drive).  We are temporizing with a one-year lease while we see if the proposed sale offer becomes real, and while we monitor closely our health and financial condition.  But really, I'm waiting to see if the popular zeal to punish our Federal government's mal-administration will materialize in a significant change in Congress, made real--that will happen in January, it seems, though November will establish the playing field for what's next.  

In that context, I am watching closely what outrages a lame duck Congress filled with Republican losers might impose upon us.  In particular, I think there is discussion in Republican backrooms about trying to pull an "Amy Conan Barrett" maneuver, convincing Alito to step down for the cause if it's clear the Senate is lost, so they can jam in another hack before history moves on.  

Last Chance, Last Dance  

I try not to repeat myself, following David Byrne's Psycho-killer philosophy.  I think the change of direction in the popular vector, discussed last February, has translated into momentum that has persisted and become ever more broad.  Rejection of Trump's  "Bad policy, poorly implemented", spiced up with frequent Trumpian inanity and lies, has now been taken on widely by independents and even penetrated the partisan wall of thought of Republican regulars.  The opinion is held by a large majority now (60%, roughly), but the electoral outcome depends on multiple factors, very much including local considerations.

 The anti-Trump alliance, enhanced by the emergence of some exciting new candidates, looks ready to capture a large popular majority in the midterms.  My estimate of 6-8% margin (measured factually by House races nationally) for Democrats should probably be increased to 8-10%.   In the House, this effect of this margin is dampened by the manipulations of Congressional districts, both the normal ones every decade and the special ones engineered prior to these elections.  It's hard to see the Democrats gaining more than 20-25 seats, but that will be more than enough, and there will be a couple of shockers, seats supposedly "fixed" for Republican control that will have upsets. 

The Senate's statewide elections have less possibility for these manipulation,  so the results will be more transparent, and any Senate seat with a presumed Republican margin of 10% or less in Federal elections, based on the last couple of contests, has become a target for a Democratic gain.  How many of them end up being Democratic will depend on whether those regular Republican voters grumpily show up and represent for their side, regardless.  There are more of those people in states like Nebraska, South Carolina, and Kansas, so I would moderate expectations for those.  I am still thinking that Alaska is a toss-up with the ranked-choice-voting dynamics somewhat against our Mary Peltola, but Iowa may be added to the list of seats we can envision winning.   A pickup of five seats (let's say NC, ME, OH, TX, AK) would not only be "Fetterman-proof", but might entice Alaska's other Senator, Lisa Murkowski, who has announced that she is now Independent, to swing over to the Democratic caucus.  

And then there is Florida, which like Texas would be monumentally important as a pick-up in state control, because it is so large and so Republican in recent years.  Angie Nixon has surprised everyone to gain the nomination with a strong roots-based campaign for Senate, and David Jolly is just the kind of reformed Republican that can win the governorship there.  Defeating DeSantis' Republican successor (the odious Byron Donalds) and Greg Abbott in Texas (Gina Hinojosa is at least close) would be landmark successes signifying an opening for a massive change in the governance of the nation. 

Anyway, if the efforts of the Drumpfenreich suppress the popular will, there will be powerful response.  And that is the cause of my wait-and-see judgment on "Living in America".   

 

Midterm Election Preview

As I write, 14 Tuesdays before Election Day 2026, the polls are about to close in Michigan for that important Democratic Senate primary.  Recent polls still are showing Abdul El-Sayed with a lead of at least 10 points.  One would think that with a leadlike that, the election will be called for him almost immediately, but I don't think that's true.  For one thing, Haley Stevens may have the momentum at the close, and the vote for the black community in Detroit may be determinative, and its nature is unknown.  

I have a rule not to take sides in Democratic primary elections not in my state, so I just want to say this:  whoever wins the primary, better win.  This seat is not one the anti-Trump movement can afford to lose. Allowing Republican Mike Rogers to win in the general election, a real possibility whichever of the two Democrats wins the nomination, would likely end any chance for a change of control through the election. It is very hard for the Democrats to get to 51 seats without Michigan's. It's the responsibility of the candidate who loses today to give full support to the winner; I've heard they are willing.  

The Background

There is a lack of consistency between the popular electoral sentiment and the estimates of the resulting elections from the political think-tanks.* Their policy is to be very cautious on rating as probable losses by incumbents, a policy well-rewarded more often than not, and now with unlimited money? 

This is not a normal year, though, with the support for the administration and its Republican Congress abysmally low, and the prospects, 14 weeks out, that things will not materially improve.  The most that seems to be likely is an ongoing question whether the Fed will  raise interest rates, the opposite of what Trump and his new Fed Chair Warsh were supposed to do.  Regardless of whether he does or does not raise, or even if he lowers rates as Trump would like, this is a distraction with regard to the election, as is the likely positive but not convincing stock market situation. We can expect gas prices to ease downward but inflation to remain stickily high, in part because of the downstream effect of higher oil prices during the acute moments of the Iran war.   

The Senate

If we look at the question from the Republican side, their strategy resembles what is called the "Prevent Defense" in American football, ahead but vulnerable.  Looking to run out the clock and not give up the lead, which is three seats.  If they lose four or more, it will be lethal for Trump 2.0, as we should assume that kind of successful Democratic Senate gain correlates with the House results, and a hostile Congress will shut down a lot of the madness and mark the end of the Drumpfenreich.  

The Republicans will have few chances to go on offense to try to take one from the Democratic side:  Michigan, and to a lesser extent New Hampshire and Wisconsin. Then there's Georgia, but the Republicans are on the defensive under the onslaught of Jon Ossoff, who's executing an excellent re-election campaign.  For the GOP, it's all about defending this Trumpist regime. That is not easy to do, and Trump is not doing things that will help them to do that.  You could say that the Republicans are fortunate in that many of the challenged Senate seats are not being defended by their  incumbent, but that is no accident. 

In the search for those four seats to flip, we start with North Carolina, where Roy Cooper is not running against Senator Thom Tillis, who chose not to run. Cooper's opposition is not in good shape and Cooper is very good at winning elections in North Carolina.  It still a state that tends slightly red, though, so his win is likely, but possibly close. 

In Ohio, there is technically an incumbent, but the Republican in that seat was appointed to it, not elected.  So, a weak opposition and a very good Democratic challenger, Sherrod Brown.  I'd say slightly better than 50-50 that Brown wins. 

Maine and Alaska are the two close races where the Republican candidate is seeking re-election. Both states in the two northern corners of the nation look to be toss-ups, but the circumstances are very different.  Maine Democrats successfully shed Graham Platner when he became untenable, and in Troy Jackson they have come up with a viable challenger who combines much of Platner's political policy with a more congenial local persona.  Alaska has the best candidate the Democrats could find, Mary Peltola, who has proven able to win statewide, but she has an uphill battle in term of party support in what appears to be mostly a head-to-head matchup where the effect of Alaska's ranked-choice-voting is not so important.   I would rate each slightly less that 50-50, but not necessarily correlated for those differing characteristics. 

Flipping those four, and holding Michigan, etc. is the shortest route to success for Democrats, but there are many other possibilities, forcing the Republicans to play defense in many states.  They have plenty of money, though.  Leading the list of those opportunities described as "not-probable, but possible" is Texas.  James Talarico's argument to the inevitable "Why this year, after so many disappointments there before?" question is referring to the previous high-water mark in recent times, Beto O'Rourke's 48% vs. Ted Cruz in 2018, and then adding that sentiment is worse for the Republicans, their candidate is somehow even worse, and the unspoken third point is that Talarico is a better candidate.  No disrespect to Beto, but Talarico is a special rhetorical talent with a very interesting political platform that he can defend, and proven ability to raise large amounts of campaign funds.  Against that is a powerful system that seeks to stack the results for Republicans.

There are several additional states, very red in Presidential contests, where the unpopularity of the government is leaving an opening for challenge, though not necessarily a Democratic challenger, and usually not an incumbent Republican.  Iowa is the best shot for Democrats of these--a strong candidate (Josh Turek) against a Trumpist. Florida has an appointed Senator and is challenged by Alex Vindman, the original whistleblower in the case of the first Trump impeachment.  Nebraska, Montana, and South Dakota feature independents making the challenge in place of a committed Democratic opponent.    

Winning one out of all those (TX, IA, FL, NE, MT, SD) would be a bonus, helping to cover for the risk in Michigan and for John Fetterman, the PA Senator who's gone rogue and could be liable to go with the Republicans at any time.  Given Fetterman, Democrats actually need to aim for 52 to have a majority that is truly functional.  

The House of Representatives 

Winning control of the House is the minimum requirement for Democrats in this election--falling short of that is not acceptable.  Still, the Republicans have mined the field with their redistricting gambit, and, while Trump's policies are disastrous for Republican candidates, he will do his best to create chaos during the election and while votes are being counted.  

It should not make a difference, if the public sentiment holds.  Based on analysis of the "generic House vote" polls and its close relationship with the Presidential approval level (or disapproval, in this case), we could project a national lead of 6-8%, which would translate to a gain of 20-30 seats, taking into account the reduced number of seats designed to be competitive.  Very much a maximal gain, under the circumstances.  

But the real starting point for the Republicans is 227 seats, given the net of +5 that they managed with the gerrymandering battles.   The resulting number is Republicans getting a number in the low 200's, while they would need 218 to keep control.  It will take some time for Democrats to pass 218, probably a week, during which the Trump-driven rants will peak. 

The prediction markets are giving Democrats about 80% chance of winning the House.+  In my view, that's a bit too high--I'd say more like 70-30.  

Statehouses  .   

Although the Congressional contest is so enormously important, that does not mean we should ignore the significance of the contests in all the 50 states, among which there are 36 governor contests. Those gubernatorial elections are important in themselves, but they also have a huge effect on state legislatures, which will have to be the firewalls for additional gerrymandering attempts in the next two years. Successful governor candidates have a strong positive effect on candidates all the way down the ticket, and on the Federal contests, too.  In particular, competitive races in Florida, Ohio, and Iowa could help the Democratic senatorial candidates' chances as underdogs.  A strong Democratic candidate for governor in Michigan, Jocelyn Benson, might help the eventual Senate candidate get over the top, while a somewhat radical Democratic governor nominee in Wisconsin (Francesca Hong) might make Tammy Baldwin's re-election as Senator more difficult.   Arizona does not have a Senate contest this year, but the political battle between Democratic incumbent Governor Hobbs and her team against a slate of extreme Trumpists will be a critical contest that may also affect a couple of the truly competitive House contests, of which there are so few nationally.  

The Prediction  Democrats will gain two governorships, three state legislatures, net gain of 12 House seats (225-210) and four Senate Seats (51-49),  the Senate seats gained being NC, OH, ME, and TX.  The Michigan Senate race will be the last to be called.  Trump will be furious!

* Think Cook Political Report, Larry Sabato's shop at U of Va., Adam Silver's group or Real Clear Politics.

+ And about 40% chance for Democrats to win the Senate, a number that has come up 10% or more since the beginning of the year.      

Update: World Cup et al.

I refrained from making predictions on the World Cup results in my last post on the subject.  That is because slight differences in the group standings, of a point or a single goal, could decide which side of the bracket a team goes, and thus affect the course of the rest of the tournament.  Now that the first round games are concluded, the brackets are set for the knockout rounds, which begin today. 

In general, the teams that were favored won their groups, so the brackets really are not so different from what could be anticipated prior to that round.  Several of them, including the US team, had their places locked up prior to the third and final group game, which allowed them to try out some other players.  There definitely was some drama in the final games, though, for other teams that were in a must-win situation--win or go home--including Ecuador, Democratic Republic of the Congo, and Croatia. There were a couple of games in which a tie score would allow both teams to go through, and, unsurprisingly, they tied, though not necessarily without some tension involved.  

Of the 16 teams that didn't make it to the knockout rounds, the most notable were Uruguay (the only prior winner thus eliminated, though Italy didn't even make it to the tournament), Turkey (which defeated the USA in its final game, but was eliminated by head-to-head results with the other two teams with which it had a draw), and Iran, which was both unlucky and ill-treated in the run-up to the tournament, visa-wise. Iran recorded three draws in its three games, but its 0 net goal difference was edged out by the result of the final game played, a 3-3 tie between Austria and Algeria, which gave each of them one more standings point than Iran.  I'm just glad there was no real trouble involving the team with which the US is currently still warring, un-acknowledgedly (if that's a word). 

The most interesting result, for me, was that nine teams from Africa made it into the final 32,   Though none of them won their groups, several of them could be tough ones to eliminate, and some might even be favored in the first round.  I mention in that regard Morocco, which played Brazil to a draw, and Egypt, which had a strong first round performance. 

The standard for an excellent result, for most teams, is reaching the quarterfinals, the round of 8, which requires two wins going forward from this point.  No more draws--if the score is tied, the teams go to 30 minutes of extra time, and then the dreaded penalty kick shootout if still tied. I am hopeful that the USA team will make it that far:  they are heavily favored in their first game, against Bosnia-Herzegovina, but I will point out that this is the team that eliminated Italy in a penalty shootout after a drawn knockout qualifying match in March. One big difference is that match was in Zenica, Bosnia and this one will be in Inglewood, California.  If the USMNT wins that game, they will play either Belgium or Senegal, either of which is a tough opponent capable of knocking us out. 

In terms of first-round games, ones that stand out as promising match-ups are Netherlands-Morocco, Ivory Coast-Norway, and Portugal-Croatia, along with that Belgium-Senegal one, though any of the games could provide some drama, if one of the top teams finds itself in trouble late in the match.  A highlighted game one might expect in the second round is France-Germany. 

My picks for the final eight: France, Morocco, Croatia, Belgium (left bracket); and Brazil, England, Argentina, and Colombia on the right side.  I anticipate a finals repeat matchup from 2022, France and Argentina, which the latter won in a penalty shootout after a 3-3 draw in regular time, and Argentina to repeat as champions, which would be the first repeat champion since Brazil in 1962.  I will point out that France, Argentina, and Mexico were the only three teams to win all three of their group matches, so those first two are in top form, while Mexico had the incentive to win in its third game and thus stay in their home country for the next round. 

Baseball

We are exactly at the halfway point of the regular season--the All-Star game break, the traditional measure of the end of the first half, is a couple weeks away.  In terms of individual performances, the leaders for the MVP are:  in the National League, Shohei Ohtani, once again, and Kyle Schwarber, who is hitting homers at a torrid pace; in the American League, Yordan Alvarez now looks like the clear leader since the injury to Aaron Judge.  For the Cy Young, a couple of youngsters lead the pack:  Jacob Misiorowski ("Le Mis") of the Brewers and Cam Schittler of the Yankees.  

In terms of league standings, the only real change in the National League since my last post was the Padres falling back toward .500, so the top second-place team is now the Phillies.  In the American League, there's a good competition between the Tampa Bay Rays and the Yankees, with the rest of the teams mired in mediocrity, or worse. 

NBA

The big event was the draft, and a number of trades around that date (along with many players being re-signed, or not). This year's draft class is considered one of the best in decades because of its depth, so there was a lot of jockeying for draft positions.  I don't want to give away my favorites, in case one of my competitors in our Rotisserie league (the "Out of Bounds League") may be watching, but there are several of the one-and-done college players I have my eye upon, guys who may be able to contribute in their first year.  Typically the draft in recent years features some promising athletic types who will need a couple years to fully develop their skills, but that is changing.  

 The big trade was Giannis Antetokounmpo, who leaves the Milwaukee Bucks after 13 seasons (one NBA championship) for the Miami Heat; and the second was a strange trade in which the Charlotte Hornets, frequently bottom-dwellers who came on strongly at the end of the last season, traded off their best player in that season, Lamelo Ball, to the Minnesota Timber Wolves, in exchange for a valuable reserve player, Naz Reid, and some exchange of future picks. 

Wimbledon (Tennis)

The tournament starts this week; I am hoping the heat wave will break, but without too much rain disrupting things. 

In the men's tournament, the big question is whether Jannik Sinner will be able to return to the dominant level he showed prior to overheating in the second round of the French Open and bowing out. Carlos Alcaraz will not be playing, as he's still recovering from a wrist problem.  Alexander (Sasha) Zverev won the French, in the absence of Alcaraz and the heatstroke of Sinner, his first Grand Slam title after several close calls, and his chances here are real, as well.  Finally, we may see whether Novak Djokovic can challenge for that one more Grand Slam victory he's been chasing for a couple of years. 

On the women's side, Aryna Sabalenka seemed to be cruising, a la Sinner, before her near-collapse in the final, from which it appears she has not fully recovered mentally.  Maybe that's a false impression.  In her absence, I would look for Coco Gauff, or the rising star Mirra Andreeva, who won the French, to step into the opening.  Serena Williams returns to the tournament after several years being retired--we shall see.  Also, tennis immortal Roger Federer returns to the grass surface where he had his greatest success, playing in a doubles semi-exhibition with a couple other old chums. 

 

 

  

Goy Goes Off On Israel

The Hamsa Flag**

 

 

 

In a recent post here, I argued that the Senate election in Texas is the most significant one this year.  That is not just because it may be the decisive 51st seat for the Democrats to gain a majority, if James Talarico can defeat Ken Paxton+ , but because of the longer-term significance of a long-sought Democratic statewide win in that giant state. What  happens there could have effects that transform the global reality!

There is another election this fall that could have that kind of effect:  it is the Israeli parliamentary election (the Knesset), which is scheduled just a few days before the USA midterm election, on October 27 (though it may come sooner; it is unlikely to be later).  The question before the Israeli electorate is whether the war government of Benyamin Netanyahu will continue. 

There are many international electoral contests to which I pay some attention, to a varying degree.* It is in part because of ties I have in those countries, people I know,  and my recognition that those results may affect them, and partly because I am a citizen of this planet and we are all one race. There can be another reason, though, and that is the effect outside events can have on our own nation, and on our own electoral events. 

I see there to be such an effect between the coming Israeli election and its outcome, and one critical election, in particular.  That is the Senate election in Michigan, a seat currently held by a Democrat, Gary Peters, who is not running for re-election.  The Republican candidate, for once, is not a no-name Trumpist stooge, but a respected Congressman, Mike Rogers, who has served responsibly as head of the Armed Services committee in the House.  

Michigan is accurately considered a swing state that tends slightly toward the Democrats.  The population centers of Detroit and Ann Arbor (U. of Michigan) are strongly Democratic, with most of the rest of the state strongly Republican, and the suburbs around Detroit are usually decisive.  Both Senators are Democratic, as is the outgoing governor, Gretchen Whitmer, who has served two terms and cannot run again.  If the Democrats run a good campaign, they should hold the governor's job and win the Senate race. It is incontrovertible fact that the Michigan seat is not one the Democrats can afford to lose in the effort to gain a majority. 

The danger comes from the likely Democratic Senate nominee, Abdul El-Sayed, who has a primary coming up soon (Aug. 4).  His policies are clearly those of the progressive wing, as opposed somewhat to his two more moderate opponents, Rep. Haley Stevens and Mallory McMorrow, who each have significant support but are seen to be splitting the vote from the party's center.  El-Sayed has run a strong campaign, is viewed as an excellent campaigner in the mold of New York's Zohran Mamdani, and has a similar stance opposing Israel's war policies in the Middle East, in Gaza and in the West Bank.  Polling of statewide Democrats shows El-Sayed with a  small lead over the other two candidates, but with a large undecided number.  I would say that he is likely to win the nomination unless one of the two more moderates pulls out and endorses the other, and maybe even if that happens. 

Michigan has a larger Muslim population than most US states, and that gave El-Sayed a significant base, from which he has successfully expanded, by showing a strong fighting resolve against the Trumpist administration.  All well and good, but there is another constituency that may be heard from, one that could affect the outcome decisively in either direction.  Michigan has a significant Jewish population, also centered around the populated areas, particularly those suburbs--it historically has voted strongly Democratic. 

Heavily involved in this primary is the Israel lobby group AIPAC, and its Political Action Committee (UDP)--they have spent a lot of money already supporting Rep. Stevens.  Although there are other Jewish lobby groups with different stances, AIPAC has the largest funding and is uncritical in its support of Israel, and it punishes heavily those who go against it, and recently, especially against Democrats who do that. Against that, there is broad desire to move away from US' uncritical support for Israel,  providing armaments to it in the wars against Iran, Lebanon, and the Palestinians in Gaza and the West Bank.  In particular, the Netanyahu coalition government in place since 2022 has been ruthless in its desire to harm Gazans, to support Israeli settlers in the West Bank who try to displace Palestinians living there, and in advocating ever harsher pre-emptive attacks on Iran and the Hezbollah in Lebanon--going beyond the aims of defensive purposes.  

The cleavage emerging in the Democratic party over the US-Israel relationship endangers the party's coalition, not just in Michigan but nationally, as is shown for example by the problematic results in New York City's Democratic primaries this week, where an anti-Zionist agitator won nomination for a Congressional seat that is securely Democratic.   Support for Zionism is and has been national policy, but where are the boundaries of Zion?  Are they limited to the UN-approved boundaries of Israel; if so, what about the occupied territories, where Israel's current government shows lack of regard for the Palestinian inhabitants, and a tendency to colonize with Jewish settlers who claim it for a Greater Israel? 

As for the Israeli elections, I find it hard to believe that Israelis will vote to retain Netanyahu as Prime Minister:  it was his government's lax security at the Gaza border which allowed the calamity of October 7, 2022, when criminal elements of Hamas overran the defenses and wreaked murder, rape and abduction on innocent Israeli civilians.  His government has pursued war endlessly since then which, despite the remarkable capabilities of the Israeli Defense Force, has shown time and again that the way toward peace in the region is not to be accomplished solely through military means. In particular, Netanyahu's coalition includes overtly racist far-right elements and rejects negotiation with Palestinians and Iranians.  

Israeli parliamentary elections are free, but complicated:  they have proportional representation with a minimum level of 3.25% vote for representation of parties.  Typically of such systems, there are lots of parties, a dozen or more, that can reach that level, each headed typically by a single prominent figure.  Then, the parties group together to form a governing coalition, an opposition coalition, and, usually, a set of Arab Israeli parties which get some 10-15% of the votes and seats but are not included in either coalition. 

Current polling suggests that neither the current Netanyahu coalition nor the grouping  of opposition parties--who generally support the war effort while opposing Netanyahu's heavy-handed mode of doing it, along with some of its policies favoring the Orthodox and new settlement activity in the West Bank, and alleging corruption-- is likely to come out of the election with a majority.  This means either a stalemate, or a possible coalition with one or more of the fragmented Arab parties, a strategy that was put together by the anti-Netanyahu coalition, somewhat unsuccessfully, prior to the last elections in 2022, when the Netanyahu coalition took power back. 

I do not take sides in primaries outside my own state (of New Mexico), and much less do I try to interfere in the elections of other nations, but I think it is of great importance that Democrats take a view towards the Israeli election that reflects our values and helps to maintain unity.  I don't think it is that hard to enunciate, something like this:  

"We are longtime allies of the state of Israel and support its continued success, but we are not wholly uncritical of its war campaigns.  We advocate for a government there that is peaceful in its intent, while prepared fully to defend itself and its people, and that provides all the residents of the territories it controls with humane treatment and justice.  We do not see that in the current coalition regime."   

If the Israeli election goes badly, in the sense that it would seem Netanyahu will once again somehow fashion a majority to continue his policies of unending war and oppression of Palestinians, that could create a fissure for Democrats in the last stages of this year's critical campaign.  What would likely emerge from that disaster would be a policy to oppose continued arming of Israel, which could be counterproductive,  both to the bilateral relationship and to the party.  Frankly, it would not even change Israel's policy under the circumstances, but it would further isolate Israel and thus make the situation even worse.  Let us hope the opposition wins the election decisively, or finds the means to include some of the Arab parties before or after the election in a way that does not fracture the level of its support and makes it possible for it to govern instead.

+Based on emails I am receiving, there are lots of other candidates for that "honor", including Ohio, Florida, South Carolina, South Dakota, Nebraska, and, of course, Maine. 

* I don't pay much attention to elections like the one upcoming in the Russian Federation, where the results will surely be rigged to show a level of support for the illegal war in Ukraine that is surely not real.  Surprise me, Russia!

**The proposed flag for the concept of one nation combining Israel and Palestine, a radical proposal to be sure, especially since even the chances for "two-state solution" seems now remote in the current political environment in the region.  However, it is one that demography and the arc of justice surely indicates to be some kind of ultimate solution . Let's hope it doesn't take a thousand years!

 

Edit: The October 7 massacre was in 2023, not in 2022.   

Sports: 4 X 3

 We'll try a disciplined posting approach and see if it goes quicker and more concisely:  four sports leagues, and for each, a beef, a freak, and my personal fave. 

National Basketball Association:  We'll start with the one currently in the highlights.  The San Antonio Spurs and New York Knicks are at this moment in a critical game 1--if the Knicks can pull off a win here, at San Antonio, it will give them an edge for the series.  I'm rooting for the New York team, though I basically gave up on them after their last Finals run, in 1999 (against the Spurs, also).  They haven't won the title since 1973, while the Spurs, rising again after a few brief years of a downturn, have had more than their share. 

Beef:  Tanking, of course.  An unacceptable phenomenon of recent years, where teams not in the running for the playoffs try to lose as many games as possible in order to gain better odds to pick up the best players turning pro.  I won't say the Spurs did it, when they got their Freak, a couple years ago, but it has become too obvious, and there are various disincentives being discussed.  

Freak:  Victor Wembanyama of the Spurs, of course.  He is not only ridiculously tall, but very skilled.  I wish him success, and above all, good health.  Players that tall often have fairly short careers because of recurring injuries to their legs.  I hope he can beat that rap. 

My guy:  Shea Gilgeous-Alexander of the Oklahoma City Thunder.  I feel like he does everything right, including all skills on the court (passing, defense, the lost art of the midrange shot, and threes when he wants to) and a wonderful demeanor off it.  He faced off with Wemby in Game 7 of the recently-concluded Western Conference Finals, the matchup of the two best teams in the regular season.  SGA had the better game, but the Spurs had the better team on the night.  This rivalry is just taking off this season and will be one to watch in the coming years. 

FIFA World Cup:  Soccer/football's biggest event is coming up in a week.  The USA is singularly unimpressed and unimpressive as a host nation, so it's good there's two others helping out (Mexico and Canada).  There are several teams that could legitimately be considered favorites.  France has too many superstars, Spain and England are hungry and full of proven talent, but I like the defending champs, Argentina, with their incomparable captain, Leonel Messi, for the win. 

Beef:  They expanded the field from 32 to 48 nations (we'll call England a nation for this purpose, another beef to be explored someday), which is OK, I guess, though it would seem it makes it too easy to qualify (Italy somehow didn't).  The real beef is that it is now too easy to get through the first round to the knockout stages, which are now up to five rounds.  So, for example, France is in the toughest group by far, with tough first-round opponents in Senegal and Norway (see below), but they will get through anyhow because three of the four teams are likely to make it (Iraq is the unfortunate fourth).  So the pressure is not really that high for that round, which has a majority of the actual games (96 vs. 31 for the rest of the tourney, by my count). ***

Freak:  Erling Haaland, the super-tall, albino-looking center forward for Manchester City and Norway.  His opponents basically have to keep him from ever getting on the ball near the goal, where he hangs out, avoiding the offside calls, because he's next to unstoppable and very accurate when he gets it there.  In that regard, he's different from the classic advanced midfielders like Messi or the ageless Luka Modric, or the withdrawn centers like Kylian Mbappe, Mohammed Salah and Harry Kane, who go back and get it and then do their magic.

My guy:  Christian Pulisic, "Captain America" for the USA team (not named the team's captain, though).  His career has been up and down, with flashes of brilliance, frequent injuries, and prolonged dry spells.  He's another who goes back and gets it and charges toward the goal with fervor (another is Kevin De Bruyne, on Belgium, who's finally slowing down).  After a successful run in the German league, Pulisic flamed out on my team, Chelsea, a couple years ago, then regained brilliance with A.C. Milan in Italy for awhile, but he lost the flame late this season and the team will probably rebuild without him next year. If he can make some major contributions toward victories in the World Cup it will do a lot for his career and for the prestige of USA soccer, which is lagging a bit.  

 Major League Baseball:  They are coming up on about 40% of the regular season now, and it's clear who are the likely contenders, especially in the National League, the one I follow more closely:  the Dodgers, Brewers, Braves, and Padres.  My Reds are among the many teams looking to grab one of the two playoff berths available after those four. 

Beef:  The lack of parity is driven by the astronomical salary load of the Dodgers, and of lesser, wealthy franchises trying to keep up with them.  The modernized game--you can like the changes, or loathe them, but they have helped broaden fan interest, and the game is more global in its reach than ever--is in peril, with the possibility of a devastating lockout and strike after this season, the dispute being over the owners' proposed salary cap.  I take the players' side always in these disputes, but the owners' willingness to restrain themselves in this way is the correct viewpoint. ,

Freak:  That's Shohei Ohtani.  His ability to dominate in both hitting and pitching (this year, so far, especially the latter) is without rival in the modern game and brings fair comparisons only to the immortal Babe Ruth--Shohei's surpassing him in some ways (the homers and speed combination, longer pitching career), but the clock is ticking, and worshippers of the game give too much emphasis on longevity, which he can't match, unless you include his stats in Japan. 

My guy:  Elly de la Cruz, of my team, the Cincinnati Reds.  My fandom of the Reds is a very long story, and I hope Elly is able to have a long, successful career with my team, though as things stand now, he will likely go to a higher bidder in a couple years.  Elly can do it all--speed, fielding, power--though he hasn't tried pitching, as far as I know.  

Women's Tennis Association:  For this post, I will focus on the women's game** Tennis is the major sport in which women's participation is most fully comparable to the men's, in terms of money and talent.*  Yes, the men generally hit the ball harder, and they play best-of-five sets to the women's best-of-three, but there is the same high-profile, personality-driven excitement in this sport, which tests the individual like no other. 

Beef:  This year's French Open, the only one of the four Grand Slams played on clay, the more demanding in terms of stamina (not so easy to serve your way through matches), is close to killing players, due to the heat wave and the five-setters on the men's side.  They need to bring in one of the initiatives of the other Slams and give the players a fucking break once in a while.  They should also make the fifth set a brief one, like the super tiebreaker they have in doubles (for which longer matches would make much more sense). 

Freak:  Aryna Sabalenka is a big woman, tall and muscular.  Handsome, I'll say, and with an underrated sweet personality.  She has a big serve and a ferocious competitive temperament.  Though she ran out of gas the other day in her quarterfinal match (see above), she is hard to handle for everyone except the similarly tall, similarly powerful-serving Elena Rybakina.  Serena Williams is coming out of retirement at age 44, to take her shot at Sabalenka, I presume:  they have quite a bit in common, except the personality. 

My guy+:  Iga Swiatek was the top player for a couple of years, nearly unbeatable until the rise of the two giants I mention above.  Swiatek is a normal-sized woman player who does most everything right, except she strives so much it's scary. I hope her form can rise up again to her previous level, but I doubt it--the competition has gotten tougher.  

There are others in today's WTA for whom I have similar soft spots:  Coco Gauff, Naomi Osaka, and Elena Svitolina, to name three; they all have their challenges.  Coco's is her serve, which comes and goes, Osaka's is her mercurial mental state, and Svitolina's is her personal challenges as a mother, wife to a men's pro, and the stress of being Ukrainian. It's hard for me to choose when they face each other, but I quietly lean toward Iga most often. 

 

P.S.  The Knicks win Game 1.  Finished this one in less than hour--that's progress.  

**I've addressed the men's game often enough in other posts--at this moment, Sinner stands alone (though he also pooped out in the heat), until Alcaraz is back on the court.  For this tourney, I'm rooting for Zverev to win; he's worked long and hard and this is his best shot ever at a slam. 

*The other might be track and field, and the Olympics generally, which have given women a lot more competitive equality in recent decades, and have dealt pretty successfully with gender ambiguity issues. 

+"Guy" in the modern language meaning of person, without gender specified, to keep parallel in form with the other three sports' comments. 

*** I am not counting the abysmal 3rd-place game, which everyone knows should have been removed decades ago.  

 

. 

 

Mark Kelly for President

I'm not joking at all.  

I realize it's way too early, and there is no need to distract from the current imperative, which is a big victory in the midterm elections in '26, but the moment demands that we consider this man and the possibility. 

For those who consider that the Democratic candidate at the head of the ticket in '28 should be a straight white male, Senator Kelly is your man.  He is a proven national hero, driven by duty and honor, who has braved the worst physical and mental challenges this era produces and kept his sanity and his nose clean.  Shot into space, shot at over Iraq, counseling the recovery of his wife after she was shot in the brain--these are a few of them. 

Most recently, he took on the terror that is Trump 2.1.  He was the front man for a group of military veterans in Congress who took out a public ad to warn our military not to obey illegal orders.  Trump called the action sedition and requested the hanging of all nine of them. Wrong, and not happening, and Kelly has been out front and open, saying both that his group's actions were legal and that he's not afraid of the Wherever Man.  

The veterans who made the ad--one can not call it a protest, nor was it anything more than a repetition of a portion of the training given to all military recruits, let's call it a Shout-Out--have been dodgy about whether they were thinking specifically when they made it about the criminal order to kill the survivors of one of the first bombings of Venezuelan boats on the high seas. They have not called the intrusion of the military into US cities an example of orders that were illegal, either, but they have stated simply that there is reason to think this administration may seek to misuse the military in the future.  No doubt of that, and one can easily think of worse abuses that the White House might order.   Trump may have criminal immunity for such orders, but those who carry them out do not.   We will come back to the "Venezuelan initiative" in a moment. 

Back to the point, though:  Based on his record, Senator Kelly seems to be a centrist Democrat, loyal, but not particularly partisan, and uniquely able to communicate on the need for responsible gun regulation. He is not a career politician, but after some years--he was first elected in 2020, in a special election--he seems to be finding his voice, which is an authentic one.  Not an intellectual-sounding one.  The only issue on which I recall his being critical of Biden's administration was on the lack of action on the border--his border.  Stop me if any of this is a negative.  

 I see only two drawbacks to his chances--apart from name recognition, which is suddenly flooding his way, right in his wheelhouse.  One is that he is not one for self-promotion, and he doesn't show that burning desire for Presidential power.  That, in reality, only makes him more attractive as someone truly fit for the job, but it could keep him completely out of the conversation (present company excepted).   The other is that, prematurely bald, he might seem older than his 61 years. It might not seem young enough for some, but it's hardly "too old". 

 As for being a sitting Senator and thus disqualified based on the recent experience of failed Democratic Senators as Presidential candidates, I think that's pretty bogus:  he's got more than his share of real-world experience, yet enough Washington time to know what is needed.. As far as I know, he is not owned by the corporations, and he has an amazing wife, former Representative Gabby Giffords. 

Maybe I'm wrong, and it won't take a Washingtonian draft movement (as in, George W.) to get him to run.  If he runs, the starting blocks for his run will be a sweeping Senate re-election win in the critical swing state of Arizona in 2026.  I see the argument for his candidacy along the same line as that for Pennsylvania's Josh Shapiro, but Kelly is a superior prospect.  

The Venezuela Gambit

What explains the recent rash of murderous attacks on boats coming off from the coast of Venezuela, heading north?  

The opportunity to drive toward regime change, removing a military dictator and usurper with blood on his hands who's caused millions to flee and impoverished his country?  No, that's more typical of Trump's foreign friends. He would emphatically be against that (then would go to sleep). 

Looking to grab the enormous Venezuelan oil production and/or reserves (nationalized) for himself/the USA?  No, not really any of those variations--we have plenty of reserves, and more being drilled domestically than needed.  The Venezuelans would hardly look to give away their ownership, but instead would look toward better domestic distribution of the proceeds.  Not interested. 

Searching for active kinetic action for  Pete Hegseth to use for military practice (after the domestic use failed to provoke sufficient resistance)?  Without war?   I suppose that is part of it, though why Venezuela? There are plenty of other alternatives still on the table, aren't they? (Greenland, Panama, Canada....) Certainly the continuing search for distractions contributes, and Trump is always ready to take credit for cruelty and brutality. He is also using this series of actions to probe a further extension of his powers to take actions beyond the rule of law and without any authorization beyond his own whim. 

No, I think there is something more involved, something even more sinister.  I look at the relatively minor Venezuelan component of the international drug trade, and its alleged association with current national government officials, and I draw a different conclusion.  These guys are horning in on the existing cartel operations, and Trump/Hegshit are assets working for their benefit against the Venezuelan outlaws.  See also the recent pardon of the Honduran government drug king.  

The Most Critical '26 Electoral Contest

 In the desperately important election this year, every closely contested race is a battle worth fighting.  There are a few state governor contests of that ilk, something like 10 different Senate races this year that could be considered competitive*, but not too many more House races than that, post-gerrymandering war, and probably a few hundred seats in state legislatures across the country.  There is the overall contest for control of the House of Representatives and for the Senate, and those two outcomes are massively important , but each is the result of a number of different elections, so one can hardly focus on those, in themselves--it is necessary to go into the next level down and look at what will drive those victories, or defeats. 

The race that I think is most critical, though, is the Senate contest in Texas, between Democrat James Talarico and Republican Ken Paxton.  The latter candidate was just nominated by his party's voters in a run-off election that ran off 24-year incumbent John Cornyn (who will remain as a dangerous zombie Senator whose emotional status is uncertain, like Bill Cassidy in Louisiana, similarly jettisoned from the Titanic Trumpist Tragedy. (ETTTTTS)).  Paxton is the most Trumpist viable candidate ever, rating super highly on both the loyalty and corruption scales. Texas is only rated as something like a 35-40% chance for Democrats to win in the prediction markets. 

It's only one Senate seat, and so the chances that it will be decisive are maybe one in 10 (but a little higher since the Platner controversy has made gaining the Maine seat more uncertain), but the implications are much greater.  Talarico is not just an unusual talent, squeaky-clean, and uniquely suited to be the Democratic candidate in Texas, due to his convincing Christian-but-not-Christian-nationalist vibe, but a potential national leader--in a Democratic administration, like Buttigieg is, even if he isn't able to get elected this year. 

Beyond that, though, the Texas race has possibly decisive and enduring effect on the big picture:  control of the Federal government at the top. The thing is, we are used to looking at a certain set of midsize "swing states" as a fixed, or slowly changing, decisive group for purposes of Presidential elections.  States like New Hampshire, say, or Iowa, may be somewhat susceptible to flipping from one election to another, but they are too small in Electoral College votes to be at all likely to changing the outcome.+   We know the suspects; it starts with Pennsylvania, then it goes to Michigan, Wisconsin, and more recently Georgia and Arizona (the last two replacing Ohio, which went red, and Minnesota, now seemingly safely blue). 

There has not been a really big state that has looked even possibly marginal in its outcome since California and New York fell off the cliff for Republicans in statewide elections.  The only other states in that category are Florida, which seemingly remains inexplicably beyond redemption, and Texas.  If Texas were to become a "purple" state where the outcome of a Presidential election there is not certain, it would have a huge effect on the numbers--of Electoral College votes, and of spending on the contest, too. 

I'm way ahead of myself, but a Mark Kelly-James Talarico ticket, Kelly promising to serve one term, could carry the swing states and Texas and lead to the kind of 350+ EV rout that is needed (in 2028, or 2032 if we must defer our dreams) in order to put the GOP in its place, which is as a regional party no longer a threat to destroy our Federal government and our Constitution.  That would make reforms of the kind needed possible. 

* In order of likelihood of Democrats winning the contested seats (+4 net result needed):  New Hampshire (to retain vacating Democratic seat),  North Carolina (flip, Republican vacating), Michigan (again, to retain vacating Democratic seat), Alaska (flip, strong Democratic candidate), Iowa (Republican vacating), Ohio (flip of appointed Republican Senator), Maine (flip, with Platner being only moderately damaged in Maine voters' eyes), Texas (flip, vacating Republican due to the primary result), then ones like Florida (weak appointed Senator), South Carolina (good candidate flipping on flippant Lindsay Graham), and finally longshots in South Dakota and Louisiana.  Ranking above Florida are Nebraska and Montana, where the strong candidate who might flip the seat is running as an Independent..   I'm assuming Georgia is safe for Jon Ossoff against a disorganized Republican opposition.  He's also a Talarico-type rising star. 

 From this list, you could see that I rate Texas as the sixth-most-likely to flip, and thus not absolutely necessary, if Democrats hold their seats and come through in Maine, Iowa, and Ohio.  I'm counting on North Carolina and Alaska to get things started.  

+ Unless there is no majority in the Electoral College and it goes to the House, where the Constitution gives each state's delegation one vote.  That remains very improbable as long as there are only two major party candidates winning all the states (last time that didn't happen was 1968).  

1000 Songs

I finally broke down and signed up for the "Premium" (paid) version of Spotify.  I'd been freeloading (literally) for a few years, but it was getting unwieldy playing and managing my "Liked Songs" list, and in particular the lack of control over the sequencing of them.  I didn't really mind the ads; if they got too obnoxious one could always mute the volume for their duration.  Truth be told, Spotify was starting to make it very difficult to utilize in the free mode:  AI no doubt the culprit. 

 I took advantage of my new-found range of freedom to expand the list from some 500 songs to 1000, adding dozens of additional artists not previously put there in the haphazard way free Spotify permitted.  I think this is the max:  my poor cellphone was slowing down tremendously toward the end.  My plan is to keep it at this level, going forward.  As I tire with some of them, I will add some others, looking toward more recent releases, more jazz (I had binged about 50 jazz pieces before but didn't add any this time around), and the Psychedelic Furs (I forgot to put some add before I hit my limit).  I could probably cut some of the Beatles ones, which are mostly drawn from that great "Love" compilation done for Cirque du Soleil. 

Here are some stats for the 1000 songs: 66 rock artists are represented with a single song--this doesn't necessarily mean they are one-hit wonders, just that selectivity drove that. There are some 32 jazz artists with 49 cuts, headed by Miles with six and Coltrane with five.  There are 73 more rock/pop ones with between 2-4 on there, total of 220 songs, and 36 with 5-10, inclusive with 270 (average 7.5). In the top group are 24 with 395 selections (about 16.5 per).  Here I should say that I am going by the first name in the artist description, but combining some of the obvious ones together (for example, Jack White and the White Stripes, or Mark Knopfler and Dire Straits, though those are not among the top group). I also made some executive decisions that might be somewhat controversial:  I didn't combine the ones from The Band and Bob Dylan, though I did combine The Band with Robbie Robertson's selections. 

For those who know me and my music tastes, there aren't too may surprises in my top 10 (there was some clustering below Bowie in the 11-15 range): 

1.  Beatles/John Lennon 34 (no McCartney, Harrison, Starkey thus far)
2.  U2 32 (including two Passengers, one The Edge solo cut)
3. Blind Faith/Eric Clapton/Traffic/Steve Winwood/Derek and the Dominoes 32 (tie) - I would argue there is a continuum in the membership
4. Steely Dan 28 (maybe too many, but I didn't limit myself to the 1970-1980 period)
5. Talking Heads/David Byrne 24
6. King Crimson 20 (including one solo from Tony Levin--I know, not necessarily Crim)
7. Bright Eyes/Conor Oberst 19 (I feel this is totally defensible)
8. David Bowie 17 
9. (tie) Jimi Hendrix 15; Police 15; Joy Division/New Order 15 --(again, uniting that pairing could be disputed--a lot, but not total continuity in the personnel, though some difference in the sound)*

Yes, I know:  "OK, Boomer Dad"!  I swear there's a good number of women in the lists, and of soul performers, but none with 10 or more songs chosen.  I don't have much country, except some outlaw versioning, and only some of the very oldest hip-hop. 

I will have to do a "Songs of Resistance" piece shortly from the list-- things that might inspire us in the days to come, though they may have been written long ago.  (by that I mean 50-60 years ago, even) 

Ed.  This post was written late last year, but I held off posting to do some analysis on my "Top Shelf" of CD's, which I didn't get around to doing.  The stats here have changed marginally as I have added some artists and cut down a few that were overly represented (meaning additional songs that didn't make my cut).   

My understanding is that one can share a playlist with the broader Spotify community, which I will attempt to do, with the list as it stands now.   

 * Here are the Honorable Mention artists with 10 or more songs chosen (alphabetically): The Band (without Dylan), Beck, Broken Bells/The Shins, Bruce Springsteen, CSN&Y (various), The Doors, Gomez, Jefferson Airplane/Hot Tuna, The Kinks/Ray Davies, Paul Simon/Simon &Garfunkel, Yes/Wakeman, Santana, The Who/Pete Townshend. 

https://open.spotify.com/user/chinshihtang?si=e3grDzxWTqy8iKTVAHk5CA

A Structured Settlement for Iran

 

 I am inspired by John
Oliver's piece on J.G. Wentworth and its approach, to propose something along their lines to end this miserably begotten war with Iran.  When it broke out, I insisted it was Bibi and Drumpf improvising and trying to create a distraction in order to improve their chances to avoid electoral catastrophe later this year.  It failed to serve its purpose, and we shouldn't have to suffer for their bad decision anymore.

There are really four causes that Bibi/Dickhead sought.  The first was the decapitation strike, which went off, but was never going to make regime change--they had missed the chance they had a few months before with the riots and their suppression.  So, forget about that one. 

The second is also to be ignored:  Iran will not stop assisting their allies in the region to cause trouble.  They pursue their perceived national interest, which is promoting Shia and irritating Israel.  Those two can duke it out forever and we don't need to get involved.  Israel does very well on its own with that.  It's really just a corollary of failing to achieve regime change.

The third is the Strait of Hormuz.  Iran's claim to control it all is most unjust:  there are nations on the shores on the other side  of it (Oman, UAE--Dubai) which have just as much right as Iran to control their territorial waters.  Basically, Iran can do what it wants with its side, but the other side should be protected, and the Gulf States' rights actively patrolled by UN forces. It's a global priority.  I think China would agree, and Trump should use his presumed leverage with Putin to get them to go along--all his sucking up for these decades should count for something. . 

Finally, there's the real horned dilemma, that of Iran's alleged intention to build a nuclear weapon.  The fact is that Iran has always denied that intention, saying it is contrary to their interpretation of Islam to have one.  I say, take them at their word*, but put strings on it.  Let them do what they want with their nuclear program, but provide an effective deterrent to their changing their mind and building a weapon, or showing they were lying all along about that.

What would be an effective deterrent?  Quite simple, really.  We inform them, publicly, that the day after they test a nuclear weapon, we will destroy their nuclear facilities with a nuclear weapon, or a couple of them if they are strategically necessary to "obliterate" their capacity to make more of them.  We have a good variety of them and could choose the appropriate one(s) if the case becomes necessary.  We inform China and Russia that is what we will do, so there is no mistake. This would also apply if they do a dirty bomb as a terrorist act.  We don't need to cause the mass casualties of an attack on a populated area, but if they are so foolish as to hide their facilities with lots of people around them, we take those sites out on a continuous basis with conventional weapons. I don't think Israel would have any problem with following through on that aspect. 

Seems monstrous, but that's nuclear deterrence for you.  Iran is a signer to the Non-Proliferation Treaty--we should penalize them if they fail to honor it.  Anyway, that's what nuclear powers do to nations that don't have the weapons--we bully them. I'm not even going to talk about Israel's unacknowledged nukes, but I will say this threat is pretty much what Hillary Clinton said years ago when addressing the issue of Iran's potential nuke. 

As for the "structured settlement" part, apparently a bunch of their assets are frozen somewhere (was it Belgium?)   We can start paying out those in (relatively small) installments as soon as they stop hostilities, which might make them willing to come to the table.  Then they can get a lump sum  (reduced by a few billion for handling costs) if they make an agreement to stay on their side of the Strait--that will be their "reparations"--the most ridiculous part of their requests. 

So, Drumpf--ready to deal?  

 

* I will admit that, since ancient times, the Persians were famed for being liars, and the modern Iranians are clever and deceitful.  Still, the deterrent will work if it has teeth and serious intent.