The Unvaccinated: Hillbillies or Heroes?

Here in Tennessee, with fewer than 40% of the population vaccinated, the unvaccinated might be perceived as political prisoners to their established commitment to the Trump era. Good people, perhaps, but hopelessly naive in their bundling of religion, white nationalism, and a distrust of established institutions. Tied to their biases, their echo chamber anti-science, and their idiosyncratic definitions of personal liberty, Tennesseans may fashionably be considered foolhardy "deplorables" who don't realize they are putting themselves, their neighbors, and their children at Covid risk by resisting the obvious benefits of vaccination.

There are, however, other ways to view the cluster of attributes that have led to vaccine resistance amidst the worst public health crisis in national history. Hillary Clinton's deplorables, whether by accident or choice, are behaving in ways eminently consistent with widespread established traditions. For example, if the U.S. is in fact deeply enmeshed in a culture conflict unprecedented since the Civil War, then it makes sense to refuse to cooperate with what MAGA voters view as an occupying force. Maintaining behavioral autonomy becomes a priority as the occupying force tries to assimilate you. It's a lesson and strategy straight out of the Bible, whether Jews in Egypt or Christians in Rome. People are willing to risk dying to maintain cultural identity. When this blueprint for sacrifice is laid out time and again in the U.S.'s most important religious text, the behaviors are more than understandable. They should have been expected.

The unvaccinated being relatively unmoved by the prospect of loss of life can be viewed as self-sacrifice to continue a cultural identity. Unvaccinated status, if one believes lack of vaccination sabotages the "conquering" of Covid, can also be viewed as an act of death-spreading aggression. Spreading disease becomes a weapon to take down the evil progressives, who currently control the House, the Senate, and the White House. Keeping Covid humming damages the economy, which can be considered a strategy to degrade the occupying power. 

Since the "culture in power" is, at the moment, pushing the narrative that vaccination reduces virus spread, not getting vaccinated becomes a rational revolutionary act. Risking one's life in the pursuit of taking down an incompetent, corrupt, un-Christian occupying force is a reasonable and rational strategy. If one buys the unvaccinated as spewing more death and destruction than the vaccinated, the deplorables wield real power.

A Lack of Discussion

Now that the Delta variant is the dominant virus, I don't much buy into the "unvaccinated spewing death" guilt messaging. In the days ahead, I'll get into that and many other curious messages being promulgated by U.S. institutions and media. For now, the point I want to make as an introduction is that for many of the unvaccinated, their actions have firm origins in American traditions. Bluntly speaking, Pickett's Charge and getting nailed to a cross set high profile, deeply embedded examples of self-sacrifice for cultural identity. The unvaccinated are defining themselves as separate from what they perceive as an occupying cultural force. With that separateness may come, consciously or not, actions that sabotage the occupying force through any available means, including self-sacrifice.

Everything I've just laid out is simple and obvious, but reality is not being framed, or even discussed, using the phrases and language I've used above. I have never seen the U.S. media stringently avoid certain topics and questions as deliberately as in 2021. Future blog entries will discuss the very strange communications mores that have emerged in the United States. What's become increasingly obvious is that Fox News has no monopoly on the "state reporting" propaganda game.

Pivoting Perspectives

One perspective on all of this is that the unvaccinated are indeed the "deplorables" -- the great unwashed who, through fear or sheer ignorance, are holding back the sacred societal effort to defeat the devil, in this case Covid-19. This perspective requires defining the unvaccinated demographic as some combination of willfully irresponsible, evil, and irrational. 

Another perspective is that the purposefully unvaccinated are, consciously or non-consciously, political actors trying to impose their will on a regime in the only way they know how. They are not solely or mainly uneducated hillbillies unable to grasp science.

To me, the fascinating aspect of all of this is that the first perspective is how most U.S. media are defining the situation. The unvaccinated are irresponsible fools gumming up society's Covid battle due to fear and ignorance. Yet I find the second perspective more Ockham's Razor worthy. It requires fewer suppositions and unlikely causes/effects. It puts the vaccinated and unvaccinated on more equal intellectual terms. The second perspective also better explains what I'll explore further in the weeks ahead. I think that the U.S. and corporate framing of the pandemic, the language used, and the topics NOT discussed publicly are best interpreted in the context of the second perspective. 

I'd argue that both the behavior of the unvaccinated, and the framing of the reporting/discussion involving them, is more usefully described by the second perspective, namely that this is an occupying cultural force scenario with the language and reportage used by the state consistent with what would be employed to dampen a revolt.

Conclusion

I don't think I've said anything particularly surprising or erudite. I've just stated the obvious. More than anything, I guess what does surprise me is that these topics aren't omnipresent in the U.S. media. Regardless, however, of how strongly I can or cannot make these points of perspective, I think that this is a rich taking off point for my investigation of propaganda in the Age of Covid.  

In my opinion, we may be on uncharted media ground, with the pandemic providing moral cover for some of the most dishonest and manipulative U.S. journalism I have witnessed in my life. And, as I will demonstrate, it is not subtle.

Bob Dietz

August 24, 2021

When Fantasy Goes Bad

 Note:  This entry does not address my predilection for Sheena Easton and Elizabeth Hurley.

The first week in June, I assembled what I thought was a pretty good FanDuel fantasy golf squad. With the Memorial due to tee off at roughly 6 AM, I did a 3 AM check to make sure that none of my six golfers had pulled out at the last minute. Everyone appeared to be present and accounted for. 

I slept for a few hours, and when I awoke and looked at the standings, I did a "What-the-bloody-hell?" Jason Day had evidently taken some practice swings, his back had flared up, and he had pulled out right before his tee time. Just lovely. That left me with five golfers. Those familiar with FanDuel golf contests know that it's virtually impossible to win, and very difficult to cash, with just five golfers. But that's the situation in which I found myself. 

Fast forward to the close of the tournament's third day, and I was somehow not only cashing, but actually a threat to crack the Top 10. Unbelievable. Through three days, John Rahm has scored more points for me than any golfer I have ever taken. He's been brilliant. He's six shots clear of the field heading into the final day. Then he signs his scorecard and is informed that he has tested positive for Covid, which means he is disqualified.

You have got to be kidding me. Well, the final day comes and goes, and my golfers, although four in number, almost cash for me. But not quite.

Later in the week, I put pitcher Max Scherzer on my FanDuel baseball team. Scherzer is one of the top pitchers in major league baseball, and his salary is high, but I want him. I check before the game to ensure that he's starting. He does indeed start, pitches to two batters, and calls it a day due to some discomfort. 

And thus ended my week in fantasy hell. This was one time my fantasy would definitely have been better served with Hurley rather than a hurler.

My Fantasy Feelings

Those familiar with me know that I'm not a big fan of the concept of fantasy sports. I feel there is something intrinsically antithetical to team sports when individual statistics become the focal point of team sport conversation, perception, and how people watch the games. When irrelevant late-game stats padding is perceived as more important than team play and the goal of winning, then team sports has devolved into a crass narcissistic exercise in personal accounting.

In a perverse way, the primacy of individual conspicuousness as the face of American team sports fits hand in glove with an out of control consumer culture that tries to sell "I" as the crux of all existence. Philosophically, that's why I'm anti fantasy sports. From a practical standpoint, however, I have additional concerns. 

The Slimy Underbelly of American Fantasy Sports

Back in October, 2015, Joe Drape and Jacqueline Williams of the NY Times published a fine DraftKings/FanDuel expose. This piece and previous exposes detailed how employees of FanDuel and DraftKings, while ostensibly not allowed to play at the company for which they worked, basically swapped insider information with each other. The FanDuel employees played at DraftKings, and the DraftKings employees played at FanDuel.

With access to percentages of how many contestants took which players, these employees were able to use insider trading to dominate the contests. Those employees and associates were able to leverage their insider knowledge to such an extent that, using mass entries with an economy of scale, the top 10% of contestants were able to wrangle the majority of the money. And, if anything, I'm understating this.

Nothing has really been solved since then. Any remedies put in place since the exposes can be easily sidestepped.

Just the other day, July 15, I received email notice of a class action suit against DraftKings. I'm eligible because I made a first time deposit prior to January 1, 2018. The email states:

"Plaintiffs allege that DraftKings falsely advertised its product as a fair, 100% legal, easy to win game of skill that players could win if they practiced, studied, or worked on, and falsely advertised that players first deposit of up to $600 would be immediately matched."

Suggestion

I think if DraftKings and FanDuel were forced to publish their prize distribution to individuals while  publicly identifying the players with mega-entries, much of the fantasy bloom would be off the rose. That would be my recommendation. Full disclosure of prize money distribution. Until then, DraftKings and FanDuel are black boxes sucking money from the general public while lining the pockets of insiders and their associates.

Bob Dietz

July 24, 2021

Conspiring: The Realities of Conspiracy Theories

My familiarity with the paranormal, UFOs, and X-Files kinds of stuff has exposed me to quite a few conspiracy theories, but I'm no conspiracy expert. In the last 30 years, academia has launched a great deal of formal investigation into conspiracies, their provenance, and their sociology.

People seem baffled by the how and why of large percentages of Americans adopting what seem to be completely irrational beliefs. Q-Anon claims that a cabal of left-wing wealth and politics is behind massive pedophilia rings, despite the minimal evidentiary strands that could point in that direction. Some 70% of Republicans claim that the 2020 presidential election was stolen, even though U.S. voting results are the very opposite of a black box. Voting results and demographics are incredibly X-ray-able going down to county and precinct levels. Voting in the U.S. takes place in both a historical and live action glass house. Any aberrations or secrets would stand out with red alert clarity.

I tried to catch up a bit on conspiracies the last few months. I've scanned The Skeptic and Skeptical Inquirer, and my book recommendations include Jesse Walker's The United States of Paranoia and psychologist Rob Brotherton's Suspicious Minds. After surveying what experts have been saying, I put some of it together. The first thing I have to say is an observation. The second is an explanation. The third is a recommendation.

Conspiracies as American Religion

The definitions of "conspiracy" and "religion" overlap mightily. One could easily swap these words for each other in most common usage, and not much about the sentences would change. 

Both conspiracies and religions feature strong belief systems. The belief systems are not primarily based on evidence examination and evidence analysis. In fact, the canon of each is designed to retreat from disconfirming evidence. Disconfirming evidence is generally attributed to those who are part of the conspiracies or, in the case of American evangelicals, Satan or the tests of a profane world. In Walker's The United States of Paranoia, he talks about categories of conspiracy theories. The first two categories feature enemies within and enemies outside, and the language is identical to "the evil" or "the other" of American religions. At the least, the United States' religiosity provides a fertile ground for non-evidence based beliefs, commitments, and calls to action. 

In addition, conspiracy theories and American religions share an explanatory style. Political scientist Michael Barkun describes the seductive explanatory model employed by most conspiracy theories. He lists the following as conspiracy attributes:

1) Conspiracies explain things when normal historical and political analyses fail.

2) Conspiracy theories divide the world into a Manichaean good and evil, with conspirators labeled as evil. This perspective simplifies an often unfathomable reality and usually suggests clear courses of action.

3) Conspiracies usually feature a type of gnosis. This secret knowledge is either not perceived by the masses or, if perceived, goes unrecognized as hugely significant.

As I mentioned earlier, all of these conspiracy characteristics have heavy overlap with characteristics of American religions. Most people are too delicate to state it, but one commitment to non-evidence based beliefs paves the way for another.

Why Believe?

I think that the most important aspect of American conspiracies is that they are not primarily about evaluating evidence and coming to a conclusion about who is doing what to whom. If you try to dissect a Q-Anon or "Trump Won" conspiracy, it's absolutely crucial to understand that these are not mainly about people surveying their world and using faulty logic or flawed info-gathering. American conspiracies in 2021 did not originate because people were trying to figure out a reality apart from themselves and ways to affect that reality. 

These 2021 American conspiracies are something entirely different. They are the result of vast numbers of Americans feeling a certain way, of having deep-seated emotional and psychological reactions to the reality they observe and the massively changing American demography. The believers are surveying their internal states and feelings, and then inventing a storyline that explains these feelings and reactions. Current American conspiracies are an explanation for stress levels, for what is felt, for insecurities recognized but not understood. 

Conspiracies are inventions that serve as explanations for emotions, thoughts and behaviors. They help explain both the actions of the outside world towards the believer, and the emotional state of the believer. And in 2021, specific instigating influence communication (think Fox News) has helped believers frame everything they see and feel. In a sense, conspiracies serve as agents of reification.

These conspiracies are not the result of an analysis of fact and a search for objective truth. They are means of explaining the agitation and insecurity of self to self via labeling the world in simple, understandable, dualistic ways. They are means to justify, with minimal weighing of actual evidence and minimal self criticism, one's thoughts and feelings. No evidence is disconfirming to devoted Q-Anon or "Trump Won" believers. Evidence is irrelevant, and any such evidence can be labeled as more work of the conspirators, who have replaced the devil (or partnered with him) as the manipulators of a profane world.

Media Responsibilities

Conservative American media that fuels the conspiracy theories is not asking the right questions. But neither are the progressive American outlets.

Instead of trying to treat conspiracy believers as people with bad data or bad logic or flawed critical thinking, journalists should identify the believers as irrational activists triggered by their own life situations and emotional states. The problem in a hyper-religious United States (and bear in mind that evangelicalism correlates highly with 2021 conspiracy beliefs) is that allowing, even promoting, people to believe whatever they like regardless of evidence is an American way of life. It's called freedom of faith. Well, now that faith has symbiotically latched onto conspiracy narratives, no amount of arguing or debate is going to budge the 70% of Republicans who declare that Trump won the 2020 election. American conspiracies work backwards. Discovered evidence doesn't affect feelings. Rather, primal feelings dictate declarations and behaviors.

Wrap-Up

We have reached the point in the United States where sanity and insanity are statistical. Whether declarations and consequent actions are rational or irrational is no longer dependent on the nature of the declarations or the actions. It's dependent on which section of the political Venn diagram in which one happens to be located. Insanity has become more relative in the U.S. than ever before. Your sanity status, once based on what you said or did, is now determined by where you said or did it and who was in the crowd. 

Until the progressive media takes on the problematic religious parallels of current conspiracies, they will be missing key questions. And unless the idea of sanity being increasingly relative is introduced, we will continue to be shocked, shocked I tell you, when the DOJ and other legal institutions are hijacked in the service of unsubstantiated beliefs.

Bob Dietz

June 13, 2021

Trans Wars: More Problems with Athletics

Today's entry continues the discussion of problems associated with allowing transgender females to participate in athletics at the grade school, high school, and college levels.

First, genetic males have an inherent advantage versus genetic females in virtually all American sports. I am unfamiliar with archery, but in all other sports, genetic males as a population will outperform genetic females. Second, I want to point out that participating in and especially excelling in grade school, high school, and college athletics have both material and non-material consequences. The non-material consequences include social networking, boosts to esteem and self-perception, notoriety, and an expanded public footprint in general. Material consequences involve the possibility of securing one of the roughly 200,000 athletic scholarships available to American students.

Unfortunately, higher education in the United States is an expensive undertaking compared to other Western democracies. Roughly two percent of American high school athletes ameliorate costs via athletic scholarships of some kind. I make no argument that the social perks and athletic scholarships resulting from athletic success are the way things ought to be. I am simply arguing that it is the current reality.

While not every family strategy is as cynically bottom-line oriented as The Sopranos, neither are most U.S. families living Disneyesque lives. It is beyond naive to ignore the material and non-material benefits if genetic males compete in women's sports. People can make the case that the social "rights" and mental health of trans children should take precedence over the issues inherent in bumping genetic females down the self-esteem, publicity, and scholarship ladders. I have a hard time, however, viewing genetic males in women's sports as separate from spotlight and financial advantage grabs.

The material consequences of genetic males in women's sports could, in part, be circumvented if all transgender women were disallowed from playing women's college and professional sports. That at least would shut down the most egregious material resource hijacking. But this avenue is highly unlikely to be voluntarily taken by the necessary parties at this time, which means that some kind of legal imposition will eventually be required. This would create a formal two-track system; one for genetic males and another for genetic females. A two-track system would be anathema to the legal and societal goals of the U.S. transgender population.

Malcolm Gladwell, Human Nature, and My Experience

Some might argue that the mental health and lifepaths of transgender Americans are too important for anyone to try to manipulate gender for personal and financial gain. All I can do is roll my eyes. Maybe it's the years of gambling, maybe it's my inestimable cynicism, perhaps it's because I've seen too many cringeworthy reality shows, but I don't view gender choices as above the attention-seeking and capitalist fray. People will do anything for material and non-material gain. 

In his books, Malcolm Gladwell often discusses the effects of age-at-school-entrance. Parents who wait until as late as permissible to enter their children into school systems provide their children with the advantages of size and an edge in athletic prowess. There are consequences.

I grew up in the hardscrabble small mining towns of southeastern Pennsylvania. In the 70's and 80's, Pennsylvania had one of the most expensive state college systems in the United States. I believe when I graduated from high school in 1975, we were the second most expensive state. 

It was routine for working class families with promising athletes to hold back their sons a year and have them repeat a grade, preferably before reaching seventh grade. This provided the families with the chance for their sons to stand out athletically and acquire college athletic scholarships. I've seen the athletic benefits of these familial strategies up close and personal. I've witnessed the older Gladwell examples have crucial successes. I've also seen younger athletes displaced in their athletic cohorts by these Gladwell cuckoos, sometimes with remarkable effects.

My point is that since I've witnessed routine grade-failing by parents in the service of material and non-material gain, don't expect me to believe gender swapping is too noble a pursuit to go unsullied by the same kinds of goals. 

Framing with Numbers

I want to throw some ballpark numbers at you in an attempt to frame the scale of the issue and put everything in some kind of context. The numbers are not hard and fast, but they are useful. Some of these estimates come from statistical modeling rather than direct surveys. The estimates from the Williams Institute think tank at UCLA, for example, used modeling. 

Basically, about .7% of teens in the U.S. consider themselves transgender. That's roughly 150,000 teenagers. There are about 20 million college students in the U.S., a figure that's been steady for about a decade. If we ballpark transgender individuals at .7%, we are once again at about 150,000 transgender individuals who are college students. 

Interestingly, the number of college students on athletic scholarship is in the same vicinity. Between 180,000 and 200,000 students are on athletic scholarship in the United States. Assuming almost half of these are women, we have somewhere around 90,000 genetic females on athletic scholarship who would be at risk of competing against genetic males.

Conclusion

Since laws regarding trans athletes are changing as I write this, I will attempt to survey the most recent legal arguments and latest policy changes as I revisit this topic in the days ahead.

The times, and the genders, they are a'changin'. The challenge will be to keep a rational, even-handed perspective on all this without getting jammed up in any La Brea pit of moral certitude. At this point, on this topic, I think what passes for American progressivism is largely in the muck. 

Bob Dietz

June 2, 2021

I Agree with She Who Was Once Bruce

After months of dealing with the murderous consequences of a narcissistic White House bully and his belly-crawling enablers during a pandemic, I find it a great relief to finally tackle the arrogance that passes for modern progressivism. I'll spend many 2021 days discussing blithering moral absolutism. May as well get things rolling.

I was between my freshman and sophomore years at Penn State when a 6'2", 195-pound icon of masculinity named Bruce Jenner pulverized the decathlon world record at the 1976 Olympics. As a college cross-country runner, I was duly impressed by Jenner's clinching 4:12 1500 meters. Despite being able to run five miles under 30 minutes, I was not able to run a 4:12 1500, and distance running was my thing. Jenner did it as the culmination event after two days of brutal competition involving the hurdles, high jump, long jump, 100, 400, javelin, shot put and (gulp) pole vault. 

Now it's 2021, I look as bad as Will Smith in this week's Instagram post, and Bruce Jenner, he of the decade of Wheaties boxes, is a she. The latter takes some mental adjusting on my part. 

Down the road, I'll devote entries to the pronoun debate and other trans issues. Today, I just want to touch on the legislation being enacted in various red states to prevent genetic males from taking part in women's sports. 

Caitlyn (previously Bruce) Jenner told TMZ last Saturday that she was against genetic males competing in women's sports. I completely agree. Let me repeat that as my progressive friends faint. I completely agree with Caitlyn Jenner on this.

I have my reasons. As always, I'm open to changing my mind, but that change of mind would have to be fueled by new data or my grasping some heretofore unseen flaw in my base logic. So I'm going to lay out my specific reasoning as to why I agree with Caitlyn Jenner. My reasoning has absolutely nothing to do with culture warring. In this post, I'm going to narrowly focus on two main arguments, then expand on them in future entries. 

First, college educations in the United States are not free. They represent enormous financial investments by both parents and students. For better or worse, built into the American educational system are tiers of athletic scholarships ranging from partial tuition to free rides. 

Genetic males have an advantage over genetic females in virtually all American sports. Name the American sport, and genetic males outperform genetic females overall. It's not really close. Baseball, softball, football, basketball, soccer, track and field, cross-country, swimming, wrestling, boxing -- for all of these sports, the average genetic male, equitably trained, outperforms the average genetic female. You can argue all you want for cultural biases working against women and women not getting the hours of training to match men, and to a degree you would be correct, but the fact remains. Given equitable training, the average genetic male outperforms the average genetic female in American sports. If you refuse to acknowledge this, you are as delusional as the 70% of the GOP that thinks Biden lost the 2020 election.

The practical consequences of superior performances by genetic males in sport is that a biological male adopting a female gender will move up the performance bell curve when competing against genetic women. This bell curve shift and enhanced standing is undeniable. What therefore happens is that the heretofore gendered male, when hopping over to a female gender, will receive more notoriety for essentially the same abilities and performance. For example, a genetic male running a 4:40 mile as a male is considered good, but not really college scholarship material. A genetic male running a 4:40 mile as a gendered female, however, is scholarship-worthy for women's track. 

My concern is that when genetic males compete against genetic females at the high school level, the genetic males will slot themselves into scholarship opportunities that would otherwise go to genetic females. A displacement would occur at each scholarship tier. Even the best genetic females risk being displaced from the best scholarships into inferior scholarship slots. If colleges that offer athletic scholarships were to outright ban genetic males from women's sports, then my concern for scholarship distribution would be unnecessary. But if different universities adopt different rules, then the teams employing transgender genetic male "ringers" would have an obvious advantage, no matter the sport.

Now to my second point. The same slotting domino effect would occur when scholarships are not the issue. Simply making high school teams becomes more difficult for women when genetic males are allowed on the same teams. Imagine three genetic males with female gender trying out for a high school basketball team. They would likely take three spots that would otherwise go to genetic women. If a genetic female makes the team, then practice time with the first team would be hijacked by the genetic males. Finally, actual game time would be hijacked by the genetic males. 

So it's not just about scholarships. It's about making the teams or not, and roles on the teams. It's about opportunities to learn, discovering how to shoulder psychological responsibilities, networking, and getting public recognition for athletic roles and accomplishments. Genetic males have the capability to hijack those roles and recognition as assuredly as any cuckoo bird.

I suppose that the pushback questions against what I've argued are, "Shouldn't genetic males living as gendered females have their emotional needs met? Is not their cumulative mental health more important than any scholarship?" I'm a bit of a cynic when these questions are asked. I'll tackle them in my next trans-issue entry.

Bob Dietz

May 6, 2021

Reopening Redux Redux

I must be psychic, or really good at timing the obvious.

The day after my April 26, "Reopening Redux" entry, Tennessee Gov. Bill Lee announced that he would not renew any public health orders. As reported by Theresa Waldrop and Gregory Lemos of CNN, Lee announced that "Covid-19 is no longer a health emergency in our state." As I mentioned in "Reopening Redux," just 25% of Tennesseans have been vaccinated, and Tennessee's infection rate was the worst in the country. Lee thus made the classic GOP move of ignoring data and playing to people's emotional preferences. He follows Georgia Gov. Brian Kemp and Texas Gov. Greg Abbott in fully opening to establish a faux sense of control..

On Monday, May 3, Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis signed into law legislation that enables him to override any city or county emergency restrictions. Limitations on business capacity and mask mandates are therefore vetoed in the name of "freedom."

The red state policy failures of 2020 have resulted in no learning curve at all. Repeating past policy decisions while assuming different results is the very definition of organizational insanity. Public health has never been a strong suit of the GOP, and the push for illusory normalcy may result in thousands of preventable deaths by the end of 2021.

Bob Dietz

May 5, 2021

Who Watches the Watchmen?

 And more importantly, who hires them and pays for them?

I've tried to keep tabs on the latest regarding a private company, Cyber Ninjas, doing an alleged forensic analysis of 2020 votes from Maricopa County, Arizona. In today's Washington Post, reporters Rosalind Helderman and Josh Dawsey laid out a comprehensive up-to-date summary of the situation. This afternoon, Elvia Diaz of the Arizona Republic posted a story from the site of the mishmash. Rather than repeating the Post and Republic reporting, I'll recommend you read those articles, then return to my thumbnail summary, which is less about details and more about a warning.

Essentially what's happening is that a private company, Cyber Ninjas, has been contracted by Senate Republicans in Arizona to forensically analyze two million ballots. Cyber Ninjas is apparently both financed and staffed by those championing the theory of widespread voter fraud. Cyber Ninjas is a Florida-based company that is not, I repeat not, accredited by the federal government to test voting systems. 

The Arizona Senate Republicans' PR statement did not state how Cyber Ninjas was given the assignment. Douglas Logan, chief executive of Cyber Ninjas, had tweeted theories pushing 2020 voter fraud. Those tweets have been deleted. Meanwhile, as the "auditors" continue to work, no federal monitors are in Arizona to audit the auditors, so to speak. The Post and the Republic covered all of this today, and they covered it well.

My personal take is that the 2020 election outcomes were not really a first step towards the U.S. regaining its rationalism. Demographic shifting is fueling a greater red/blue divide than anyone thought possible. The cultural wars are likely to worsen dramatically in the years ahead, and the red states will become even more entrenched in their anti-democratic machinations.

Any moneyed, motivated individual or entity has the capability to further undermine what passes for U.S. democracy. The narrative being pushed in Arizona isn't likely to be ameliorated by reasoned arguments or disconfirming evidence. A company hired to find something isn't likely to baldly report that they were hired for nothing. 

More and more red states will begin to install Watchmen organizations and hired-gun private companies. The arguments for reviewing every lost election will have little to do with logic or rationality or drawing conclusions from evidence. The reviews will be a mechanism to find justification for why disappointed voters feel the way they do. The reviews exist to explain the en masse emotions of an electorate that feels itself losing power. In the months ahead, all manner of political intrigue will be employed to pander to these en masse emotions. Logic and the quality of evidence found will not matter. Any evidential port in a storm will be the theme.

Many people want to believe elections were massively rigged, and that their voting cohort wasn't badly outnumbered. All that will matter to them is that they find something on which to anchor their needs during the ongoing demographic storm. And that demographic storm has just begun.

Bob Dietz

April 29, 2021