The President's Core Base of Support

Most of the time the president has been in office his approval rating has been in a range of about 41% to 43% based on aggregated poll data by the poll analysis site 538. Today, the president’s approval is 41.6% and disapproval is 53.7%. From that it seemed reasonable to think that his core base of unshakeable supporters is about 41-43%. The logic is that if people still support the president, they are likely solid supporters who would not vote for any democrat in 2020.

Despite that, other indications at least since the 2018 mid-terms kept suggesting his solid support base is somewhat lower.

The Cook Political Report, a low bias, high fact accuracy analysis site, analyzed this question in December of 2018. The CPR wrote:

In this year’s network exit polls, 45 percent approved the job Trump is doing, while 54 percent disapproved. The "strongly approve" number was 31 percent. In the last Fox News poll before the midterm election, 31 percent of registered voters and 33 percent of likely voters strongly approved. The last pre-election NBC News/Wall Street Journal poll pegged his "strongly approve" numbers at 32 percent of registered and 35 percent of likely voters, while the ABC News/Washington Post poll had it a bit lower with 28 percent. So between 28 and 35 percent can be said to be his solid base.

What about Trump’s hard-core opposition? The exit poll showed 46 percent strongly disapproving, while in the Fox News poll it was 43 and 45 percent respectively among registered and likely voters. The NBC/WSJ poll had the numbers a bit larger, with 45 percent of registered voters and 47 percent of likely voters strongly disapproving.

Polling in July and September of this year indicates that about 27-32% of registered voters strongly approve and 45-48% strongly disapprove. That suggests that Trump's solid base hasn't changed much since last December. A different September 2019 poll put the president’s strong approval rating with voters at 28%, with strong disapproval at 45%.

Obviously, support for the president can change over time.  But, if these polls are basically accurate, it is reasonable to think that the president’s core base of unshakeable support right now is about 30% instead of about 42%. If that is correct and holds up for the next 3-4 months, the president will probably need to appeal to a broader swath of the American public than he does now. It isn't clear how or if he can do that, but there will very likely be a major effort to do so. Maybe such an effort already is under way. As of September 2019, about 11% of eligible voters claim to be undecided, so that group could be the key target.

The Supreme Court term begins with a crazy case about insanity

By Ephrat Livni in Washington DC

https://qz.com/1721661/scotus-kicks-off-term-with-a-kansas-insanity-defense-case/

The US Supreme Court will kick off a new term on Oct. 7 with arguments about a classic topic, the knowledge of good and evil.

Specifically, the justices will be considering the constitutionality of a Kansas statute that abolished the insanity defense. It’s being challenged by Kraig Kahler, a man convicted by a Kansas jury for the 2009 murders of his two daughters, ex-wife, and former mother-in-law, plus burglary, and sentenced to death.

Kahler’s attorneys argue that the state’s approach to mental illness in criminal culpability violates the US Constitution’s eighth amendment prohibition on cruel and unusual punishment, as well as the 14th amendment guarantee of due process of law. They say their client’s sentence is a mistake because Kahler lacked the moral capacity to tell right from wrong when he killed his family. The attorneys say that this was because Kahler suffered from severe depression and personality disorders, and he should have been allowed to present an insanity defense.

Kansas argues in its brief that Kahler is not insane. Before he killed his family on Thanksgiving weekend 2009, he was a successful public official. He was reportedly obsessed with seeming to have the perfect life and family, and for a while he did. However, when his wife left him for a woman, Kahler was shattered. He lost his job and moved in with his parents.

Not long after, Kahler drove to his former mother-in-law’s house and shot everyone but his son. The state says Kahler’s actions—driving, sparing his son, aiming at his targets and hitting them, pursuing the victims from room to room—are evidence that he had the requisite intent to commit the murders. The state also contends that the expert testimony presented by the defendant didn’t show he was insane anyway, even had Kansas allowed the desired defense.

Most notably, the state argues that its statute is constitutional. It has not abolished the insanity defense but redefined it, Kansas claims. “While Kansas no longer has an affirmative defense called insanity, evidence of mental disease or defect is still admissible to show a lack of mens rea, thus exempting certain mentally ill individuals from criminal liability,“ the state writes.

The elements of a crime

Kansas law considers mental defects in the context of intent. Mens rea is one of two elements prosecutors must prove along with criminal conduct, or an actus reus.  State law allows defendants to argue that they lacked the mental state—or mens rea—for criminal culpability, and to present evidence of a mental illness that prevented them from forming the requisite intent. But they can’t argue that they weren’t guilty by virtue of insanity.

An amicus brief filed by law professors and philosophers “for neither party” argues that the Kansas law is unjust because a mentally ill defendant could form the intent to commit a crime but still lack the capacity to judge between right and wrong. And a fair society doesn’t punish someone who can’t understand the consequences of their actions or any subsequent punishment. “Sanity is a precondition of responsibility,” they write. “The lack of an insanity defense, as in Kansas, will ensure that the state punishes some defendants in the absence of responsibility for their crimes.”  

In other words, Kahler may have had the intent to kill. Yet, he might still not have been able to judge the morality of his act. That failure—not knowing in the moment of action that killing was wrong—would make Kahler not responsible for the crime by virtue of his mental illness.

The brief distinguishes between excuses, such as self-defense, and justifications that negate wrongdoing, such as infancy, duress, and insanity. The justification defenses exist because society recognizes that to be responsible for one’s acts a person has to be able to judge what they are doing.

In the beginning

Kahler argues that the insanity defense has a long and venerable history in humanity’s many legal traditions. His brief cites the first book of the Old Testament, Genesis, for support. “Ancient civilizations recognized the distinction between the insane and those capable of understanding the moral implications of their actions,” Kahler’s attorneys write. “In the early Jewish tradition, ‘madness’ was an excuse for otherwise punishable crimes. The first pages of the Torah introduce ‘knowledge of good and evil’ as a central reality of the human condition.”

In Islam, Christianity, and Greek philosophy, too, they argue, the ability to distinguish between right and wrong is a prerequisite to culpability. It’s been similarly established in the Anglo-Saxon tradition since the 18th century, according to Kahler’s counsel. That’s why 48 American jurisdictions—45 states, the federal criminal justice system, the military justice system, and the District of Columbia—currently provide an affirmative insanity defense that considers a defendant’s lack of moral culpability.

Kansas begs to differ. The state writes, “Many ancient references to insanity are at best ambiguous and consistent with the mens rea approach.” It dismisses claims that ancient courts considered insanity exculpatory. On the contrary, the state argues, insanity was a sign of intent. Neither the framers of the constitution nor ancient Greek philosophers would be bothered about exculpating the insane based on a “good and evil” test, the state says. “Kansas has reasonably determined that individuals who voluntarily and intentionally kill another human being are culpable, even if they do not recognize their actions are morally wrong,” the state concludes.

This is what most offends the philosophers. They argue that there is no basis for punishment if a person can’t make moral judgments, and a statute that fails to recognize as much is fundamentally unjust. “It is crucial for our society to tolerate a diversity of ethical views…but toleration and deference cannot go so far as to allow a government to perpetrate injustice of this sort. The Court should correct Kansas’s error,” they urge.

Kansas flips the script on opponents of the statute, saying its approach is actually more “evolved” than the old insanity defense. The state argues that by “redefining” insanity’s role in culpability, it severs the link between mental illness and criminality, minimizing societal stigma for the afflicted.

It’ll be months before we learn where the justices ultimately stand on the knowledge of good and evil and its role in crime and punishment. But by Monday, their most pressing concerns should at least become apparent.

Biased Political Attitudes Toward Science

Last August, the Pew Research Center wrote “Democrats and Republicans differ over role and value of scientists in policy debates.” Pew polling shows what is by now a predictable divide in attitudes toward science. Overall, about 60% of Americans believe that when science is relevant, scientists with relevant expertise should have a role in policy debates. That said, party-based differences are major.

For example, 54% of Democrats say policy choices from scientific experts are usually better than other people’s, while 66% of Republicans believe the experts are the same or worse than choices of average people.

Other Pew data suggest that for issues grounded in matters of science, there is significant distrust of scientists and/or science itself.

This polling seems to imply that people who see bias among scientists leads them to question or distrust the logic that scientists use. Flawed logic definitely can lead people to draw false conclusions from data. However, all people are open to bias. That includes people who distrust scientists due to their own anti-science biases. People are biased but nonetheless they still can be guided by facts and logic more than what their bias alone would lead them to believe.

Arguably, anti-science bias is the basis that some people rely on to reject consensus data-based science beliefs such as climate change or the urgency of the climate problem.

Mindsets

Mindset: noun

an attitude, disposition, or mood.

an intention or inclination.

Being the homemade philosopher that I am, I was waking up in bed this morning thinking about mindsets.  Btw, how lucky am I to have the uncomplicated life that affords me such a thought luxury?  Very, and I know it!  :) Anyway…

Mindsets are really interesting things to think about.  The irony is that, when you think about them, you do so under a mindset.  I suspect that’s where many-a-reasoning capabilities can and have taken some wild, illogical turns.  Conundrum: How to “see clearly” when under the influence of a particular mindset?  How to weed out fact from fiction, truth from lie, and come out on the other side with a mindset somewhat still intact?  What kind of person can do that?  Or better yet, what kind of person can’t?  Great questions, right?

We all have mindsets.  Actually, we’ve all had many.  Think about how you thought when you were a teenager.  A lot different than now, ‘eh?  Somewhere along the line of life, like the proverbial shit, “influences happen.”  Sometimes they can be like epiphanies, coming out of the blue.  What happens in the brain that triggers that moment in time?  I don’t know; probably some chemical secretion surge.  Like a flash of lucidity, a situation “meets the (your) requirements” and it, a newish mindset, happens... boom.

I was thinking about, for example, people who kill other people.  Take John Lennon’s killer, Mark David Chapman.  He was in a mindset when he approached John and robbed him of his young life.  I wonder if Chapman is NOW thinking, “What was I thinking?! A probable life in prison, for a life in the grave. Was it really worth it?” he must wonder.

Yes it’s very true.  We can mess up our life, or someone else’s, with a somewhat/relatively “momentary life-situation” mindset.  Such mindsets can involve many categories, such as crimes of passion, or revenge, or the meting out of believed justice.  Lots of reasons can put us (stick us) in a mindset; ones that we may regret later.  Your life is pretty much based on your current mindset.  So… here’s my ask:

Talk to us about mindsets.  What do you make of mindsets?  Analyze that phenomenon for us from your current mindset.  Should we be more mindful of them?  How do they affect our politics?

Take your answers to wherever your mind(set) sends you.  And if this write-up has caused you to think about your own mindset more closely, then “mission accomplished.” ;)

Thanks for recommending.

Animosity Toward Journalists & Journalism Is Spreading

The Washington Post describes a alleged incident of hostility toward journalist Ben Watson by a Customs and Border Control (CBP). The CBP is investigating the incident. The officer involved may wind up denying the story. WaPo reports that the journalist has filed a complaint with the Department of Health and Human Services and he has published an article in Defense One, the news organization the journalist works for, describing the incident. WaPo writes:

It took a moment for Ben Watson to realize the officer was not joking.

Watson had just told the Customs and Border Protection staffer reviewing his passport that he works in journalism. Then the seemingly routine Thursday encounter at the Washington Dulles International Airport got tense.

“So you write propaganda, right?” Watson, the news editor at the national security site Defense One, recalled the CBP officer asking.

“No,” Watson says he replied. He affirmed again that he was a journalist.

The officer repeated his propaganda question, said Watson, who was returning from a reporting trip in Denmark.

“With his tone, and he’s looking me in the eye — I very much realized this is not a joke,” Watson told The Washington Post on Friday. Watson said he got his passport back only after agreeing with the “propaganda” charge.

The CBP officer made Watson state that he writes propaganda twice before letting him go.

Watson writes in his Defense One article: “Over the past year, several journalists have reported being harassed and even detained by U.S. customs agents. In February, CBP officials apologized to a BuzzFeed reporter who was aggressively questioned upon entering New York’s JFK Airport. In June, freelance reporter Seth Harp described his hours-long detention by CBP officers in the Austin, Texas, airport. .... Update: In an email, a CBP spokesperson said that the agency is aware of and is investigating the “allegation about an officer’s alleged inappropriate conduct at Washington Dulles International airport,” adding that the agency holds its employees accountable and does not tolerate inappropriate comments or behavior. The spokesperson declined to be identified.”

Does a president bear any responsibility for demagoguery and authoritarian behavior?

Most or all authoritarian leaders throughout history have relied on dark free speech[1] to some extent to gain acceptance and power. In recent centuries, demagogues and tyrants focus on censoring the press, sometimes forcing it to put out propaganda or go out of business.

The president’s hate of the professional press is well-known and undeniable. The effect of a leader’s rhetoric to influence public opinion and behavior is also well-known and undeniable. Are incidents of journalist harassment due to some non-trivial degree to the president’s anti-journalism rhetoric and behavior? Or, (1) does a president’s rhetoric and behavior have no cause and effect linkage in matters like this, or (2) what the president says is protected free speech and thus any effects the speech may have on people is justifiable or otherwise does not reflect badly on a president in any way?


Footnote:
1. Dark free speech: Constitutionally or legally protected (1) lies and deceit to distract, misinform, confuse, polarize and/or demoralize, (2) unwarranted opacity to hide inconvenient truths, facts and corruption (lies and deceit of omission), and (3) unwarranted emotional manipulation (i) to obscure the truth and blind the mind to lies and deceit, and (ii) to provoke irrational, reason-killing emotions and feelings, including fear, hate, anger, disgust, distrust, intolerance, cynicism, pessimism and all kinds of bigotry including racism. (my label, my definition)

Dispelling the Myths About Sexuality Education

All girls and boys – and all women and men, for that matter – can benefit from comprehensive knowledge about safe sexual behavior. Yet opposition to sexuality education is loud, persistent, and widespread, often because critics lack an accurate understanding of what it entails.

By Helen Clark, a former Prime Minister of New Zealand, is a former Administrator of the United Nations Development Programme.
https://www.project-syndicate.org/commentary/sexuality-education-benefits-opposition-by-helen-clark-2019-10

NEW YORK – Sexuality education empowers people to make informed choices about their own bodies and sexuality – and to stay safe in the process. It is therefore an essential element of a quality education. Yet, far from promoting comprehensive sexuality education, many are fighting to limit it. The consequences – especially for young people – are serious, lasting, and sometimes deadly.

As “Facing the Facts,” a new policy paper by UNESCO’s Global Education Monitoring Report, reminds us, each year some 16 million girls aged 15-19 (and two million under 15) give birth – a development that often marks the end of their formal education. Another three million girls aged 15-19 undergo unsafe abortions each year.

These numbers are linked to a lack of education about sex, sexuality, and the human body. For example, in the Islamic Republic of Iran, according to WaterAid, around one-half of girls think that menstruation is a disease. In Afghanistan, 51% of girls know nothing about menstruation before experiencing it themselves. In Malawi, that figure jumps to 82%. If girls – let alone boys – do not know what menstruation is, how can they possibly be expected to protect themselves against unwanted pregnancy?

The same goes for sexually transmitted infections like HIV. Young people aged 15-24 account for one-third of new HIV infections among adults. This is partly because only one-third of young women in most low- and middle-income countries know how to prevent the transmission of the virus.

But, contrary to popular belief, sexuality education is not just about sex. As “Facing the Facts” highlights, it also includes lessons about families and social relationships. These can benefit children as young as five, not least by enabling them to differentiate between appropriate physical contact and abuse.

Moreover, sexuality education offers important lessons about gender dynamics, including issues such as consent, coercion, and violence. Some 120 million girls worldwide – slightly more than one in ten – have experienced forced intercourse, forced sexual acts, or other forms of intimate partner violence at some point in their lives. This helps to explain why violence is the second leading cause of death among adolescent girls globally.

Comprehensive sexuality education can go some way toward countering the warped messages about masculinity that encourage male sexual dominance and so often lead to exploitation and violence. It can also assist in breaking the silence on such experiences among victims, potentially inspiring them to seek help.

All girls and boys – and all women and men, for that matter – can benefit from comprehensive knowledge about safe sexual behavior. Yet opposition to sexuality education is loud, persistent, and widespread. Some call for it to be banned outright. Others insist that schools should teach only abstinence, despite evidence showing that such programs often provide medically inaccurate information.

Like critics of LGBTQI+ education, opponents of comprehensive sexuality education seek to justify their stance on cultural, religious, social, or even political grounds. But, whatever the apparent motivation, their opposition often reflects a lack of knowledge about what such education entails. Improving the public’s understanding of sexuality education could therefore help to neutralize the negative hype and open the way for more young people to benefit.

Leaders worldwide must stand up for comprehensive sexuality education, by touting its clear, evidence-based benefits and dispelling harmful myths. An informed news media and advocacy by civil-society groups must also contribute to this process. With accurate information, the public is far more likely to accept sexuality education.

But for such education to be meaningful, it must be of high quality. Teachers must therefore be given the knowledge, resources, and, thus, confidence they need to teach these lessons effectively. Scripted lessons, like those introduced in Namibia and Chile, or online resources for teachers, as Tanzania provides, can go a long way toward fulfilling that need.

Furthermore, sexuality education should ideally be provided as a standalone program, rather than integrated into other subjects (a common practice that diminishes its impact). And it must be complemented by widely accessible, youth-friendly sexual and reproductive health services.

It is time to face the facts: humans have sex, often long before they reach adulthood. And it is immoral – perverse, even – to withhold potentially life-saving information from young people. After all, knowledge is power. By giving today’s youth, and girls in particular, a better understanding of their bodies, we can give them the power to protect their health – and their futures.