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Robert Ingersoll (August 11, 1833 – July 21, 1899) is the subject of the biography The Great Agnostic, by Susan Jacoby. As one might expect from the title, Ingersoll was a freethinker, an agnostic, an atheist; but as a highly successful & articulate lawyer, he became a highly visible and surprisingly popular advocate for freethinking, and, by the reverse side of that coin, a fierce critic of religion. The son of a Presbyterian minister, he was schooled to a thorough knowledge of religion, and when he chose a life of, to paraphrase, “freeing men and women from fear”, he came well-equipped.

I have not yet finished TGA, but have decided to quote some relevant remarks from Mz. Jacoby and quotes from Ingersoll while I’m thinking about them. I’m a little concerned this may be a hagiography rather than a proper biography, as the worst criticism Mz. Jacoby has leveled is that of ‘portliness’, at least so far. Regardless, the quotes are presumably verifiable and provoked thought in their relevance to today.

From page 116:

Ingersoll considered the passage of laws that turned Chinese into a special category of American residents without constitutional rights as not only morally wrong but wrong in terms of American self-interest, since Chinese made up one-fourth of the human race and Americans surely wanted to trade with that country.

“After all, it pays to do right. This is a hard truth to learn — especially for a nation. A great nation should be bound by the highest conception of justice and honor … It should remember that its responsibilities are in accordance with its power and intelligence.”

There’s a couple of thoughts here. First, the welcome congruency to my own thought that principles are not simple arbitrary rules that are to be followed, as at least I was taught growing up, but actually have positive consequences accruing to their adherence. I have to wonder if this connection should be more firmly taught to our youth; or if the connection is not as strong as it ought to be as the upper classes take advantage of the virtuous lower classes. Neither thought is original, and might even be considered clichés, but a cliché is not false because of this status, merely tired. The application to Trump business practices should be obvious.

Second, the connection between power and responsibility is drawn. The current GOP themes of using the worst and most insulting tactics in regard to Muslims, both naturalized and aliens, comes directly to mind as violating this dictate, and the consequences of dismaying our allies, as well as discouraging those who are ambivalent, are negative and evidence of an immature mind.

Feel free to send your own thoughts using the mail link on the right. More to come as I find and urge to transcribe from the book.

As Bill Clinton gives the keynote speech I’m reminded that he’s one of the best orators of the current era. Against the background of years of Republic deprecation, he’s humanizing her in a wonderful way, by telling a story that gives her motivations, her accomplishments, and more importantly her self-doubts, and her successful efforts to overcome them. This understanding of how the human race, for the most part, adores a good story, the story of the underdog who fights for the good.

He makes canny mention of her working with such Republicans as DeLay and Gingrich, and the positive words they have, perhaps incautiously, spoken of her. This speaks to her ability to work with all sides to create solutions to problems, to ignore ideological problems – an implied condemnation of GOP recalcitrance over the last 8 years.

And, as her husband, he can testify to her with authenticity; but he also does it with humor that reveals both his and her foibles, that he courted a woman he found attractive, she was independent and refused to assent to his proposals and made him work for the marriage. This transforms the overall political narrative from a picture of a grasping, cold-hearted bitch who wants power for power’s sake, to the picture of a woman person motivated by the needs of those in need of help, whether it be veterans, women, or her favorite – children. The crowd is going wild as Bill now exudes, with sincerity, his observations and belief at her ability as a “changemaker”.

Now he mentions how he was sent to West Virginia, a state they knew she’d lose in primaries, to tell the coalminers that if and when she became President, she’d come to West Virginia to try to help them. This is to counter the opposition story thread of Clinton vindictiveness.

He finishes up with a laundry list of accomplishments, diverse and inspirational, if sometimes obscure and a little hurried, and then a final, perhaps slightly weak ending, an encouragement to vote for her.

Ah! An interview with an audience member makes me realize this also introduces Hillary to younger voters who don’t know the story.

Now Meryl Streep is telling the story of a woman in the Revolutionary Army who took a bullet for George Washington, and now tries link that woman (I didn’t catch the name) to a series of other famous ladies, such as Eleanor Roosevelt, to Hillary. It’s an appeal to emotion, as it does not reveal anything new personally or politically about Hillary. Just a rah-rah moment.

I didn’t get to see the other speakers tonight, but I daresay Bill was the big cannon in what may be his final major speech, and I’d say he more or less nailed it. It was aimed at the independents who may think they know about Hillary, but Bill set out to set them straight on their perceptions by giving the story – a real story, one that resonates with the classic elements of story-telling and with verifiable facts (I should think).

The RNC sought to resonate with their delegates, and to some extent they managed it – and the performance of Trump and his surrogates reflected the nature of those delegates. If you watched or read about the RNC, then you understand that it ran on a mythos unrelated to reality, or for that matter an understanding of the traditions of American politics.

The DNC, too, has tried to resonate with the delegates, and again it’s a reflection of the delegates. The boisterous booing of Sanders delegates looked bad, but the overt multiculturalism, the messages of hope, and the refusal to indulge in outright hatred of the opposition – contrast with the disgraceful calls for imprisoning and executing Hillary at the RNC – should be a message to the independents and moderate and ex-Republicans that the Democrats remember and hold sacred the best traditions of American politics.

The NOAA ship Okeanos recently completed an exploration of the deep Marianas Trench. Here’s a few of the things they found:

Acorn worms were just one of the many types of strange fauna observed at Twin Peaks. Image courtesy of the NOAA Office of Ocean Exploration and Research, 2016 Deepwater Exploration of the Marianas.

One of the unusual benthic platyctenid ctenophores documented during Dive 5 at Ahyi Seamount. Image courtesy of the NOAA Office of Ocean Exploration and Research, 2016 Deepwater Exploration of the Marianas.

ROV Deep Discoverer discovers a B-29 Superfortress resting upsidedown on the seafloor. This is the first B-29 crash site found of over a dozen American B-29s lost in the area while flying missions during World War II. Image courtesy of the NOAA Office of Ocean Exploration and Research, 2016 Deepwater Exploration of the Marianas.

More here.

In this post I suggested the GOP rank and file are being trained to be victims. I’m not the only one, as James Hoggan notes in NewScientist (16 July 2016):

One would hope that evidence and reasoned debate would rule. But reality doesn’t matter to the likes of Trump, who sees himself as more powerful than mere facts. Yale philosopher Jason Stanley says such figures ruthlessly prey on public fears to reconstruct reality to pander to them.

Many people feel beleaguered, notes psychologist Bryant Welch. Trying to keep pace with change places ever greater demands on the brain, and this combines with worries about immigration policy, the economy, unemployment, terrorism, climate change and security. Anxiety makes the crowd turn to a powerful commander.

The danger is that the more this happens, the weaker and less capable people become. Welch compares it to a heroin addict craving larger and larger doses to get the same high. People are mainlining the Trump drug, a cocktail of absolute certainty, strong opinion and talk of control.

And then it becomes a self-perpetuating vortex as those who have assented to the all powerful leader continue to become more and more dependent. It’s essential that Trump not only lose, but lose big-time – and I fear that the blunder of Debbie Wasserman Schultz may make this impossible. We may be in for a long period of embittered people who – if we’re lucky – saw their leader lose an election; excuse me, no doubt the verb will be stolen. After all, combining this with the religious certainty of the fundamentalist and they will be certain they’ve been wronged.

I was too tired to subject myself to the traditional political raz-ma-taz of a convention last night, a decision I rather regret given the highly positive reviews I’ve been seeing of Michelle Obama’s speech. Glancing through the Andrew Sullivan live-blog, though, I do see that there was some heckling of Elizabeth Warren (!), attributed to the Sanders supporters:

You know, I didn’t cover this primary election but watching some of these Bernie supporters throw various hissy fits, I wonder if I would have found myself backing Clinton. I understand the passion but they sure come off as assholes. Sanders himself was far better – poised, happy to have swung the debate his way, and endorsing Clinton without any serious caveats at all.

I find it far harder to call them assholes in view of the revelations of the activities of Debbie Wasserman Schultz, the DNC chairman who appears to have favored Clinton over Sanders in substantial ways despite rules stating that the DNC should remain neutral during the primaries.

I’ve been poking around just a little, and it appears many observers are looking at Schultz’s future. I think that this is really a secondary issue, despite her position as a Representative for Florida, a state up for grabs. Instead, as Trump continues to look more than a little suspect no matter the issue, this is the time for Clinton to look like the old-time saviour of the nation, to do so she must appeal to the independents who seem to view her with suspicion.

The fact that Schultz favored her will, instead, once again cast black suspicion on Hillary. I’ve yet to see any reports indicating the leaked emails suggest that Hillary knew she was being awarded improper help – much less having actually illicitly requested it. Nevertheless, suspicious independents as well as moderate Republicans (such as former NYC mayor Michael Bloomberg), urged on by the right wing, will be tempted to think that just such has occurred – and because there’s no effective way to deny it, the tar will stick.

So when the Sanders supporters, already miffed at Bernie’s loss in the primaries, are faced with the news of a conspiracy against Sanders at the highest levels of the Party, is it any surprise that they react with disrespect – even when it’s progressive icon Elizabeth Warren? They know they’ve been screwed over. If you don’t express your discontent at being screwed, you’ll never be respected.

But in the bigger picture, the real matter of concern is the perception of Hillary as once again engaged in dirty politics. Whether or not she has ever been in the past, the perception, from national polls, is that she cannot be trusted. From Gallup:

I’m left wondering how Schultz didn’t understand the importance of following the rules, and how this places her favorite in peril of losing this election. Trump should be so vulnerable that his post-convention bounce was miniscule, but with this disaster, neither candidate appears to be reasonably pristine – and that’s a problem. Only one has the experience to be trusted with nuclear weapons and to recognize the dangers posed by Russia, while the other appears to be carrying water for Putin. But instead of this being crystal clear to the majority of the electorate, we’re instead pre-occupied with questions of the trustability of a former Senator and Secretary who has performed competently and honorably in her previous positions.

If we find the country at risk in December, a substantial portion of the blame should be placed at Schultz’s feet.

And now for some lovely family portraits. Some may seem familiar, of course, like any good portrait.

Some of the gangly teenagers in this one.

Uncle Henry, there in the foreground, has a lovely set of broad shoulders.

A casual shot of the family gossiping.

This appears to be some angry aunts. Best not to inquire about the roast turkey.

Sally Adee throws some cold water on the fears of Elon Musk, et al, in the pages of NewScientist (16 July 2016, paywall), suggesting that even the phrase “artificial intelligence” is misleading – because the computers aren’t really thinking:

“The black magic seduction of neural networks has always been that by some occult way, they will learn from data so they can understand things they have never seen before,” says Mark Bishop at Goldsmiths University of London. Their complexity (157 layers in one case) helps people suspend disbelief and imagine that the algorithms will converge to form some kind of emergent intelligence. But it’s still just a machine built on rule-based mathematical systems, says Schank.

In 2014, a paper that could be seen as the successor to the Lighthill report punctured holes in the belief that neural networks do anything even remotely akin to actual understanding.

Instead, they recognise patterns, finding relationships in data sets that are so complex that no human can see them. This matters because it disproves the idea that they could develop an understanding of the world. A neural network can say a cat is a cat, but it has no concept of what a cat is. It cannot differentiate between a real cat or a picture of one.

The paper isn’t the only thing giving people deja vu. Schank and others see money pouring into deep learning and the funnelling of academic talent.

“When the field focuses too heavily on short-term progress by only exploring the strength of a single technique, this can lead to a long-term dead end,” says Kenneth Friedman, a student at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, who adds that the AI and computer science students around him are flocking to deep learning.

So the suggestion is that the AI field may be pursuing another dead-end approach to discovering actual thinking machines. While not everyone agrees on this point, Roger Schrank at Northwestern University says:

“The beginning and the end of the problem is the term AI,” says Schank. “Can we just call it ‘cool things we do with computers’?”

In other news, also from NewScientist, comes word of new EU regulations which will impact the more mysterious computing systems:

Soon, you may have the right to ask the inscrutable algorithms involved to explain themselves.

In April this year, the European parliament approved the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR), a new set of rules governing personal data. Due to go into effect in 2018, it introduces a “right to explanation”: the opportunity for European Union citizens to question the logic of an algorithmic decision – and contest the results.

In life some things can be controlled and some cannot, and a key to sanity is having at least some control. The more we are at the mercy of the unfeeling vortex, the less happy we become, and the more bad decisions we make. The software engineers may whine about it, but I’ll happily applaud this decision and hope this idea may make its way over the Atlantic.

Steve Benen @ Maddowblog notes the Trump campaign has decided to question the honesty of various government agencies:

Late last week, as Donald Trump made claims about the U.S. crime rate that were demonstrably untrue, many began to wonder why the campaign was presenting fiction as fact. Paul Manafort, Trump’s campaign chairman, said the FBI’s data may show a steady decline in the crime rate, but Americans shouldn’t necessarily trust the FBI. Federal law enforcement, Manafort argued, is “suspect these days.”

Three days later, Don Trump Jr. appeared on CNN in his official capacity as a campaign surrogate, and Jake Tapper reminded him that not only has the crime rate improved, but “unemployment is much, much lower than when President Obama took office. Trump Jr. wasn’t impressed.

“These are artificial numbers, Jake. These are numbers that are massaged to make the existing economy look good and make the administration look good when in fact it’s a total disaster.”

It prompted the Huffington Post’s Sam Stein to note, “So, to be clear, the Trump campaign trusts the National Enquirer but not the Bureau of Labor Statistics.”

So – I know the Trump campaign surrogates are focused on winning the election and aren’t thinking beyond that – what happens a year after winning and they try to claim some achievement based on, say, the Bureau of Labor Statistics? Everyone just sneers and returns the same accusations?

This is a very divisive situation. The institutions that deliver stability and trustable information are crucial in today’s data-heavy society, and by implying, without solid information, that the numbers are not trustworthy is to drive another wedge between Americans. Now if they had some solid evidence then they’d be worth listening to, but if all they have are complaints that the numbers don’t match those predicted by ideology, as Steve reports, then perhaps your ideology isn’t sacred.

By assuming the government agencies which reported the terrible statistics of the Bush Administration are now handmaidens to the current Administration betrays a mindset similar to the Communists at their worst. Either put up the evidence, boys, or shut up.

For those of us who pay attention to quantum mechanics comes a possible solution to the conundrum of observation. Speaking as a simple software engineer, it has never made sense to say that for some (very small) entity, its various attributes do not have set values until it comes under observation. This is known as the Copenhagen interpretation:

… it says that a particle’s state before observation is fundamentally, intrinsically, insurmountably uncertain. If the wave function says a particle could be here and there, then it really is here and there, however hard that is to fathom in terms of everyday experience. Only the act of looking at a quantum object “collapses” its wave function, jolting it from a shadowy netherworld into definite reality.

Not only is it intuitively puzzling, it also leaves open important questions concerning how the Universe ever got started. I’ve given some thought to the possibility that, if true, it might constitute a clue as to whether we’re in a computer simulation, and this is an artifact of late resolution of “reality”, but it’s hard to see my way to really believing that.

And now perhaps that won’t be necessary. From NewScientist (16 July 2016, paywall) comes a longish article on the work of Daniel Sudarsky of National Autonomous University of Mexico (UNAM), who is extending a theory from the 1970s:

… Sudarsky began with a third option: that wave functions are real things and do indeed collapse – but randomly, by themselves. “Something like a measurement occurs, but without anybody actually measuring,” says Sudarsky. It doesn’t need a human observer, so this process is known as an objective collapse.

Objective collapse would be rare, but catching. Wait for a single particle’s wave function to collapse and you could be waiting longer than the age of the universe. Group many particles together, however, and the chance swiftly escalates. With a few billion particles, you might only have to wait a few seconds for one wave function to collapse – and for that to set the rest off.

Objective collapse theory was first put forward in the 1970s by Philip Pearle at Hamilton College in New York, and later refined by Giancarlo Ghirardi and Tulio Weber at the University of Trieste and Alberto Rimini at the University of Pavia, Italy. Their goal was to tweak Schrödinger’s equation so that the wave function evolves naturally, without an observer, from a mix of states into a single, well-defined state. To do so, they added a couple of extra mathematical terms: a non-linear term, which rapidly promotes one state at the expense of others, and a stochastic term, which makes that happen at random.

At least superficially, these tweaks can explain quite a lot that’s inexplicable about quantum theory. We never see ghostly quantum effects in large objects such as cats or the moon because, with so many interacting particles, their wave functions readily collapse or else never form. And in the early universe, as Sudarsky and physicist-philosopher Elias Okon, also at UNAM, showed a decade ago, it was only a matter of time before the wave functions of matter collapsed into an uneven distribution from which stars and galaxies could form, God or no God.

All still tentative, but it’s good to see someone takes my intuitive unease seriously and is investigating an alternative to one of the most successful scientific theories ever.

Katherine Martinko on Treehugger.com reports on the new mayor of Turin, Italy, and her primary focus:

It is into this firmly entrenched culinary tradition that Chiara Appendino has stepped. She is the controversial new mayor of Turin, a large city of over 870,000 people in the industrial northwest region of Piedmont that is famous for its food, primarily cured meats, and for being the birthplace of the Slow Food movement.

Appendino has announced her intention to promote vegetarianism and veganism in Turin. In a document outlining her plan for the city in 2016-2021, Appendino states that her government will prioritize

“The promotion of vegetarian and vegan diets throughout the municipality as an fundamental act that will protect the environment, health, and animals through awareness-building actions on the ground.”

The statement is consistent with Appendino’s strong stance on animal rights. Her Manifesto promises to “promote a culture of respect that recognizes all animals as having rights”and to make curricular changes in schools that include educating kids about “protection and respect for animals and proper nutrition in collaboration with animal welfare organizations and nutritionists.”

As Katherine notes, meat is a central part of the cuisine of Turin and Italy, and I would not expect a mass conversion of the citizenry to veganism nor vegetarianism. In my view, the philosophical defenses of vegetarianism are defective in that they ignore the biological requirements given to use by evolution. However, I will grant that it seems as if humanity is often at its best when it is defying the dictates of evolution; and Social Darwinism, the imposition of the perceived dictates of evolution on human society in the form of condemning the poor for the sin of being poor, without ever following the logic of justice in the implementation of same (and that would be such things as banning inheritance and any other activity, outside of the control of the newborn, which might give one newborn an advantage over another), is a repugnant mechanism to those who realize that society doesn’t exist to encapsulate cut-throat competition, but for the age-old exigencies: to safeguard all those who choose to join and are willing to contribute.

A little off-course.

The point being, evolution is a natural mechanism, not an idol to be adored, so it’s worth exploring the variants; and, in any case, we eat too much meat (& fish), so I expect the mayor’s campaign should have a positive effect, regardless of how close she comes to her nominative goal.

And I’m not talking World War II aircraft carriers …

Creeping up behind you

Now in its clutches!

And now back in hiding, no doubt digesting that innocent lettuce.

dicotyledonous:

The dicotyledons, also known as dicots (or more rarely dicotyls^[2]), were one of the two groups into which all the flowering plants or angiosperms were formerly divided. The name refers to one of the typical characteristics of the group, namely that the seed has two embryonic leaves or cotyledons.

Heard from my Uncle Lester today in conversation, as he recalled it from his botany class 60+ years ago.

The royal purples cling to existence…

NewScientist (16 July 2016) comes up with a summary of new British PM Theresa May:

Despite the UK being way off course on its target of an 80 per cent cut in greenhouse gas emissions by 2050, May has generally voted against measures to fight climate change, as well as against environmental regulation for UK fracking.

Uh oh. She also sponsored a national security bill:

The bill also appears to ask online service providers to reveal encrypted messages for which they don’t have the key – a mathematical impossibility. With May as prime minister, it seems likely the bill will pass unhindered.

Well. This should be interesting. Will math trump politics, or the reverse? She seems to have a problem with reality.

Skirting the edges of respectability….

A bit of echinacea.

Lettuce please you…

And for the fun of basil sins.

Due to other commitments, I was unable to watch the fourth and final night of the RNC. Not wishing to suffer through 2-3 hours of speechifying, I chose the easy alternative of reading the Andrew Sullivan live blog, which featured Andrew freaking out after reading the speech, and then his gradual return to normalcy as he realized Trump has not yet learned how to deliver a competent speech.

I think that Andrew, as a British immigrant of a true conservative bent, despite having been here for years, doesn’t understand that sometimes we Americans tend to have emotional surges and often forget that our personal experiences simply do not translate to this huge country of ours. For example, me getting mugged in downtown St. Paul doesn’t mean we’re in a crime wave and that chaos is about to descend upon the head of every Tom, Dick, and Harry. We need to be reminded of our immense size and activity from time to time, and then we start thinking again.

And that really leads me onto the important question of the day: What would I do if I were confronted with a Trump supporter today (and was actually articulate, rather than, like my wife, an “irrepressible wallflower”)?

I’d say, “Look, if you love your country, don’t yell at me about Hillary and all her alleged crimes. Take not 1, not 2, but 3 of Donald Trump’s claims, at random, and research them, and I mean really get down with them. Check the government reports, the neutral web sites – don’t take Donald’s word for it, don’t take the GOP’s, don’t take the Democrats’ word for it, and certainly don’t take Fox News’ word for it (because of this – summary: Fox makes you stupid, according to a long-time conservative’s objective research) – but the government non-partisan agencies are required to give truthful information. So, for instance, take Donald’s claim that crime is running rampant – and go get the stats. They’re online – so go find them. (Don’t expect me to help – of course!)

Do the damn research!

Did Donald lie? On all of them? Did he manage to be for something before he was against it before he was for it? Think about that. And you’re excited by him?

Finally, you say you want to shake things up in Washington? Here, show me your car. OK, would you let a thirteen year old with no experience fixing cars work on your beauty? No? Donald has no applicable experience – and, no, being a businessman simply doesn’t cut it. Why are you supporting him? Is your government not as important as your car? He can destroy civilization if he’s the President; in your case, you could have a car accident and get hurt, maybe even hurt a few other people, but that’s it. I know Paul Ryan and a few other GOPers think experts are unnecessary, but tell that to your car. Think about it. What possible good will come of this?”

And I’m not talking about the RNC. We have purple and white phlox in the background (oh so invasive), with a steadily creeping lamb’s ear in the foreground. Hollyhocks and daisies look on….

University of Minnesota researchers have used an electron microscope to see heat propagation:

“As soon as we saw the waves, we knew it was an extremely exciting observation,” said lead researcher David Flannigan, an assistant professor of chemical engineering and materials science at the University of Minnesota. “Actually watching this process happen at the nanoscale is a dream come true.”

Flannigan said the movement of heat through the material looks like ripples on a pond after a pebble is dropped in the water. The videos show waves of energy moving at about 6 nanometers (0.000000006 meters) per picosecond (0.000000000001 second). Mapping the oscillations of energy, called phonons, at the nanoscale is critical to developing a detailed understanding of the fundamentals of thermal-energy motion.

I had no idea electron microscopes were so capable!

The straw flowers are humble.

The lilies are bright and daring!

A bit of live-blogging…

8:15 Tonight’s chant appears to be “Because America Deserves Better!” if Governor Walker of Wisconsin is following the script. Which, oddly enough, happens to coincide with a trend in advertising of the last few years of telling consumers that they deserve this product or that product, with an intimation that what they’re getting is inferior.

So … what’s this deserve word? What has this target group done to deserve this upgrade?

OK, so it’s a thought we’ve all had, and we all know it’s just an advertising ploy, right? But here’s the flip side – it’s a victimization ploy. You know, someone has withheld something you deserve and, well, doesn’t that make you a victim? Of someone?

And resentful? Because your problems are someone else’s fault, someone’s intentional action has made your situation worse and it’s not your fault!

And ready to do something out of the ordinary to get it back?

Now I know why I loathe that particular advertising ploy. It virtually begs for supinity, for the strongman to take over and make it all better. The opposite of American self-sufficiency, no?

8:35 Now Senator Ted Cruz, who reportedly is maneuvering for the 2020 Presidential nomination even now, is giving his speech. Cloying, as he uses the recent tragedies. “We the people constrain government.” Now he’s telling us that “I want to be free” are the five most important words. How about “No more religious government“? (His father wishes to institute a theocracy.) Now we’re off to the lying races … too much to type … “choose your own doctor without Obamacare” … that is, if you can afford it at all. Does he know what health care prices were doing before Obamacare? And how rates of growth have dropped, while rates of insured have risen?

Now “don’t give it away to Russia!” He does know the Donald thinks Putin is great?

“States should be able to choose policies that reflect local values” … careful, Ted, isn’t that how the Civil War started? Not that my response is nuanced 🙂 Now to tar Hillary – she wants to control speech, even, according to him? Now a transition to Brexit … is he calling for secession? I hope he knows what Lawrence Wilkerson thinks of such an action.

8:51 Now he talks about the AME murderer, and I notice the applause is muted when he says the survivors forgave their attacker. What does that mean?

8:52 A desperate plea for voters to show up in November. Down-ballot fearfulness.

8:55 The audience sure sounds upset as Cruz wraps up a speech about some little girl. Cruz is about 4 steps above most of the other speakers, but his voice makes me cringe, and his willingness to lie makes it hard to take him – a Senator – seriously. And, according to Andrew Sullivan, who must be watching (I’m only listening):

Now, open war is breaking out, as the crowd is beginning to shout Cruz down. Watching Cruz get booed at this event is quite something. He’s being heckled and jeered – as Trump appears at the side of the stage as if to distract attention. Cruz leaves to a massive wall of hostile noise.

Well, well, well. Or is that part of Cruz’s master plan? He was definitely the most intellectually impressive of the 17 GOP candidates this season. I could see him making this part of his long game. Although upon reading earlier today that he’s already planning for 2020, it occurred to me that he might not be far enough right for the 2020 GOP – if it even exists.

9:30 I return to hear Newt is employing the shameful but traditional tactics of fear-mongering. He throws his net wide, leaning on some alleged historical expertise.

Too busy tonight for the rest, and tomorrow will be busy again. Apparently the folks in the donor suite are enraged at Cruz:

From @DanaBashCNN: Some people on donor suite level so angry at @tedcruz they called him disgrace to his face; one man had to be restrained…

— Dylan Byers (@DylanByers) July 21, 2016

Via Andrew, again.

Much like the GOP, the Iranian hardliners cannot believe they are not in power, as Ali Omidi makes clear in this AL Monitor article:

As the faction most opposed to the government, Iran’s hard-liners have made it their goal to make Hassan Rouhani the first Iranian president not to be re-elected for a second term. In fact, this objective was sought since their loss of the executive branch back in 2013. They simply cannot fathom being barred from the presidency for another five years until the 2021 presidential election. Thus, they’re determined to seize back control of the executive branch as soon as possible. …

At present, there are five key economic and political variables that can play an important role in determining whether Rouhani will get a second term.

First is the scapegoating of former President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad for all current economic problems. Rouhani and his Cabinet look to the previous administration as the cause of the current economic dire straits. This is a line of reasoning that, even if valid, does not satisfy average — and particularly vulnerable — Iranians. In the Rouhani administration’s telling, even the most popular policies of the previous administration were wrong and problematic. Indeed, Minister of Roads and Urban Development Abbas Akhoundi has called the Mehr Housing Project a “disaster.”

Comments such as these are seen by the lower classes as a sign that the government does not represent them. These citizens question what Rouhani has done for them, since many of them were able to own homes and were also given a monthly income in the form of cash subsidies as a result of Ahmadinejad’s populist programs. Though the cash payments were disastrous for the economy, Rouhani has been unable to convince the poor that these kinds of policies are problematic.

The other four reasons have to do with the age and conduct of Rouhani’s Cabinet, the recession, the blocking of banking operations, and the conduct of certain domestic institutions over which he has no control, yet receives the blame. He clearly sees challenges for Rouhani. J. Matthew McInnis at AEI agrees there are headwinds, but Rouhani also has made some progress:

The new parliament may also help. There was never much hope for a moderate or reformist legislature after most of the moderate or reformist candidates were disqualified from running in the first place. But Rouhani, along with former president and ally Rafsanjani, was able to successfully target and oust many of his most difficult opponents in the February elections. With conservative Ali Larijani re-elected as speaker — with whom Rouhani has a strong working relationship — and even some reformists in deputy speaker roles, it will be a somewhat more manageable body. The key will be watching how the hardliners behave during this session. If they are able organize themselves into a coherent opposition (which has eluded them for years), that could spell trouble for Rouhani’s legislative agenda and the potential for a viable rival to emerge for the presidency.

Foreign Policy’s Special Correspondent thinks Rouhani has a good shot:

There is good reason, however, to think that Rouhani will be more adept at countering his rivals than Khatami ever was. Unlike the former reformist president, the incumbent has held some of the most senior security posts in the Islamic Republic. His recent election victory, on the heels of the nuclear deal, helps him prove that he is not a one-trick pony, but a canny operator whose deeper links within the elite can yield results. It won’t be easy to change how the Islamic Republic operates, but Rouhani is better positioned than any of his predecessors to give it a shot.

Some plump succulents for your delectation.

… I was fortunately busy with other matters and only caught part of the very end of RNC-2, where Dr. Carson seemed to think referencing “In God We Trust” on our currency has some sort of relevance to our successes – and failures – as a nation. I’m also curious why such a brilliant surgeon finds it so urgent to credit God with the successes of Man. Are the most reverent the most successful? There’s little correlation; and it’s disrespectful to those who’ve worked so hard to achieve so much. He’s basically telling them that all the time, effort, and discipline is irrelevant, since God really does it all. For those who can think clearly, and yet accept such an assertion, it must be quite the blow to one’s faith in the virtues of working hard.

And reading Andrew Sullivan’s second night of live-blogging, I must admit to feeling pity for him. He’s clearly feeling a lot of pain at watching the GOP melting into irrelevance. Read it backwards:

9:31 p.m. In the last few seconds, Paul Ryan got his mojo back in a call for unity. But the speech was painfully devoid of any praise for the nominee, and framed around supporting a “conservative governing majority,” rather than a president. Again, it’s pretty amazing for the speaker of the House not to mention in more than a cursory way the actual nominee of his own party. Beyond Awkward. I bet you Trump is pissed.

9:27 p.m. Ryan is dying up there. A reader writes:

Paul Ryan’s speech would be very good in 1988 or thereabouts. Today, it’s just pathetic and utterly detached from the Trumpers who don’t know whether to clap or not.

He’s now all but apologizing for speaking: “Last. Last point …” Jesus this is depressing.

9:26 p.m. A speaker actually mentioned “liberties”. Ryan is just offering some somewhat lame anti-progressive clichés. The crowd is talking among themselves.

9:20 p.m. Ryan is trying to make a change election argument. So far, awkward. No mention of any policies proposed by Trump.

9:19 p.m. Ryan invokes Lincoln. Graves spin.

While it may be enjoyable in a creepy sort of way, I’m dismayed that the best analogy for the RNC is to Elvira, Mistress of the Dark, who made her name through, let us say, excess cleavage. Given the lies and appeals to the “fever swamps right” emotions, its really base nature and disdain for facts and truth, it’s really how it all seems to be. A vast orgasmic week for the resentful.

A number of GOP officials have avoided this year’s RNC, supposedly because of concerns about violence, although the idea of riots seems to have faded. I think that was just an excuse, and that most of them were so embarrassed at the thought of associating with Trump that they just decided to find a reason not to be present. It’ll be interesting to see how that plays out now that he’s the official nominee. Will they support him? Subtly chip away at him while trying to retain their elective seats? The drama continues.

On Lawfare, John Bellinger notes the ratification of two more treaties (extradition treaties with Chile and the Dominican Republic), and notes this sets a record for a new low:

This brings to six the number of treaties approved by the Senate in the Obama Administration’s second term. (In 2014, the Senate approved four fisheries treaties.)  The Senate approved nine treaties in the Obama Administration’s first term, bringing to 15 the number of treaties approved by the Senate during the Obama Administration.  This is the fewest number of treaties approved by the Senate in a four-year period or eight-year period at least since World War II (and probably much longer — some intrepid law student will need to check).

In contrast, the Senate approved 163 treaties during the eight years of the Bush administration, including a record 90 treaties during the last two years of the Administration. Ironically, under a President who most Europeans and many international law professors are convinced did not believe in international law, the United States may have become party to more new treaty law than during any other eight-year period in U.S. history.

Perhaps I’m naive, but counting the number of ratified treaties and declaring this to be akin to a crisis because not enough law is being passed seems wildly inappropriate.

First, treaties come in wildly differing sizes. One treaty may cover an enormous subject, another a very slender subject. Would we equate an extradition treaty with,say, a treaty divvying up the Antarctica resources?

Second, as a metric it fails to account for the potential slothfulness of the Administration.

Third, it also fails to account for the potential spitefulness of the Senate. Or, to be polite, honest differences of opinion, as some would insist.

Fourth, it also fails to account for the need for new laws. I certainly have no idea how much need there is for more international law, although the Internet and software in general no doubt remain fertile areas.

To some extent, I have my doubts as to the worthiness of whipping out a tape measure how much law we currently have and need. However, since there is some worth in actually pointing fingers, probably the best measure is how many treaties are stuck in the pipeline, and even better, for how long? While companies often love backlogs as they show how popular their products have become, for the government sector it’s indicative of inefficiencies and even dangers. Numbers measuring these treaties, perhaps with risks attached or even modifying the numbers, might be far more useful than simply counting pieces of signed papers.