My Blog Week: October 16 to October 22

All the Latest from Torsade!

Cartoon of the Week: In the Blink of an Eye

Democracy fans have been worried this week over polls, that show dismaying trends towards the crappy people winning their races. One thing that strikes me, is that whenever the number of people surveyed seems low, and this is pointed out, polls are defended on the basis of special statistical math. Why not just poll a larger number of people? Wouldn’t the math work just as well? If the answer is “we don’t have time”, or “we don’t have the staff”, or (as everyone on Twitter suspects) “not enough people will talk to us”, wouldn’t that be a fault of the poll, and make it non-newsworthy, to say the least?

Meanwhile, undecided voters have to be a different animal today from outliers of the past. “Swing”, “undecided”, “single issue”, aren’t categories to account for the embracing of extremities. America’s GOP is against schools, the environment, the IRS, the post office, the FBI, support for Ukraine, judgeships held by qualified people, voting rights, LGBTQ rights, women’s rights, minority rights, immigrant rights…

It seems implausible that anyone could be mulling these things over, tempted to elect sane government, but finally choosing lunacy. The whole “swing voter” narrative makes no sense.

On Tuesday, Catastrophe, with details from the burial crews. Wednesday, The Mirrors, and a trip down to the river. Friday, a poem reissue from The Poor Belabored Beast, “Gravity Hold the Moon”. Saturday, a new episode of The Totem-Maker, and a forced confrontation bearing for Nur-Elom the fruits of activist sacrifice. 

Images on my posts sometimes have a link to related information (click first image), sometimes serious, sometimes whimsical, sometimes in answer to a direct reference. Since people can be leery about links, I include them here: what they are, what sites they point to.

My Blog Week: October 16 to October 22

Catastrophe (part thirty-four)

October 18

The Mirrors (part twenty-one)

October 19

Gravity Hold the Moon (poem)

October 20

The Totem-Maker: A Mother or a Father (part eight)

October 21