Change, Resistance, and Complacency

Writing science fiction, one area I end up studying and contemplating is change. I was happy to come across this Harvard Business Review (Walter Frick) interview with Tyler Cowen. Cowen’s newest book, ‘The Complacent Class’, addresses how America has become complacent and averse to change in recent years.

I’ve watched this develop. NIMBY – Not In My Back Yard – was the rallying chorus to battle many new construction suggestions. Property values and appearances take precedence over more pragmatic uses of land, usually in the name of property values, especially when one small set who don’t live in the area will benefit to the detriment of those living in the area and fighting the action.

Yet, we can see the concrete results in places like Oroville Dam. Oroville Dam was headline news during some of February as record rains struck parts of California. The dam’s spillway was opened but damage caused it to be closed. With water rising behind the dam, the emergency spillway was employed but the visibly fast erosion taking place concerned many. Fears that the dam was going to collapse caused mass evacuation. Many area residents were pissed because the water behind that dam in their back yard benefited others living hundreds of miles away.

Almost as an extension of NIMBY, Homeowners Associations (HOAs), have developed to protect individual neighborhoods and developments here in southern Oregon. A large part of that is the agreement to establish a new development is centered around having an open green space, or mini-park, as part of the development. That park, and the attendant common areas, need a management focus. Hence, the HOA is used. To protect property values, the HOA restricts changes and uses. Home owners are limited to what they can plant; fruit and vegetable gardens are generally off-limits, frustrating people who want to grow their own produce. Some common interest developments address this by creating a community garden.

So, from the economic and social ramification of residing in America in the early twenty-first century, to watching and thinking about politics, to imagining our future, Cowen’s book entices me.

______________________________________________________________

HBR: And all this is happening during a time when we see a lot of change in technology, particularly in IT and machine learning, and, potentially, artificial intelligence. How does that progress fit with your thesis?

Well, there is a lot of change, but it’s concentrated in some areas. Look at a classic 20th-century notion of progress: how quickly you can move through physical space. That hasn’t gotten faster for a long time. Planes are not faster. With cars, there’s more traffic. It’s actually harder to get around, and that makes the physical world less dynamic. It’s harder to build things in the United States.

The thing that’s much easier to do is sit at home and have all of life come to you. You speak to your Alexa or your Echo, and you have things be ordered. You use the internet. You watch on Netflix. It’s made us all much more homebodies, feeling we don’t need to change things, more comfortable in our consumption patterns. And obviously that has big private gains, or people wouldn’t be doing it. But there’s nonetheless a collective effect that I think is worrying when our physical and geographic spaces become less dynamic, less mobile, less intermixed. And that’s the America we’re seeing today.

Read the entire short, engaging interview at HBR.

 

Dance, Dance, Dance

Succinct dreams remembered.

I was in the military once again, USAF, wearing my light blue shirt with its salad, dark blue pants, working in the command post. I’m in my mid-thirties.

I’ve acquired an additional duty. Every day at noon, someone comes in and relieves me so I can teach others to dance. I teach two to three people at a time.  don’t know them. They learn their steps and moves quickly. Once they learn, they disappear and others replace them. It’s important to the dream me that the students get in and out quickly, because I’m teaching them to dance to reduce tension and conflict.

The dream logic puzzles the dream me, who points out that I can’t dance in real life. Oddly, I’m not actually dancing in the dream, either; I just offered music and told them to dance. They would dance, laugh, and disappear. I was pleased with the assignment.

The song in the dream was Justin Timberlake’s ‘Can’t Stop the Feeling, from ‘Trolls’. 

The second dream was as succinct. Living on some land I’d fixed up, I was now feeding the cats. I measured out food into bowls and then go find the cats and give them the food.

Then I awoke and fed the cats.

 

The Last Four Movies

We’ve seen four movies in five days to cap off our annual Oscar whirl. I already posted about the terrific animated film, ‘Kubo and the Two Strings’. Following it was an absurdist black comedy, ‘The Lobster’. 

Colin Ferrell, Rachel Weitz and Jenna Coleman star. These are all actors I enjoy. Their portrayals in this were all low energy, as if people were straining to comprehend what was happening. Emotional responses were muted, like too much emotion had already been expended in their lives.

We follow Colin Ferrell’s character from his arrival at the hotel and orientation. One hand is cuffed so he could appreciate, “Two is better.” The premise, that if you don’t have a mate, you will be turned into an animal, and that this is now the accepted social norm, is never explained. Nor is the hotel’s limitations on clothing so that everyone is dressed in the same manner, or having the women hunt in dresses. It’s absurd, right? None of the concepts underlying the plot are explained. You just go along with it. Strange, but engaging.

Behind ‘The Lobster’ came something one hundred and eight degrees different: an animated film about animals as people, ‘Zootopia’. The movie takes it name from the animal nation’s major urban area, Zootopia. Central to the is Judy Hopper’s dream of being a police officer, and her life as the first bunny copper in Zootopia. A crime spree has sprung up in which animals are disappearing. It’s a good movie for young people to watch. One of the baristas, a twenty year old, has watched it four times while baby-sitting children. Her take is that its message is not to stereotype people, which is demonstrated by individual’s roles as wolves, foxes, weasels, sheep and bunnies. It is more, she acknowledged. The movie takes on bullying, determination and persistence, and pursuing your goals despite obstacles. All of this is done through a clever, humorous lens that’s more slanted toward adults, such as the lemmings, all dressed the same, leaving the Lemmings Brothers building.

My wife asked, which movie, ‘Zootopia’ or ‘Kubo and the Two Strings’ would receive my Oscar vote? I loved Kubo’s beautiful, amazing artwork, and the film’s ethereal aura. I also enjoyed and admired the plucky young main character’s good nature and determination. Yet, ‘Zootopia’ edged it out to receive my vote. Kubo is better at art; I thought ‘Zootopia’ was better at entertainment. A fun movie, ‘Zootopia’ kept my interest. I would have given the Oscar to ‘Zootopia’, but the edge was the thickness of a sheet of paper.

Last, last night, we watched the documentary, ‘13th‘.  This film meticulously states facts connecting the end of the civil war and the transition from black people being slaves as owned property to slaves as criminals. The documentary attacks the issues from multiple points of view, laying out a convincing narrative that letting slaves go wasn’t financially acceptable, and all the manners in which blacks, especially men, were portrayed in popular media and entertainment as criminals, thugs and murders.

Blacks naturally reacted. As blacks reacted, whites reacted. We follow the political arc, beginning with the Thirteenth Amendment. The Thirteenth Amendment abolished slavery and involuntary servitude, except as punishment for a crime. There was the out, the loophole. Blacks were locked up in greater and greater numbers as drug use was criminalized by the legal system. ALEC – American Legislative Exchange Council – established its agenda of feeding states the legislative measures and acts that furthered a reactionary social agenda but also helped its members realize increasing profits through state laws. From that, CCA – the Corrections Corporation of America, an ironic name if ever heard – is born, as is the monetized incarceration system that establishes prisons as profit centers. Now America has fallen from leading the world in many areas, but has managed to imprison more people than any other nation. And disproportionately imprisoned are blacks, and more specifically, black men.

It’s demonstrated in the documentary how the system is gained so that many blacks who are arrested, even when they’ve not committed a crime, are never convicted of a crime but end up spending time in jails and prisons through plea bargains, and how the fear of the maximum sentence is leveraged to encourage plea bargaining.

Senator Cory Booker points out that most race riots begin with incidents of police brutality. The hype over the threat from the Black Panthers is portrayed as the greatest danger to America. Footage Angela Davis’ gripping, powerful testimony in her trail is presented.

Politically, Lee Atwater’s notorious recordings are heard about how to manipulate voters. Willie Horton is brought up again, and how it turned the election for Bush. Bill Clinton’s role and his erroneous policies are shown, and their tangible impact, along with the insane, ‘Three Strikes Law’.

Political hype feeds fears; fears led to election victories; election victories lead to increased demonizing of blacks; increased demonizing leads to greater criminalizing, which develops into greater profits. A direct result is Donald Trump’ s election as ‘the law and order president’. His boogeyman are the brown people, refugees and immigrants. Guess which pretty little group of white dominated men is profiting from increased worries about immigrants and refugees?

Yes, ALEC.

As a final straw, prisons are being used as source for cheap labor for American companies to build their products. Meanwhile, poor, unemployed and underemployed people are distracted into believing the problems lie with immigrants, refugees and terrorists. And as each political party tries to regain office, they must outdo the previous administration’s stance as being tough on law and order. President Obama was finally one to begin to point out what was happening; Hillary changed her stance from hard on crime to intelligent on crime.

I recommend you see the film.

So here we have these movies, which teach our children to be strong and unafraid, to be honest and hopeful, along with one mocking our position on marriage as an institution, and finally one demonstrating the truth about how politicians and corporations manipulate and guide people to fear and hate, and vote and profits.

This, by the way, is why I march against Trump’s Agenda.

Today’s Theme Music

I’ve decided it’s time to upgrade. In accordance with that decision, I’ve replaced my mental jukebox with a mental iPod. Yes, I’ve gone digital.

That required me to transfer all my music from the old jukebox to the iPod. That required a lot of time. Although the mental jukebox was old, it still performed pretty well, only occasionally not playing something correctly. It was pretty full, though. Mom loves music and so does my older sis. The two were feeding me songs from the beginning. They influenced me to continue the pursuit of listening to music throughout my life.

This might have a tangible effect on these posts. I may end up repeating some songs and memories. Sorry about that. These things sometimes happen during upgrades.

The song chosen today was influenced by that realization. It also features a performer who’s had a long, impressive career. This selection strikes me as apropos for these backslide sidestep shuffle politics that seem to be permeating global legislatures. I know you’re reading with bated breath and asking, Seidel, what’s the song already?

I’ll tease you no longer.

Well, maybe one more paragraph. This song was enjoyed while I was living in Mountain View, California, commuting to work at PAS in Palo Alto for my first employment after retiring from the Air Force. I retired in November, 1995, and started working for them in December, 1995.

Here it is, then, from 1998, Shirley Bassey and the Propellerheads with ‘History Repeating’. 

 

Longings

I hate myself on days like this.

I confess, I have longings.

Some are very simple and basic. Many will claim them as impractical and idealistic, even absurd.

Like, I have longings to be young again, and to have a nice cup of coffee with a pastry or donuts without worries about its healthiness or origins, longings to walk around, preferably on a warm, pleasant beach, smiling and nodding in friendliness to other people, who simply nod and smile back in friendliness.

I have longings for success, comfort, happiness, fun, and security in all its forms.

I have longings for freedom, equality, liberty and justice.

I’ll bet those longings are shared with many others.

I bet many people on the right and left share these longings.

I bet many politicians and CEOs share these longings, along with teachers, minorities, refugees, shoppers, consumers, teenagers, the elderly, the rich and the poor.

The nut is in the details of how we get satisfy these longings.

When the United States was founded, it was another step as part of a long walk to satisfy these longings, and the founders walked on the backs of many others. We’re shocked, angry and dismayed by their declaration that all men are created equal even while they were stealing land others already lived upon, deciding women are less deserving, and so are people who were slaves, because slaves were slaves; they were property. That was a compromise. A good one? Hell, no, I hear some shout. We’re still arguing it. It was a different era, with different values, views and principles.

I have sisters and friends who wish the protests going on in the U.S. to be over because, well, the elections are over, and isn’t that what this is all about? They have longings for a happier, more relaxed life.

But the protests and elections are part of a process. Both are symptoms of desires and larger arguments about what is right and wrong, and whether freedom, liberty and equality is even possible for everyone. Aren’t we humans simply animals at the heart of the matter, and shouldn’t it be that the strongest shall rule and take what is theirs by right of strength and power, whether it’s physical or intellectual prowess, military force, or the power of our gods?

These are arguments about longings and principles, perceptions, hopes, dreams, emotions and frustrations, resentments, hostilities and dreams that go back to separations derived from where we live, what we speak, our differences and similarities, all the way back to the most basic and fundamental questions of why we’re here, how we came to be here, and what we want to become.

I hate myself on days like this because I have longings. I want to go write. I want to enjoy my comfortable routine of writing fiction, dreaming of breaking out, working toward the horizon that I’ve created for myself to keep myself going while staving off bitterness, weariness and depression.

Some will read this and remark to their screens to me through their screen, you are a self-indulgent idiot.

I can’t argue that I’m not. I know too well the limits of my talents, intelligence and abilities. I tell myself that if I try harder and persist, promising myself, “I can do better,” and that, if I do, I can overcome my shortcomings.

Which is what these longings are all about, really. You understand.

And I hate myself on days like this, because others have longings, and I think of myself as one person but part of a larger body trying to make a difference. So I set aside my personal longings to take up the longings of others, those longings that were there long before I was born as an American, and march for what we believe is right against an agenda that we believe is wrong.

History will not judge us. History is written by the winners. It’ll be the winners who judge us. If we lose, we’ll probably be forgotten. Hell, if we win, we’ll probably be forgotten as well.

That’s the nature of being part of a larger longing.

America First

I was accused of seeing too much of the big picture the other day. Guilty, I answered.

The march last weekend to protest Trump’s agenda reminded me of the marches and vigils against the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. We, the protesters, were told we were unpatriotic. Saddam Hussein was a threat, a bad guy who had to be removed for the good of the world. Afghanistan needed to be punished for shielding OBL and his organization.

I was skeptical then. I saw a lot of lies and patriotic zeal being organized in support of a fraudulent crusade. Yes, I supported the troops, an expression that still fills me with anger. I’ve never envisioned yellow magnetic ribbons or lights of any color really being a supportive move for people killing and being killed far, far away. Perhaps that’s my cynical streak. I’m angry that so many of them died in false causes, and that we destroyed so many Afghani and Iraqi lives and families. Worse, I felt the pursuit of war to end violence doesn’t work, and that we ended up creating larger numbers of enemies through our military actions.

When, later on, Judith Miller’s bullshit became more fully exposed, and President Bush came out and said, “Iraq had nothing to do with 9/11,” and when weapons of mass destruction were never found, everyone said, “Gosh, how were we all so fooled?”

Number one, not all of us were fooled. Number two, you stopped thinking and remembering; that’s how you were fooled. You were fooled because you wanted to believe. Then you had buyer’s remorse.

Because I see the big picture, I don’t automatically put America First. In no general order, I put freedom, equality, human rights, and the planet and environment first. I question those who assert ‘America First’ without thinking about what it means and the greater ramifications of a policy predicated on America First. As I understand it, the United States of America was established to create a more perfect union, a place where life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness were rights we were born with, along with a bunch of other rights, such as freedom of speech and freedom of religion. In other words, the United States is not an end in itself, but another step along a greater path, and a sanctuary from those who had their rights taken from them..

Besides not putting America first, I don’t put men first, nor whites. I do see it as a weakness to imprison others in order to restore ‘your rights’ and privilege. Our weaknesses are what will keep us from improving our country and our world, and from solving our problems. If we don’t nakedly bare our problems and address them but instead blind ourselves with mindless propaganda, we will create larger problems. Especially if, under guise of America First, we begin torturing and imprisoning people; we begin building walls and establishing a larger military at the cost of arts, education and the greater public weal; if, under the guise of America First, we morally, ethically and financially bankrupt our nation; if, under the guise of America First, we destroy precious resources and kill others because they are not Americans; if, under America First, our servants in the Federal government are told they are not allowed to interact with the citizens they were hired to serve.

Some will have already quit reading, writing me off as another soft liberal; others will urge me, “If you don’t like America, why don’t you leave it?” I’ve never said I don’t like America, and indeed, the United States of America was founded upon a huge liberal experiment, the idea that we could have a government of, by and for the people. I want a better nation, a nation that is a true, principled leader for freedom, democracy and equality, not a land of killings, walls and slogans.

 

The March Yesterday

The southern Oregon’s women march was yesterday, January 21st, 2017.

I participated by being there and walking, trying to be supportive of women and others worried about their rights and freedom. Because, sorry, when I fought for freedom and equality, it included everyone. There were and are no buts, exceptions, exclusions, or doubts. Also, the Trump agenda seems to be releasing a chaos of hatred, bigotry and sexism, things that I endured in my youth, crap that we were moving past. I don’t want to move ‘back’ to anything; I want to keep moving forward as a world, taking everyone with us to a better existence for everyone. Call me idealistic or romantic, but I grew up on science fiction shows and literature in which we did find a better future. So blame popular culture for creating me.

Besides that, I worry about anyone who begins talking about ‘alternate facts’. As a writer, I call that fiction. It’s all right as fiction, but it doesn’t do anyone any good when it’s our government using ‘alternate facts’.

I was expecting about two thousand people at our Ashland march. I was off.

About eight thousand people, according to the Ashland police, participated in the march in Ashland, population about twenty grand. (Now I’m reading that the Ashland police estimated that it was fifteen thousand, and that traffic was backed up onto the Interstate with cars trying to get into town.) People came from other parts of southern Oregon and northern California to participate. I didn’t witness anything hateful, just determination about rights, equality and justice. Although the temperature nudged to just forty-eight F when the clouds parted enough for the sun, and it rained, the march had an exuberant, energetic, positive aura.

Some call it a protest, but I call it an assemblage and an exercising of civic rights, even civic duties. If we do not agree with the politics, practices and policies of our elected officials at any level, we should be determined and brave enough to voice our differences without resorting to violence or being fearful of retributions. Changes rarely begin at our highest echelons of society, government and finance. Those levels usually have the most to lose in a change of the status quo. Change typically begins with grass root movements as people raise their voices and state their concerns and insist on change.

So raise your voice, no matter where you reside on the spectrum, or who you believe to be right and wrong. Let’s debate these questions with the civility they deserve. As one citizen to another, as one human to another, I ask that you not be hateful about this, and that you don’t resort to violence and name-calling. I ask that you use facts, and not any alternatives. The United States and other democracies remain a great experiment. There will be setbacks, detours, and red herrings, but let’s keep moving it forward, and give other generations a chance to continue this great experiment.

Cheers

Today’s Theme Music

Nancy Sinatra was brought up in my memories this week. She was quite popular among the neighborhood girls when I was young and living in Wilkinsburg, PA. Hullabaloo was a big hit then. Mini-skirts and white go-go boots were in. Young girls liked to put Nancy’s song on and dance on chairs as go-go dancers.

From 1966, here is ‘These Boots Are Made for Walkin’.

Marching Saturday

Multiple, large marches are planned for Saturday, January 21st, 2017. These are women’s marches, to protect their rights against Trump’s encroachment. For some reason, they’re concerned about a man who likes grabbing them by their pussy while thinking nothing of he or anyone else doing anything like that.

I’ll be marching, too, to support women, as part of a local march in southern Oregon.

What can I say? I like women. Why, some of my best friends are women. I like them so much, I married one. I don’t want to see her, Mom, my sisters or any other woman grabbed by their pussy because some idiot thinks it’s okay. Grab him by the balls uninvited, and let us see how he reacts. Well, the first thing he’d do is react according to who’s grabbing them. If they’re not a ‘loser’ or aren’t ‘unattractive’, he’ll be all for it.

According to a recent poll, many Republican men think it’s better to be a woman than a man now, because women have more rights. Too bad we can’t have someone grab them by their pussy, or work the same hours for less pay, or get raped and told they must carry the child to term because of another’s religions, or get raped and beaten and told they were asking for it because they were drinking or how they were dressed. Bet they’d change their fucking minds in a New York minute, were they ever the victims. But their white maleness often saves them from being victims.

Now some may read this and think that I want Trump to fail. Ben Carson, the failed presidential candidate now up for HUD Secretary, is probably one of those people. Ben said last November that he wouldn’t accept a Trump cabinet position. ‘“The way I’m leaning is to work from the outside and not from the inside,” Carson said in an interview Tuesday with The Washington Post. “I want to have the freedom to work on many issues and not be pigeonholed into one particular area.”’ He said that he made that clear to Trump in several conversations. I guess it wasn’t very clear after all.

It’s amusing to me that Trump often states he ‘dislikes losers’, but someone like Ben Carson, who ran for office and failed to win, the very definition of a loser, is his buddy. Likewise, the young woman singing the national anthem for his inauguration did not finish first on ‘America’s Got Talent’, which, sadly, according to Trump, makes her a loser. That’s how it works, right?

But I don’t want Trump to ‘fail’ any more than I want the United States to ‘fail’. I want Trump’s racist, bigoted, sexist and hateful policies to fail. I want his efforts to drag our country and progress in the areas of social rights and justice back to the 1950s or earlier to fail. I want his efforts to make shitloads of money by being POTUS to fail. But I don’t want him to fail.

I want him to change. I want him to be enlightened. I want him to quit acting like a child throwing a tantrum on Twitter every time someone famous criticizes him. And yeah, views of what it means to be enlightened can be different. I’ll be willing to argue those facts, although it’s hard addressing facts with people who insist that facts don’t matter.

I don’t want Trump to fail but I’d rather that we didn’t put the oilman in charge of oil policy, especially one so in love with Russia, like Rex Tillerson. It’s odd to note that if U.S. oil production increases, oil prices will drop, unless, as it is likely, OPEC takes action to protect their income streams by reducing production. No matter; Trump and his incoming administration want to wean America off of oil imports, even though that trend has been going on for a number of years, which Rex Tillerson should know, right?

I don’t want Trump to fail but I question his understanding of modern manufacturing processes and economics. He must know, because he’s a successful businessman, a reputed billionaire. We can argue about those points, too. Trump has promised and then refused to divulge his ‘big, very beautiful’ tax returns so we don’t know if he’s actually a billionaire. We do know from public records that he’s made money by suing others, reneging on contracts and payments for work done, and declaring bankruptcies.

Trump believes he can save America by putting tariffs on anything imported into America and forcing companies to build factories in America. By this, then, America will become great again. He believes he can force Apple, for example, to build their iPhones in America instead of China. Perhaps he can (although experts think he can’t). See, that’s been addressed multiple times by multiple people but no matter; it’s new to Trump and his supporters. Trump hasn’t been leading by example in this matter by outsourcing his clothing manufacturing to other countries besides America. He says that it’s because that’s the way it is but that he didn’t want to; yet, as a billionaire, he lacked that clout and needs to be POTUS in order to have such clout?

Oddly, a Chinese woman ordered a gold-plated iPhone encrusted with diamonds and engraved with Trump’s face to give to him as a gift at the inauguration. Perhaps she’s being ironic.

Wonder if he’ll turn it down?

I’m A PLAID

Have you told you that I’m a PLAID? I may have. You may have deduced it.

PLAID:

Progressive

Libertarian

Activist

Independent

Democrat

I’m a Progressive, believing that we should be moving forward in the arenas of justice, freedom and equality, along with protecting our planet. I’m also a progressive that leans toward socialism (perhaps making me a PLAIDS) because I don’t believe that making money off everything and the free market is the answer to every problem.

You can also say I’m a Feminist, but I consider that as part of the broader arc of being a Progressive. Equal rights are equal rights, equal opportunity is equal opportunity, and equal freedom is equal freedom.

I’m dismayed that technology has become so consumer oriented. I accept it with a large dose of regret, but I understand money makes money and fuels ideas. Being principled is challenging and requires courage. I often find myself lacking the courage to live up to my beliefs, and keep kicking myself in the ass to be more cognizant of what’s going on, to live up to my principles, and not be a sheeple.

Besides being Progressive, I’m a Libertarian. Government overreach does exist. Knee-jerk reactions are often embedded into laws that become destructive in practice. Once in law, removing it from the books is problematic, and it comes back and bites us in the ass.

As an Activist. I actively voice my politics through letters, donations, demonstrations and activities. I pursue knowledge and truth. Sometimes, too many times, it seems, I don’t like what I find. Then, weary, I withdraw from my activism to recharge, re-balance and start afresh. Change is a constant; as part of that, I must change. To do that, I need to be able to identify my boundaries and horizons. Otherwise, I can’t go forward.

And I’m an Independent. The I could also be for Idealist. I believe we should have principled leaders with vision who do not live in a protective bubble of privilege but serve us and endure the same problems and situations as as. But wealth and power has its perks, and most people succumb to enjoying the perks to the point that they’re taken for granted and ultimately abused, leading to greater abuses.

I end up as a Democrat, with a sigh, because our two party system dominates the system, writing and enforcing laws, customs and loopholes to protect their power and accomodate them. I wanted a black POTUS but did not believe Barack Obama was the best person to achieve that change. I watched and listened during his primary campaign as he pivoted from being a progressive to becoming a solid centrist. I understood that was politics to win the greater vote but also speculated that it could be more. I wondered where he would govern when he won. He described himself as a Reagan Moderate in later interviews and his actions and positions agree with that description. He is less of a leader and visionary than I wanted and more of a political manager.

Likewise, I believe we’re as long overdue for a female POTUS as we were for a black POTUS, but Hillary Clinton was not the person for that role. Neither was Jill Stein. I prefer Elizabeth Warren to both. She speaks to me more than Jill or Hillary.

There I am, in a complex crucible that barely begins to capture my politics and thinking.

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