Had a good chuckle out of this. Geraldo Rivera family struggles.

https://pagesix.com/wp-content/uploa...trip=all&w=650

It is pretty clear that the PredictIt markets are manipulated by partisans who want the site to tell a certain story. I would suspect that each party has a hand in it. What's a better use of $500,000: a few more ads in Florida, or moving the markets to try and generate some "According to prediction markets, Biden is surging after the debates" free media?

Knowing that that markets are being manipulated, it has been funny to watch NC and Fla. moving opposite each other. NC is just barely red. And FL is just barely blue. And neither of them will "flip," and they tend to actually mirror each other. If, say, Florida goes from 51% Biden to 54% Biden, then you are likely to see NC go from 52% Trump to 54% Trump at the same time.

I think that in a pure market, you would see them shifting in the same direction, and the magical 50% barrier would not matter. But, in this market, I think that you have people on each side making sure that their state does not flip over to the other team.

There's a dissertation in there somewhere if PredictIt would ever let someone see the actual numbers of who is buying and selling.

Didn't watch the town hall so can't really tell how well he performed.

But reading what he said ... looks like Fauci will be back on TV if Biden wins.

My wife and watched it and he was very coherent and gave long detailed answers that had him giving various details. I did not catch any gaffes. I thought he did well.

He knows things and prepared for the event, so naturally some on the right are arguing that he had the questions in advance. They forget that their candidates used to work hard, too.

This will be the argument if Trump underwhelms in the debates.

McConnell is telling the Dems what to do if they manage to get the House, Senate, and Presidency:

MCCONNELL: "After they change the filibuster, they're going to admit the District as a state. They're going to admit Puerto Rico as a state. That's four new Democratic senators in perpetuity. Once they get a hammerlock on the Senate, they're going to then pack the Supreme Court."

— Ryan Struyk (@ryanstruyk) September 18, 2020

And the Dems are so dysfunctional and afraid of actually using the power that the voters give them that they won't do anything like this.

I can see them admit the District as a state, tbh. Probably not the rest though.

Also, "Four new Democratic senators in perpetuity" is telling.

The Dems still have Senators in West Virginia, Montana, Alabama, etc. They moderate themselves to reach out to white, rural, southern, conservative, etc. states and voters. They are a national party.

In contrast, McConnell isn't even pretending that the GOP will or can change to be responsive to non-white voters. Just a complete "if the voters are black or Hispanic, we won't even try."

As telling as it is sad.

The district should be a state. The arguments against are just not legitimate.

The filibuster is already dead. Not even waiting this time.

I doubt eh Dems will eliminate the filibuster even if they had 59 members in the Senate. Feinstein is already hinting that she might bring back the blue slip rule.

Dem leadership sees power the same way that Trump sees exercise. They don't want to use it in case they then run out.

Yeah, I was listening to Fox News this morning to see what they said. They had some talking head on who was all indignant that the questions Trump got and the ones Biden got were so obviously skewed. They played a montage of both and the questions Trump got were all legitimate and relevant to what is happening in our world right now. Sorry that you have to be held accountable Donny Boy.

It's amazing that these people believe the Dems have the media, entertainment, education, social media, and now the military as part of the deep state yet believe they have a huge majority and the only way Dems win is by rigging elections.

Everything is rigged against Donny and he's just out there trying to keep liberals from raping and eating children. I mean, the tie he wears tells us everything and every now and then he acknowledges them by saying the number 17.

Admittedly, it does a great job of playing into the white Christian persecution complex. They're underdogs in a spiritual and cultural war.

If Trump was a normal prepared politician he actually could have answered them. They were 'tough' questions because he does no prep.

The debates will be fascinating.

Team Trump has, for some reason, lowered expectations for Biden through the floor. It's a bizarre strategy. Especially considering that Trump benefited from the Dems doing the same thing 4 years ago. They made Trump out to be such a monster that when he managed to stand on stage with Hillary for 90 minutes and not call her the C-word, people thought "OK, he's more Presidential than I thought."

So why Trump and his people think that "Let's tell everyone that Biden is senile, so when people see him give the same average debate performance that he's given all year in the primary, they will actually consider it a big win" is a good idea makes no sense to me.

I am constantly impressed by the success of the people pushing the complex. I am a White, Christian, straight, English-speaking, non-disabled male American with a stable job.

And I can tell you that from where I sit, it seems like White, Christian, straight, English-speaking, non-disabled male Americans with stable jobs have it better than any other group of people in the history of humanity.

I just can't do the mental gymnastics required to somehow see myself as persecuted or disadvantaged based on those traits.

There are things in my life that are good. And there are things in my life that are bad. But the bad things have nothing to do with the categories listed above. Those are either neutral or relatively large advantages.

This is an interesting take. I had never really thought of this but could be something to consider. It seems as reasonably likely as the silent Trump voters which don't appear to be all that shy these days.
https://www.yahoo.com/news/whose-vot...090014890.html

Yeah I mentioned a few pages ago about how Republicans are usually so good at this kind of thing. The problem is Trump is so arrogant that he can't play any sort of game that makes him look weak or builds up his opponent.

Well Asian-Americans do make more money than their white counterparts. But they are discriminated against when applying to Harvard.

The article reads like someone trying to talk themselves into something.

In aggregate they do. Some interesting stats from 2012 Pew survey.

The Rise of Asian Americans | Pew Research Center
Great that so many asian immigrants + children have achieved "success" (e.g. American dream). Need to continue the brain drain.


You're right but IMO this is okay. There are only so many ivy league schools and asian americans far exceed their proportion. Although not truly a zero sum game (but for all practical purposes, it is), the disproportion will result in other minorities losing out.

There's the argument about meritocracy, you get the highest grades, score the best in standardized tests, interview well etc. but we know there are legacy admissions (and influence from "contributions"). So yeah, lower or change the established selection standards, get more other minorities in there. It's for the better good.

A look at the data and arguments about Asian-Americans and admissions at elite colleges

100% disagree. Treating people unfairly is treating people unfairly, no matter who it is. If we can improve the situation vis a vis the influence of money let's do so, but it doesn't at all justify this approach.

Who in the world thinks college is only about the best grades or test scores? Why do colleges tout the college experience? Why do they play up the networking (which is why plenty of non-legacy folk aren't too upset about legacies... to a point). Why do folks talk about the benefit of having different perspectives (and it's not solely about race - it's also about geography and income diversity)?

The whole college is only about grades and tests has never exists and the vast majority of people wouldn't want it.

I'm glad some folks care that my people are being discriminated so much, but I can't imagine the uproar if 40% of the incoming class of Harvard becomes Asians (domestic and foreign) due to strict testing.

I went to Rutgers, one of the most diverse colleges in the country, and I learned a TON about different cultures which has provided me with a much better education than some of the classes I had to take (my science requirements for one, lol).

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I guess it depends on how one defines treating people "unfairly".

As I mentioned before, it's not a pure zero-sum game but for all practical purposes, it is due to very limited ivy slots. Someone wins, someone else loses. For someone it's fair, for someone else it's not. The ivy system right now advantages legacies, generous donors, and because ...

... smart american-asian kids have advantageous that other minorities have less of due to various reasons (see Pew poll I quoted) and it's not going to change anytime soon. So the way I see it, we need to change the acceptance criteria/process to give a temporary leg up.

5% of population, 22% of Harvard's freshman class. I'm not saying reduce it down to 5% but how about something like 10-15%.

Interestingly, international students are approx 23% of Harvard (GA Tech is also about 23%). Diversity from international students is definitely important but I'm all for reducing those high % to benefit more US minority enrollment.

Early voting starts on 10/12 8am-5pm in GA. Daughter wants to go vote in person so planning on going with her on a Sat, preferably at 8am.

Easy enough to go online and check if I'm registered to vote and to request an absentee ballot if I so desired.

I would argue that discriminating against someone because of their race is unfair.


What's wrong with 22%? Why should it be reduced at all?

Toss in gender, sexual orientation, national origin, race, age etc.

I agree it's unfair. The Ivy pie can't grow to accommodate all that want it and is, for all practical purposes, a zero-sum game/pie. One way or another, you take away from Peter (asian american) to pay Paul (blacks, hispanics, native americans etc.) or vice versa.

Is it fair that asian americans have "advantages" that gives them more opportunities & resources to excel in Ivy admissions? I'm guessing you think its fair but I'd think many blacks and hispanics will say it's not fair. The admissions criteria is never going to be "fair" for everyone. But that is the real world we live in right now and the process won't change much or as quickly without some sort of intervention.

The reason why we should intervene somehow is because there is a point where it becomes for the greater good. If one believes this (which you probably do not, but that's okay) when is that point?

So question for you. Is there ever a point where you think some sort of intervention should occur? Taking your stance in the purest form which I think is take no action, continue admissions based on merit + a little bit of legacy/contributions influence, it's likely asian americans would exceed the 22%. Would you take action if asian americans enrollment get to 30% or 40% or 50% of enrollment.

No easy answer for sure.

BTW - don't worry about being called a racist because the ADL definition is only when it "privileges white people". Since we are talking about privileging (or not) the yellow people, you are free and clear :)

My perspective is that two wrongs don't make a right. You don't fix one injustice by perpetrating another. If admissions are overly based on contributions/legacy/etc., the answer is to fix that problem. If education is too different for the poor than it is for the rich (it is), the answer is to mitigate that problem as much as possible. Due to the influence of parenting, you'll never get rid of it completely, but let's go as far as we can.

The answer is not to give more access to highly sought after and limited-availability training/education/whatever to those who are less qualified - by whatever best determination of qualification we can find. I.e., it doesn't have to be grades and test scores, but it shouldn't be 'these people haven't had a fair shake, so let's give more of it to them and less of it those who are more prepared/qualified'.

So apparently a doctor on Fox News is trying to say Biden is on speed and Adderall. I guess because Biden's town halls were so good. This is the ridiculously obvious issue with the Sleepy Biden has dementia attacks - when he shows he obviously doesn't, you have to invent other ludicrous lines of attacks.

Admittedly, you said it better than I did. The only think I would quibble is how long will it take. I would rather this happen sooner vs over a drawn out period, and that would require some sort of "intervention".


Not the focus of our asian american discussion but an interesting data point for some additional context. I think the athletic admissions comment below is red herring but legacy admissions and "donations" isn't.

https://nymag.com/intelligencer/2019...&utm_source=tw

Is there ever a point where I think intervention should occur? As long as admissions are based on merit then no. It's not a hard question. What do you have against the student population being half asian?

Why would I be worried about being called racist? I'm not the one arguing for discriminating based on skin color.

"Merit" is based on criteria such as ACT, SAT, extra curricular activities etc. Not all, but many of these merit based criteria can be influenced by $ which many minorities do not have as much.

We were in a position to get ACT tutoring for my kids. Their ACT scores went up 3-4 points which is pretty significant, opening up more college options. A rich family can afford to help kid develop their musical abilities (and other talents) etc.

The problem I have with student population being over half-asian is because it's a zero-sum game/pie and that means other minorities (and their families) who weren't able to "enhance" their "merit" lose out.

So I'm all for changing, modifying "merit" criteria. However, the current merit criteria seems to overly advantage asian americans.

Why should we add another "state" that only has 700,000 people? Why not just fold them into Maryland since like 1/3 of Maryland's population is already DC suburbs?

If we do that then we have to fold Wyoming into another state since their population is less.

Combining Wyoming and Montana would probably be a decent idea. And then add DC as a state to keep it at 50 if that's important ;).

In your opinion.

In my opinion, it's a city. At 68 square miles, it's a fairly small city. If it was supposed to be a state, it would have been one of the Fourteen Colonies.

Of course in my opinion. What does this even mean?


And this argument continues to astound me every time it is made. There's a long list of things that were meant to be a certain way in 1789 that I'm sure as fuck aren't that way today.

Using PredictIt as sole source of information is kind of like using one news outlet like Fox News or MSNBC. For political betting markets, a better snapshot in time is a composite of multiple betting markets, such as this:

Betting Odds - 2020 U.S. President

https://twitter.com/davidfrum/status...058496/photo/1

Another idea: Merge Montana, Wyoming and the Dakotas into the new state of "South Saskatchewan". The new "super state" would still have a population less then Massachusetts.

2nd tweet:)

(Correction: "South Saskatchewan would have a population approximately equal to Connecticut. Throw in *IDAHO* too, and you catch up to MA

I could maybe buy an argument that it should become part of another state, although its current population is more than Wyoming and the new census is likely to make it bigger than Vermont as well, with Alaska and the Dakota not much higher.

The fact remains that the residents of D.C. pay income tax and do not have representation that has a say on those taxes. There are no legitimate arguments to sustain that setup. I don't care if that's how it was in 1789, 1889, 1989, or how it will be in 2089.

What would pass the eye test as a state today? An adequate number of waterfalls? Tumbleweeds? Brothels?

Or perhaps that there are enough Americans, living within the continental US land mass, who are currently being denied full franchise... perhaps that's enough of a test?

Or is it people? Please don't sit in, say, Nevada, and tell us there have to be a certain number of people. Look it up, Nevada got the ultimate "bet on the come" deal there. DC has more people than some current states, it's rather simple.

I recognize that this doesn't necessarily differentiate between "make the district its own new state" and "jam it back up Maryland's ass" but at least recognizing these Americans deserve the same rights as the people in your *state ... at least that seems fair.

And if it's really just about "oh noes which party will win in the voting?" then fine, at least let's come clean and say that's what we care about.

South Saskatchewan would be the greatest state name.

Conservative views can win a majority of votes nationally. The problem is that white nationalism probably can't, and enough of the GOP is wedded to white nationalism that they can't imagine competing on different ground.

Only if the capital is renamed Moose Waffle or something similar.

The argument here seems to be trending that DC (which was specifically carved out as a donut hole from the existing states of Maryland and Virginia to serve as the seat of the Federal government) should be granted statehood like the subsequent states that were added as additional land was acquired via treaty, purchase or conquest.

I disagree, but I have no issue with giving citizens due representation by taking the residential boundaries of DC and annexing them into Maryland or Virginia, while leaving the land occupied by the Federal office buildings as the seat of the Federal government.

What you are listing as "merit" is only a fraction of the process when admission officers of elite schools evaluate who is accepted. There isn't a "line" of accomplishments that everyone above gets in and everyone below isn't. Elite schools goal in admissions is to include a diverse body of students, not just a cookie cutter "fit into this mold." No one gets in that is not "qualified", but many that may be "qualified" do not get in. Liberal Arts colleges believe in a holistic approach in acceptance, which means personality and drive will mean as much or more than a SAT score. As matter of fact, most schools are no longer going to take SAT/ACT scores in to account starting next year.

I think the fact they weigh too highly things like "legacies" and fund-raising is a real problem. Making sure their student body is diverse is not.

Screw that, name Fargo the capital and name Marge Gunderson the mythical hero of the state.

Oh wait... Sioux City, South Saskatchewan is a fantastic tongue twisting capital

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GWB was a shit student, but also became the President. Grades aren't a perfect predictor of outcomes.