Dan Erwin

#MeToo, After One Year

The latest issue of The Economist  (9/29/2018) devotes its lead article to the #MeToo movement. A positive and constructive editorial, the authors drop fascinating tidbits of sociological and historical insight along the way. They argue that women's testimony is being taken more seriously--at last.

But they point out a clear possibility: if #MeToo becomes a Democrats only movement, it will be set back. The polling reveals its partisanship: 39% of Republican women think it's a problem  that men get away with. That compares to 66% of Democratic women. The inevitable consequence of these figures, they argue, is that some men will excuse their behavior on the grounds that it's all a Democratic ploy.

The closing paragraph offers the best insight: 

A Heckler's Warning

Balancing free speech with students’ objections to speakers with unpopular views has become a messy task in recent years. With students, the rights of free speech can come into conflict with the need to feel safe and welcome. Although the problem has recently surfaced all across the country, the most public episode was the shouting down of the conservative, Charles Murray, at Dartmouth last year.

Four months later when Murray was to appear at the University of Michigan, the experience was very different than that at Dartmouth. The problem has a long history. My college grappled with the issue back in the 1950s. But with the polarization in our country, the issue has become more front and center.

Part of the problem is that students often come to college having never interacted with someone with a different viewpoint or different lifestyle. Today’s homogeneous residential neighborhoods limit the opportunities for diverse interactions. There are also virtual reality silos where similar views can be curated so that one’s perspectives are always affirmed and never challenged.

Of course, there’s also a bit of imitation going on. The student brain thinks that they did it at Dartmouth so we can do it here in Podunk Center.

The best way to deal with the issue is...

Failing Your Way to Success

Walter Russell Mead, an astute historian and commentator on American history and current events, recently wrote an article on our American history of failing our way to success. His first paragraph is a fun mind game.

As Americans struggle to make sense of a series of uncomfortable economic changes and disturbing political developments, a worrying picture emerges of ineffective politicians, frequent scandals, racial backsliding, polarized and irresponsible news media, populists spouting quack economic remedies, growing suspicion of elites and experts, frightening outbreaks of violence, major job losses, high-profile terrorist attacks, anti-immigrant agitations, declining social mobility, etc. etc. etc.

Sound familiar? Really? Actually, it’s a description of the American Democracy in the years between 1865 and 1900.

Mead then reverts to our world. He’s aware that it will a very long time before it becomes clear what a fully mature information economy might look like. He points out that if people and the 1860s and 1870s had been told that only two percent of the population would earn a living on the farm in the twentieth century, they could never imagine what jobs the displaced farmers could find. The full consequences of the knowledge economy and the information age will only come into view on a very slow time table. The implication, however, is that getting caught in the grip of profound pessimism and giving up on government, business and the nation is highly unrealistic.

But he draws some interesting conclusions about...

Do You Remember My Lai?

Since my typical readers are under age 35, I assume the answer to the question is negative unless you happen to be a Vietnam buff. Are there such people under the age of 35? Seymour Hersh published the story of the My Lai massacre in Harper’s, 1970. At least 109 civilians were killed by an American soldier, Bill Calley. That number may be smaller than the actual number killed. And a lot more soldiers were probably involved.

So why am I bringing this up now? 

Deciding Whether to Buy a Book. . . .

Or, why I bought Yascha Mounk’s The People vs Democracy.

If you have only so much time to read and you’re watching your pennies, how do you decide whether to buy a new book outside your area of expertise? One way to go at that is to check out who’s reviewing the book. You may not know all the reviewers, but you can probably flag bias pretty quickly if you read a few of the online reviews. Next you have to ask yourself what you think about the bias. And then, decide. I bought Mounk’s book on the above basis!

Mounk’s recent book The People vs. Democracy has been reviewed or commented about positively in the Wall Street Journal, the New York Times, The Economist, Washington Post, The Atlantic and the New Yorker. That says “buy me.” I had read his earlier book with much admiration, and this was another fascinating study to buy and digest.

Mounk points out that democracy—not just in the US—is going through its worst crisis since..

What the Kids Are Finding Out About Guns

As a result, partially because of years of horrible shootings in our country, much research has been completed on who governs. Who actually governs? Although there are hundreds of studies on this subject, the latest work is by Princeton and Northwestern scholars, political scientists and long-term experts on the issues. They work from a huge body of evidence—some quantitative (the statistics), some historical (to make sense out of the statistics), and some actually observational. 

The authors of the study reveal that there are “four families” of research: elected politicians, the economic elites (Wall Street and major Hedge Fund directors), interest groups (tending to be millions of ordinary people with differing interests and personal drivers), and biased interest groups with differing targets.

What makes this study highly useful is the existence of a unique data set, compiled over many years, by one of the authors: Martin Gilens. The study is especially interesting to me because it is not focused on gun research, but on a related issue: who controls public policy? 

Well, take a guess. Is it average citizens, business interest group, mass-based interest groups (like AARP) or economic elites (Koch brothers)? First of all, average citizens and their elected politicians have zero impact upon policy. Organized interest groups, a substitute for voters, also have nearly zero impact on policy. That means that organized populists groups who want government to respond primarily or exclusively to the preferences of their citizens have no effect on public policy. . .

Why You Need to Think and Talk on Two Tracks (Part Two)

In complex business conversations, metacomm can profoundly impact conversations and make them far more constructive and efficient—even timesaving. To a significant degree, metacomm functions to facilitate conversation and is highly useful for training participants in sequencing 101. In our studies and experience with metacomm, we have found a number of these forms especially useful.

Monitoring processes. Conversations that stick to your planned objectives to focus on problem solving, innovation or developing cross-disciplinary agreements, readily become mere discussions rather than action-oriented. However, the use of metacomm can serve to 

Peggy Noonan on "Democracy Is Not Your Plaything

Once in a while I read a summary that is so pointed and thorough that it needs neither explaining nor comment. Noonan is former speech-writer for President Reagan and long-time, Pulitzer winning writer for the Wall Street Journal. (This explanation was probably needed.)

Here’s an idea.

It would be good if top Hill Republicans went en masse to the president and said: “Stop it. Clean up your act. Shut your mouth. Do your job. Stop tweeting. Stop seething. Stop wasting time. You lost the thread and don’t even know what you were elected to do anymore. Get a grip. Grow up and look at the terrain, see it for what it is. We have limited time. Every day you undercut yourself, you undercut us. More important, you keep from happening the good policy things we could have done together. If you don’t grow up fast, you’ll wind up abandoned and alone. Act like a president or leave the presidency.”

Could it help? For a minute. But it would be constructive—not just carping, leaking, posing, cheering and tweeting but actually trying to lead.

The president needs to be told: Democracy is not your plaything.

A New Definition of Political Insanity

I've read Vanity Fair, complements of my eldest daughter, for years. When I pick it up at the apartment PO box, I usually turn the cover against my body, fearful that someone might see I'm reading a girly magazine. But she continues to send it, and I continue to skim it, looking for the three or four brilliant ideas that make it worth the 15 minutes it takes for my quick-eyed research. Besides, Michael Lewis writes five or six fascinating, vibrant commentaries per year, making it well worth my time. Historically, some of the great writers used to pen articles, including Christopher Hitchens, Martin Amis and E.E. Cummings. Great stuff!
How do you assess political insanity?
The latest issue of Vanity Fair had the most intriguing and hilarious notion of political insanity, quoted by the publisher, Graydon Carter, I've ever seen. And I've got at least two semesters of abnormal psychology behind me, as well as consulting and pastoral interactions with some psychopaths, sociopaths, narcissists and paranoids. But first, a bit about the context...

A Better Understanding of the Trump Presidency

Inevitably, as we face the losses of Republicans and Democrats to Trump, we're trying to make sense of the situation. Making sense of Trump is relatively easy: very little in the toolkit which makes for a great deal of unpredictability. This presidency is unique in that it's the only successful response of American populism. Historically, populists have failed to elect a president.

For years, however, both Republicans and Democrats have failed or were unable to understand how to deal with the social and political discontent of many Americans. In spite of years of denial, it's...