The electoral college is a deal in the US constitution concerning election of the president. It's been there a long time, since the original ratification of the Constitution in 1789. The founders intended the electoral college to equalize the power of large states and give small states (like New Hampshire) a stronger voice in presidential elections. There have been a few presidential elections, most recently 2016, where the winner in the electoral college received fewer popular votes than the loser in the electoral college did. Trump for example.
Since 2016 a push to dump the electoral college and go with a straight popular vote has arisen. Even Youngest Son is in favor. As a citizen of a small state, I am against the idea, because New Hampshire gets to exert a lot more influence in the federal government than it would in a straight popular vote deal. For instance the NH first-in-the-nation presidential primary is important, all candidates have to show themselves in New Hampshire and pass muster with the New Hampshire electorate, a patriotic, well informed, and fair minded bunch. In a straight popular vote setup only primary elections in big states (California, New York, Florida, etc) would count.
Anyhow the "popular vote is all" people got my address and mailed me an 8.5 by 11 inch, two inch thick, five pound trade paperback urging the "popular vote is all". Massive it is. I don't plan to read it, I am against the idea. I wonder where this outfit got my name and address. It was addressed to "The Hon. David Starr". I only got elected NH senator less than a year ago, so they must have done some research fairly recently.
Anyhow, Long Live the Electoral College.
Saturday, October 12, 2019
Friday, October 11, 2019
We need to outlaw robocalling
We could do it with a state law. Or a federal law if you thought the Congress would ever vote on anything. Many state legislatures are still interested in constituent service, unlike our noble Congresscritters.
Step 1 of such a law would be to require the telephone companies to implement a spoof proof caller ID system. Today's caller ID can be easily spoofed by robocallers and spammers. Making caller ID spoof proof would give us voters and small chance to not answer calls from numbers we never heard of. Penalty of say $10,000 to the phone companies for each spoofed caller ID incident.
Step 2 of such a law would define the felony of robocalling. Placing a cold call to anyone and giving a pitch for any product or political party, candidate, or idea is robocalling. Playing recording or speech from electronic devices to the victim is robocalling. Uttering false hoods such as claiming to be calling from the IRS, Social Security, Microsoft, or any other institution is robocalling. Persons who place the call, who speak to the victim, who maintain or service the robocalling equipment are all robocallers and subject to the penalty of law. People who support the robocaller[s] with workspace or money are guilty of robocalling.
Step 3 of such a law would spell out penalties for convicted robocallers. I would suggest five years in jail for the first offense, and ten years for repeat offenses.
There is still a good deal of work to do, namely catching robocallers, after passage of an anti-robocalling law, but we must have the law making robocalling a felony before we can expect law enforcement to do anything about it.
Step 1 of such a law would be to require the telephone companies to implement a spoof proof caller ID system. Today's caller ID can be easily spoofed by robocallers and spammers. Making caller ID spoof proof would give us voters and small chance to not answer calls from numbers we never heard of. Penalty of say $10,000 to the phone companies for each spoofed caller ID incident.
Step 2 of such a law would define the felony of robocalling. Placing a cold call to anyone and giving a pitch for any product or political party, candidate, or idea is robocalling. Playing recording or speech from electronic devices to the victim is robocalling. Uttering false hoods such as claiming to be calling from the IRS, Social Security, Microsoft, or any other institution is robocalling. Persons who place the call, who speak to the victim, who maintain or service the robocalling equipment are all robocallers and subject to the penalty of law. People who support the robocaller[s] with workspace or money are guilty of robocalling.
Step 3 of such a law would spell out penalties for convicted robocallers. I would suggest five years in jail for the first offense, and ten years for repeat offenses.
There is still a good deal of work to do, namely catching robocallers, after passage of an anti-robocalling law, but we must have the law making robocalling a felony before we can expect law enforcement to do anything about it.
Wednesday, October 9, 2019
Who is that masked whistleblower?
The democrats want to keep the identity of their Ukrainian telephone call whistle blower secret. They are talking about having him (her?) testify using an electronic voice distorter and wearing a mask.
That ought to give us all a good warm feeling that this whistle blower is telling the truth. It will look really strange on TV too.
Rots of Ruck Democrats.
That ought to give us all a good warm feeling that this whistle blower is telling the truth. It will look really strange on TV too.
Rots of Ruck Democrats.
Tuesday, October 8, 2019
Leaf Season in Franconia Notch
Finding password. How deep can Windows bury something?
I managed to knock out my internet connection the other day. I had been troubled by a wireless modem that failed to connect automatically upon power up. I dug out the documentation on the wireless and found the CD with the wireless driver on it. And a bright red label reading Stop! Insert CD first!. I didn't remember doing that when I just plugged the modem into a new-to-me Dell Optiplex 900. So I tried it, stuck in the CD, and all sorts of things happened. And my internet connection went away.
Quite a bit of fiddling and running the Windows troubleshooters and clicking on every box on all the screens that showed up finally this morning got me to a screen that showed the router's password. All the wireless routers come with a factory password burned into their PROMS. I suppose the user can change the router password, but few of us do. Anyhow, the password, smoothprairie295, was misspelled. I fixed that and bingo, Internet came back. Dunno how the misspell got into Win 10, but while trying to get internet back I went to a lotta places and typed in a lotta stuff.
Anyhow, this is what I had to do to reach the password screen. You may want to do this when you bring home a new computer or want to get a house guest's computer to work on your internet.
Right Click on the network icon on the taskbar
Click on network and connections setting
Open Network to Internet Setting
Click on Change Adaptor Setting
Right click on your network device icon
Click on Status
Click on Wireless Properties
Click on the Security Tab
Click on Show Characters.
And now we are deep enough. Took me a long time to go this deep. Should you need to know your password, and you forgot to write it down, that's what you have to do to retrieve it from Windows.
Quite a bit of fiddling and running the Windows troubleshooters and clicking on every box on all the screens that showed up finally this morning got me to a screen that showed the router's password. All the wireless routers come with a factory password burned into their PROMS. I suppose the user can change the router password, but few of us do. Anyhow, the password, smoothprairie295, was misspelled. I fixed that and bingo, Internet came back. Dunno how the misspell got into Win 10, but while trying to get internet back I went to a lotta places and typed in a lotta stuff.
Anyhow, this is what I had to do to reach the password screen. You may want to do this when you bring home a new computer or want to get a house guest's computer to work on your internet.
Right Click on the network icon on the taskbar
Click on network and connections setting
Open Network to Internet Setting
Click on Change Adaptor Setting
Right click on your network device icon
Click on Status
Click on Wireless Properties
Click on the Security Tab
Click on Show Characters.
And now we are deep enough. Took me a long time to go this deep. Should you need to know your password, and you forgot to write it down, that's what you have to do to retrieve it from Windows.
Thursday, October 3, 2019
$2000 for Samsung Galaxy Fold Smartphone.
Wow. My HP laptop was only $300 at Staples three years ago. My lightly used Dell desktop was only $200. $2k for a smartphone seems like a lotta money. It is cool, I think. The thing unfolds like a book, the screen has a fold in the middle. Gotta wonder about screen life. How long does it take for a fold line in the screen to become permanent?
Wednesday, October 2, 2019
American Flag flies in Hong Kong
Wall St Journal had a photo of Hong Kongers waving American flags above a piece on "unrest" in Hong Kong. I was touched that a people on the far side of the world, under attack by their communist government, would find inspiration in the American flag. I guess what America stands for still has meaning around the world.
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