Random Thoughts: Look Beyond Dallas County to Know Who Won

Tweets from May, 2021:

• 2021-05-02: Look beyond the Dallas County vote to know who won the election (or made the run-off anyway). Daniel Burdette beat Marilyn Frederick in Dallas County, but it was the reverse in Collin County, so Frederick will face Arefin Shamsul in a run-off for Richardson City Council.
• 2021-05-03: There's something deeply wrong with an American political party that tolerates collusion with Russian interference in US elections, but wants nothing to do with vaccination against a pandemic disease.
• 2021-05-04: Trying to shoehorn English into the rules of Latin makes no more sense than the Star Wars nerds who try to speak English with the speech patterns of Yoda of Dagobah: "Backward run sentences 'til reels the mind."

After the jump, more random thoughts.

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• 2021-05-04: The Mitchells vs. the Machines (2021): Girl leaves for film school, glad to be away from embarrassing dad. On the way the family is attacked by army of robots. Lots of noise and violence, but it's robots getting blasted so I guess it's OK. Zero dead family, so happy ending. C-
• 2021-05-04: Has misuse of "you and I" as the object of a sentence (as in "misused by you and I") become so common that it's completely crowded out "correct" usage? Will the language guides ever catch up with usage?
• 2021-05-04: Angie Chen Button votes to, in effect, force companies to invest in fossil fuels. What happened to the party that used to champion free market capitalism? Maybe it's always been a sham?
• 2021-05-04: Biden, making America great again.
• 2021-05-04: Voters in the City of Richardson and Richardson ISD both face run-off elections on June 5. What a waste of time and money. What would it take to do it right? "Ranked-choice voting is already changing politics for the better."
• 2021-05-06: Exterminate All the Brutes (TV 2021): 1,000 years of genocide, colonialism, slavery, extermination of indigenous peoples, and, yes, the Holocaust, told as a personal narrative by Raoul Peck. Sure to drive MAGA crowd crazy, but there's a lot of history that cannot be defended. B-
• 2021-05-06: There's a Richardson City Council member who has blocked me on Facebook. He's not the President. He's not the Texas Atty Gen. He's just an elected official at the municipal level. But he blocked me. I'm just sayin'.
• 2021-05-07: Why I oppose the death penalty and you should, too. "Four Years After Arkansas Executed Ledell Lee, DNA Points to Someone Else."
• 2021-05-11: Tenet (2020): Action thriller. Our hero stops WW III by keeping evil arms dealer from getting plutonium, but the threat isn't nuclear war, it's inverted time. Bad guys use, not time travel, but reverse time. Events happen backwards. Maybe it all makes sense, but I doubt it. C+
• 2021-05-11: TX HB 547 proponents argue that it's unfair to ban home-schooled kids from UIL sports. Ironically, largely the same people think it's fine to ban trans girls from UIL sports. Rationales in both instances are strained.
• 2021-05-11: Democracy is not working as intended. It's intended for political parties to adopt policies to win a majority of voters. Republicans have abandoned that in favor of subverting the rules so a minority of voters can prevail.
• 2021-05-12: The GOP House caucus cancels Liz Cheney by voice vote. Not secret ballot. Not roll call. They are afraid to go on record individually. Tellingly, none of them will say that what she's saying is actually wrong, only that she shouldn't be saying it.
• 2021-05-14: Hamilton (2020): Original Broadway production, with a live theatre feel. The mostly black cast uses hip-hop music to teach history. Innovative storytelling that works brilliantly. Every high school American history class should see it. Do Lincoln next, Lin-Manuel Miranda. A+
• 2021-05-17: This Is a Robbery (TV 2021): 4-part doc about $500 million art heist from Boston museum. Biggest problem is lack of resolution, even 30 years on. Lots of repetition. Should have focused less on one robbery and more on inadequacies of museum security and police detective work. C+
• 2021-05-18: Angie Chen Button votes to make Texas roads more unsafe.
• 2021-05-18: Bob Hall's east Texas district doesn't extend quite to the City of Richardson or RISD, but it comes close.
• 2021-05-20: WandaVision (TV 2021): Mashup of Marvel comics, the Dick Van Dyke Show, Bewitched, and more. At heart is a woman learning to deal with grief. A refreshingly novel superhero movie that takes a while just to figure out it's a superhero movie. Novel, clever and captivating. B+
• 2021-05-22: Teachers, who have studied the subject matter, used to be trusted to present it to students. But the State Board of Education didn't like that, so they took over. Now the Texas legislature doesn't like that, so they've taken over. How do teachers stand it?
• 2021-05-24: Angie Chen Button refuses to take a stand on a bill to increase the presence of guns on Texas streets.
• 2021-05-25: "The neoliberal order seems to be collapsing. A generation of young activists is trying to insure that it's replaced by progressive populism, not by the fascist right." With Biden's win, progressive populism is still alive, but I think fascism is favored.
• 2021-05-25: Once again, Angie Chen Button adds obstacles for city governments to make local decisions. Maybe the state legislature should require voter approval of all bills passed by the legislature.
• 2021-05-27: "Forward Drew Timme returning to Gonzaga men's basketball team next season" | The Seattle Times
• 2021-05-28: The Nevers (TV 2021): In Victorian London, Amalia runs a home for women, each "touched" with unique powers. Who or what is behind it all is the mystery. While Joss Whedon takes his time telling us, he pads with a large cast of villains, violence, sci-fi, and special effects. C-
• 2021-05-29: "Can't anybody here play this game?" -- Casey Stengel.
• 2021-05-29: "The Mets have shown me more ways to lose than I even knew existed." -- Casey Stengel
• 2021-05-30: You know what can really make a Boomer feel old? Reading about the Millennial/Gen Z divide over Olivia Rodrigo.