Thursday 13 June 2019

Draft Law on 'Dirt'?

Yep, like you'd suspect....the Democrats announced today that they are building a draft law which mandates that all candidates, upon getting 'dirt' from a foreign source.....must turn that 'dirt' over (suggesting the FBI).  If the 'dirt' comes from a US source?  They aren't that clear if that will be legal or illegal.  If the info comes from some barber from Tulsa, and he got it from an illegal Mexican.....well, that might be reportable, or it might be non-reportable.

Yeah, it's got the scent to it of being a failed law.

So in the midst of a debate, reporter 'Joe' could ask Trump if he has 'dirt' on the Democrat, and Trump could say 'yes'....then the follow-up question is.....is this from a Russian, a Brit, or some tow-truck driver from Iowa? 

Who will get this dirt?  They haven't said for sure, but it'd have to be a Justice Department guy, or maybe some FBI guy.  A bureau of 'dirt'?  Well.....yeah, you could say that.

Will this pass?  It'd have to pass via the House, and then the Senate, and be signed by the President.  Course, they might be shocked that Mitch says fine with the Senate and gets every Republican lined up.  The President might say sure, and even sign it in the Rose Garden.  Challenged?  I suspect the Russians will immediately challenge this in court and say that it's unfair that they got 'dirt' and can't hand it to someone to use.

You can just see that Ginsburg gal on the Supreme Court and trying to find some legality to this idea, and how foreign 'dirt' is different from US-generated 'dirt'. 

Do we really need more regulation on 'dirt'?  And will this provoke CNN into having a full-time 'dirt' analyst on the payroll.....talking daily about 'dirt'? 

School Story

There's this experimental school underway in Germany.....probably in the range of five to ten total across the entire nation.  The basic idea?  Well....you come in as a kid (after the fifth grade) and have a long talk over your interests, and you build your own 'agenda' or projects.  Yes, self-learn.....self-taught.

Most people will suggest that it's fairly doomed, but I think it's a bold idea.  If you'd come to me with just the basic algebra book, without wasting hours and hours of marginal teacher-to-student time, I probably would have achieved 10th grade algebra by the sixth-grade.  I probably would have spent five hours a day in some library....reading over European history, and asking a lot of economic questions.  I came to some point by the 10th grade of seeing school as basically a kid-sitter service, and that a quarter of kids hit their learning peak around the 7th grade.  You got tossed into a room with these kids, and the teacher just resorted to the most marginal level of teaching.....to waste an hour. 

The idea is that you will have a computer network.....some mentors in the background to review your projects....and somehow grade you enough for each year.

The potential that half the kids will be ready for college by age sixteen?  I suspect that might come out of this idea. 

But here's the thing....you can line up forty kids....to find that at least thirty-five of them need continual monitoring and this luxury of 'freedom' simply can't exist.  You might be shocked that out of 10,000 twelve-year old kids.....there's forty ready for 1st college courses.  It'll be curious how this works out or if they abandon this after five years. 

When the News is the News

The Reuters Institute went out and asked a bunch of questions, and eventually came to this shocking result.....over the past couple of years, in general.....people don't want to pay for online news.  They aren't subscribing for services or newspapers, or 'special content'.

Naturally, you'd then ask....if you have some news group (TV, internet, or whatever) which doesn't get much revenue collected except for 'click-bait' or some special billionaire throwing money into the pit....how would you survive?  The answer?  You won't survive.

There is this problem brewing and you could feel it almost twenty years ago....too many groups pretending to be news organizations, and the news just doesn't have content or value. 

It's like asking the question about sports and sports-related news.  Can you dig eighty-eight different stories (of value) out of the Atlanta Braves for the month of May, from sixteen different news sources?  Answer?  No.  So you end up with five stories over some rookie which all basically say the same thing.  Or you get three interviews with the Manager which seem to be all the same content.  If you went back to 1975, there might have been a day-to-day assessment of games, but you might have only seen a total of five stories over an entire month on the Braves.

The same thing is happening with the NFL, the NBA, the NHL, the NCAA football crowd, and various sports.

If you go looking for Nancy Pelosi stories for May, there's probably a total of ninety stories out there, and maybe four have some general value.  The rest are.....'Nancy said' stories. 

Have we come to the end of the news being worth reading or listening to?  Not quiet yet, but I'd suggest various news groups are financially coming to a point where the big-money is gone, and million-dollar deals are going to happen at a lesser pace in the future for journalists.  People are going to start going back to landscaping work, painting their fence posts, fishing, and hobby-time. 

"I Think I'd Take It"

When asked if a foreign 'dirt' would come up on his opponent in the 2020 election, Trump responded....."I think I'd take it".  Naturally, this got folks all upset, and the news media countered that you need to turn this over to the FBI.

So the question to ask here....is there a law that says you need to turn 'dirt' of a political type over to the FBI?  NO.  There is NO such law. In fact, I suspect if you ask the FBI....they'd prefer you not get them into dirt investigative practices.

The 'pee' dossier that Senator McCain delivered?  No such law exists for this type of material to be turned over to the FBI, or the Justice Department. 

If a US government employee or representative is being bribed or blackmailed into doing something?  Yes, there are laws for that, and it's generally required to provide that data to a federal law enforcement service.  If some Senator was doing favors for the Chinese?  If some action involved money or government favors, then that's illegal an you have to react.  But just plain regular 'dirt'?  No.

The problem here for the news media.....they are reacting to this, and the question draws this stimulating idea.....is there 'dirt' on Joe Biden?  Is there 'dirt' on Mayor Pete?

I'm guessing that Joe Biden is quietly meeting with his advisers and discussing all the various 'dirt' items of the past forty years and wondering if the Russians know about this, or if some 'James Bond' secret agent for the Brits is building a dossier on him.  Mayor Pete?  Maybe behind all this gay business....we end up finding some kind of 'dirt' item that Mayor Pete is really bisexual (not gay) and having an affair on the side with some lady.  Or we find out that Mayor Pete did smoke a joint back in 1998 at a college party. 

In the end, all of this is proving the case that no one takes politics serious anymore, and it's all a big joke.