Every party in a political year claims to be the one that will boost employment.

The adjacent graph shows unemployment rates for the USA by year for 1901-2021. Blue indicates Democratic (D) rule and red indicates Republican (R). Darker colors show years in which a ruling party experienced rising unemployment.

Unemployment declined in 76 of 121 years, 43 times under Democrats and 33 times under Republicans.

Under Democrats unemployment declined 43 times and rose 13 times. Under Republicans it rose 32 of 65 times.

Thus rising unemployment in any year was over twice as likely under Republican administrations (32:13), and Democratic eras experienced employment gains three times as often as losses (43:13 vs 33:32).

Unemployment fell in 43 years of (D) administrations compared to 33 years of (R) administrations, a difference of 30%.

In sum, claims that Republican policies are conducive to lower unemployment are not supported by these 121 years of data.

All employment analysis should consider ratios, not workforce size. The number of employed persons tends to grow by the addition of new workers through population growth and immigration regardless of government policy. In addition, it is likely that non-political factors influenced employment at least as much as government decisions.

Keep this handy; you'll need it before November 5.

If necessary, click image to enlarge for printing or sharing. Click again to maximize.

Despite the best efforts of (R)ight wing conspiracy theorists and (R)evisionist self-described historians, it is clear that the United States and/or states and earlier colonies paid bounties for the killing of Indigenous people at various points in its history. This practice was part of broader campaigns of violence and displacement against Native American communities. Although the term genocide was not invented until after World War II, that earlier behavior would appear to look, walk and quack like a duck. There are many easily discovered examples.

This policy and others like it were part of a larger, tragic pattern of violence, displacement, and genocide against Native American populations throughout the history of the United States. The (R)ecent (R)evisionism is clearly intended to normalize such behavior in the current era. Any who deny this history should be ashamed of themselves and deemed unfit for public office.

Continues...

Fossil Fuel Lovers Unite! You have nothing to lose but your stains. In recent years many adherents of petroleum power have gleefully broadcast every possible negative aspect of conversion to solar and other electric power. What they have shown is that it's easy to create any case with selective facts.

One can probably be sure that the facts cited in the adjacent graphic that appeared in 2023 in Facebook are true. However, one must consider the scale and effects of their complaints. Of course we could point out that the author does not know how to spell nickel and that if one capitalizes some chemical elements one should capitalize all, but we would never go there.

If one accepts that mining, transportation and manufacturing of batteries consume the vast amounts described, one can also add "so what?" The absolute numbers tell us nothing about the relative environmental effects.

One can assume that the effects cited are highly localized. Mining at Thacker Pass, wherever that is, has no effect on horse ranchers in Mongolia. In contrast, the exhaust from fuel burning, being hotter than air, rises into the admosphere and spreads around the globe. Like the butterfly's wings, its motion has unknown effects, and it is conceivable that some Mongolian or his horse might be sickened by atmospheric hydrocarbons, but never by transcontinental diffusion of acid. In any event, sulphuric acid is well understood, even by high school chemistry students, and can be safely stabilized across its "life cycle." (Ref. attached.)

This is but one of many such Save internal combustion! screeds that have appeared in the last couple of years. Our guess is that they originate either with oil-company shills or with aging, unreconstructed high-school boys who still want to rev their engines at traffic lights to hear the sound of their detuned mufflers.

The cost of safely migrating our energy and transportation models away from fossil fuels will not be cheap, Worse however is that a Planet Earth with prevailing temperatures of 140ºF will not be survivable.

Sulphuric acid safety

Fox News or wherever the interviewer works now.

What was the name of the political party that ruled Italy during World War II?

Those who cannot remember the past
are condemned to repeat it.
—G. Santayana

Answer

A Texas study (somewhat ironically) estimates that bystanders stop active attacks about 16% of the time, typically without using a gun. Put another way, the good guy exists, but his gun is 84% irrelevant.

Check the source

This study demonstrated that black and white men were most impacted by firearm deaths, and that firearm homicide and suicide rates increased between 2019 and 2020 for nearly all racial groups. The authors suggest that prevention efforts should focus on specific demographic factors and articulate the urgency to mitigate firearm-related deaths in the US.

This study found a recent spike in firearm homicide death rates between 2019 and 2020, particularly affecting men and the black population. A national priority in dismantling structural racism is important to address disparities in firearm violence as indicated by our study. Disparities within the population were striking. Black men were 30 to 50 times more likely than white women to die from homicide by firearm. The authors suggest that only changes in social organization, coupled with reductions in available firearms, might have an effect on the rates of suicide and homicide.

Source article

So here you are. It would appear that satire is not your long suit. We're sorry; here's something that might ease your pain.

"Satire is a genre of the visual, literary, and performing arts, usually in the form of fiction and less frequently non-fiction, in which vices, follies, abuses and shortcomings are held up to ridicule, with the intent of shaming individuals, corporations, government, or society itself into improvement." (After Wikipedia)

Here's an example in graphical form.

After two hours reading a certain charging-indictment document from Florida, I've concluded that one person you don't want to be today is one Waltine Nauta. Imagine he (You) have been named as a co-conspirator in a national security case, and you must decide whether to

1. lie under oath, protect your co-conspirator, and go ignominiously to jail forever as Mr. Also Convicted, or
2. tell the truth and go to jail for a while waiting for public sympathy to rediscover you as a victim swept up by circumstance—however willingly—out of some bizarre subservience to an embodiment of Dr. Evil's less intelligent twin.

Read the indictment (PDF)

From our Needed Legislation Dept.: Make mocking an assault victim a felony as accessory after the fact.

In Virginia, "...to be convicted of accessory after the fact under Virginia Code §18.2-19, the defendant must have been aware of the underlying felony. Knowledge of the commission of a misdemeanor is not enough. Furthermore, the Commonwealth must prove that the defendant knew that a felony had been completed (not attempted). This knowledge element is the hardest part for the Commonwealth to prove. The Commonwealth can usually prove that the felony was completed, and that the defendant assisted the person in some way after the fact; but the challenge is demonstrating that the defendant actually knew about the felony. Knowledge is the critical element that most typically results in acquittal in these cases."

VA Governor Glenn Youngkin, in his approach to the Paul Pelosi assault in California, prefaces his distasteful remarks with a report that the assault had happened, clearly indicates that he had knowledge, and then with a giggle, makes a cute little joke intended to assist the perpetrator by diminishing the seriousness of the crime, which clearly indicates malice aforethought.

One need not be a lawyer to know right from wrong.

Of course, such a prohibition would violate the principle of free speach. Alternatives are invited that would result at least in public shaming.

Just read a review of Dobbs v. Jackson Health (overturned Roe v Wade). Sorry but some reading is required.

It says "When the Supreme Court granted Mississippi's request to hear the abortion law case, it limited itself to one question: "Whether all pre-viability prohibitions on elective abortions are unconstitutional."

The notion of viability is crucial in abortion law. As Priscilla Smith, a supporter of abortion rights and director for the Program for the Study of Reproduction Justice at Yale Law School, told NPR late last year, 'The central tenet of Roe is the availability of abortions up to viability.'

Mississippi's petition to the Supreme Court called that standard 'unsatisfactory.' It also noted that fetal viability has changed over time, thanks to advances in obstetrics and medical technology.

'Tomorrow, development of an artificial womb will inevitably move the "viability" line to the moment of conception,' the state wrote in its petition."

One wonders how the speculatively said artificial womb will solve the problem of an embryo that is defective from said moment of conception. One in five pregnancies ends in miscarriage, with no intervention by hell-bound mothers or eeveyul abortionists, presumably due to an error in the DNA of the parents' respective egg or sperm or from the misalignment of a base pair in the resulting DNA molecule or from ... (insert a million other causes here).

When the amazing Zippy Womb eventually expels a defective fetus, will the manufacturer be prosecuted for homicide if not murder? Probably not, since the manufacturer will no doubt be part of a conglomerate formed from other giant corporations donating enough money to get their pet jurists elected to "business friendly" legislatures or appointed to high courts.

It's always about the money and the power and never about the fetus or the parents. Or in this context about the power to impose cruelty on the weak, because you can.

Dobbs v Jackson health article @ NPR

A recent Internet meme, reproduced on Facebook but probably originating in an oil refinery somewhere on the computer of someone not too skilled in punctuation or spelling, identifies some probably true statistics about issues surrounding Lithium-ion technology and paints a scary picture of conversion to battery-powered vehicles. So herewith a bit about "transitional technologies:"

In 1921, refiners started adding tetraethyl lead to gasoline to lubricate cylinder walls and prevent "knocking." For 100 years, lead wafted over the planet, contaminating everything, probably driving many soil-dwelling species to extinction, and sickening, killing and plants, animals and humans worldwide until it was finally outlawed. The last country to ban leaded gasoline did so in 2021. It turned out to be a transitional technology, and other solutions to the knocking program have replaced it, but the lead remains. We'll be paying for the cleanup for generations, and as everyone knows lead is not the only product of combustion from cars.

According to a Huffington Post chronology, "By the end of World War II, it was clear that the oil industry was king, and while...some global oil cabal (may not have controlled events), there is certainly evidence to suggest big oil played a major role in keeping electric cars off the road for...70 or so years. During which time the modern petroleum-fueled economy ravaged prairies and oceans, funded and justified wars, and pumped enough carbon into the atmosphere to assure the crash of the entire climate."

Now the internal combustion engine itself is under assault, as ever more ways it fouls the environment are becoming known. Within the lifetimes of many people now alive, it, too, will be relegated to the ash heap of history as new and better was of moving people and their goods are developed.

Spoiler alert: Lithium-ion batteries are not the only game in town. (One Review

The market for privately owned automobiles could be next. On the horizon are web-based applications that will deliver to your door in minutes, on demand, a perfect, driverless vehicle for the trip you intend to make, with the correct number of seats and cargo space. You will just tell Alexa, Google, Siri... how many passengers and what cargo you need to move and where you want to go, and "Mr. Movement Inc." will do the rest. You'll pay a monthly subscription plus a time-mileage rate for use of the system and the vehicles. Your old sedan, station wagon, minivan, SUV, etc., will not be able to compete.

The system will roll out (couldn't resist) first in major cities and then become ubiquitous. Your great-grandchildren will not yearn for the ol' Model T. Your only problem will be what to do with the 500 square feet of space added to your home by eliminating the garage.

Despite the general replacement, some fueled vehicles (probably burning hydrogen) will remain available for use in certain circumstances, such as in industry, agriculture and remote activities like fighting fires in remote areas.

Fearless prediction: 50% penetration, 15 to 20 years; full deployment, 25 to 30 years. Since I'm almost 80, you may have to tease my descendants if I'm wrong. (And electric airplanes are already flying.)

BTW, electric cars in the US currently amount to about 1% of vehicles on the road. The EV industry is at about the same relative stage of development as the overall auto industrin before the Great Depression (graphic, offset). It is anticipated (Bloomberg) that half of all cars will be electric by 2030. That would suggest roughly a 50-year phase out of most fueled vehicles. The issue is not whether battery-powered cars are "better" but rather: what is the greater problem, and what balance of power will minimize the overall impact of human transportation on the environment?

It may also be pertinent to consider the sources of lithium. As of 2022 the largest proven reserves are in order Chile, Australia and Argentina. Fourth is China. There is as yet no OPEC controlling sources, and the capital to develop the reserves in those relatively small economies must probably come from North America and Europe. Technology will surely seek to create future storage systems from more ubiquitous materials. Thus the predictable transitions should be economically viable.

Original meme

Report — Members of the Ohio House of Representatives have demanded that the state open an inquiry into voting irregularities that may have led to the certification of the Democratic candidate in the election, who went on to be confirmed in the United States Senate and to take office in January.

Proponents insisted that if the legislature as a body should fail to act, they and their supporters would attempt a private review of the election. This is essentially the model used earlier this year in Arizona.

One member of the group acknowledged that the results of the "audit" in Maricopa County confirmed the results as reported to the US Senate, but he observed, "there might have been problems and they might have been important."

"We will pursue this matter as long as it takes and wherever it may lead," he added.

The Republicans seeking the inquiry (they are calling it an "audit") have been easily identified as supporters of the candidacy of former president and rap artist D-J Trump, who observed, "gotcha."

Details

We often have fun with the news here in Smoldering Stump, but the current situation is too serious for humor. Vladimir Putin's insane war in Ukraine threatens to create famine—or at least food shortages and high prices—in dozens of countries on every continent.

Ukraine produces wheat and other grains, along with many others for its own consumption and for export around the globe. The countries most likely to suffer from impending food shortages are in the Global South—countries mainly in the lower half of the world map and certainly in the list of "less developed countries (LDCs)."

Lest you think this concern is overblown, here's a list of news outlets (among hundreds more), spanning the political spectrum that have published articles and opinions on the subject since the war began. Regardless of your views on US politics, you will find one of your favorites.

Straits Times (Singapore)

New York Times

Time

Forbes

Breitbart

Newsmax

And the beat goes on. (Along with the beatings by Russian soldiers and mercenaries just before they murder their civilian victims. Coming soon to a street corner near you.)