Just say no to fake news

November is a dark month for baseball fans. It’s too early to talk about spring training and the hot stove isn’t even warm — there’s just not that much to say right now. Rather than just making stuff up (about Ortiz wanting to return one more season but worried about the “Trump effect”), I’m not even going to write about baseball this week.

So who’s to blame? TRUMP!  Yes, let’s blame him. It’s definitely his fault. Now share this with everyone you know on Facebook and say “Here’s the proof: it’s Trump’s fault that Ortiz is not coming back!” I’ve saved you the trouble of having to think for yourself or even read a short sentence. Now that you’ve saved all your friends and neighbors from the truth, go back to playing Candy Crush.

All kidding aside, we’re all a bit to blame. In the age of the 24 hour news cycle, information reduced to 140 characters and a language down to letters (ICYMI: TTYL), we’ve dumbed ourselves down so far that we’ve actually lowered our own IQs. In the last 10 years, circulation for the Providence Sunday Journal has dropped by more than half and many of us are getting our news from online sources — not journalists — but sources who make money from advertisers based on the number of clicks that their stories receive. So my “Ortiz considers return for second farewell season” story could be a goldmine and the real story — that there’s little to report on our retired hero — gets as many views as the ProJo classifieds.

During the presidential campaign, fake news was abundant and supporters on both sides were (and are) guilty of sharing and promoting untruth all over social media. I was hoping it would die down a bit but a quick look at my Facebook feed and I can see that Steve Bannon is both Satan and a populist. While I hope social media goes back to being a safe place to view cat videos and share common stain fighting techniques, it’s incumbent on all of us to push back on the wave of fake news.

Start by being a bit skeptical. Are you clicking on things that are tempting but sound crazy (lose 20 pounds watching TV!) or are you getting our online news from a reliable source? When you read a newspaper or watch the news do you think about the sources they cite or the perspectives that the reporter sought? There are no unbiased sources of information since the people putting the stories together are (presumably) human and produce their pieces from their perspective, but paid journalists have reputations to maintain and aren’t just looking for a quick click.

Be careful what you share. Don’t circulate clickbait, block it from your page and “unlike” anything that isn’t legitimate. In the pay-per-click world, your “likes” are gold. And of course, share your newfound discipline with your children. If I could count the number of conversations that started, “Hey Mom - I saw this thing on Tumblr…” and ended with the equivalent of “ okay, so Grant IS buried in Grant’s tomb,” I’d have my very own media empire.

If in doubt, just remember what Nancy Reagan said, “just say no” to fake news. OMG. JSN.

A new team takes the field

Regardless of how you feel about the outcome of the election, we have a new President of the United States. You might find him repugnant, you may find to be a breath of fresh air. As of January 20, 2017, he is the President of the United States.

You can complain about the electoral college system or you may wish you lived in a swing state, so your vote would “matter.”  President-elect Trump still won in a fair election under the process set out by the U.S. Constitution.

You might blame others for voting for Trump — or not choosing to vote at all — we each have the right to make the choice that’s best for us. You may feel “robbed” because the first woman President has yet to be elected or you may feel relieved that she wasn’t. The new President can choose who he wants to run his administration.

You can say he’s not your President, but as long as you are a U.S. citizen, he actually is.

You have options of course. You can threaten to leave the country, share fake stories on Facebook, and criticize every move he makes. It’s a beautiful thing to live in a country where you can despise and mock your leader and have no fear of repercussions. You can also choose to go down a more meaningful and productive route for your anger.

One of my friends had a “Think globally, act locally” poster in her room throughout our college years. At the time I didn’t think too much about what it meant, but it resonates today. Individuals that might be frustrated by who we’ve elected at any level of government have the option to put their energies to work in any number of ways from volunteering and advocacy work to running for office or managing a political campaign. Here in Rhode Island we have amazing organizations that always need support — from the Institute for the Study and Prevention of Nonviolence to the East Bay Food Pantry — and something for every other need in our community. Your commitment can be huge or it can be minimal and the choices are literally endless: be a mentor, walk a shelter dog, pick up litter, volunteer in a school, thank a veteran, shovel a sidewalk. There’s really no limit to the ways people can contribute locally.

I get it if it all seems like too much work — especially since hitting the “share” button on Facebook requires no thought and even less effort — but if you REALLY care, use this election as a reason to engage locally and make a real difference in your community in a way that matters to you. One President can’t ruin a country or make it great again, only the people can do that.

Even the umpires couldn’t fix this game

We’ve all watched a game where an umpire makes a terrible call and it changes the outcome. In the post-mortem of the 2016 election, one can make the case that the results were inevitable before the final teams were chosen. Despite the best efforts of the umpires — the media elites — the odds were never in her favor.

I’m certain that brings no comfort to her or her supporters, but the 2016 presidential race was going to be a “change” election. For more than a year, national polls asking their version of  “do you think the country is on the right track or the wrong track” were getting a very firm “wrong track” with most polls showing that between sixty and seventy percent of Americans believed that the country was headed in the wrong direction. When that many likely voters agreed on the “directional” question, there’s little doubt that President Obama would not get a so-called third term with the election of someone who pledged to continue to govern along the same ideological path. Voters were determined to make a change.

I am not sure how that giant red flag was missed by so many — perhaps her own pollsters had nightmares about this simple number — and with good reason. I can’t imagine they ignored it, but instead they probably reasoned with it: if you are up against a candidate that is perceived as racist, sexist and bigoted, surely people won’t vote for him if they have been informed of the horrible things he has said. Perhaps they assumed (or hoped) that the change people were looking for would be satisfied by a woman president or even by flipping the Senate. Either way, the narrative developed by her campaign highlighting her experience and contrasting it with his shortcomings completely backfired, motivating dissatisfied Democrats to vote Trump and inspiring people who wanted change to turn out and vote, bigly.

I have to believe that the big red flag of change was also missed because of the smoke coming from the media elites. I have a tremendous amount of respect for reporters — it’s a thankless job and can be a dangerous one — but I have to wonder about the producers and editors who could see these poll numbers and glossed over that directional question, instead choosing to highlight President Obama’s healthy job approval number. Or how about those whose coverage of a Trump rally included only Trump’s offensive comments rather than note that 10,000 people in the audience were clapping and that they had waited three hours to get in? While they hoped to help her get elected, the smokescreen effect was so thick that everyone missed the story. Everyone bought into the narrative that America couldn’t possibly elect Donald Trump, so the shock was huge — uuge.

I don’t know that President-elect Trump was destined to be our agent of change, but the role seemed to be written for him. With a country is screaming for something different, he was outsider with sky-high name recognition in a primary field chock full of governors and senators who were shocked by his bad manners and could barely defend themselves.  Most could only stand there and elaborate on their weakness: they had been part of the government that voters were hell-bent on rejecting. The media elites were so tickled by his candidacy since he was someone that Clinton could surely beat that they practically ignored the others and followed him around with his own camera pool. They went to mock him and highlight his lack of depth on the issues and instead they raised him up as a legitimate candidate with hours of free media. They gave him a satellite uplink while the others shouted into Styrofoam cups with strings attached. 

Many Bernie Sanders supporters are wondering if his brand of change would have won the election. Certainly Sanders had attracted huge crowds of the very voters that ended up voting for Trump — and Clinton did not inspire women or minorities to vote — but would an aging socialist have embodied the kind of change people were looking for? We’ll never know.

In the days and weeks to come, there will surely be a very thorough post-mortem by the Clinton campaign, the Democratic party and the national media. My ultra curious mind would like to know if Wikileaks has any more juicy e-mails to share that show whether there was a voice of truth inside the campaign or if everyone was too consumed reciting the narrative they’d been given to think for themselves. While looking back will be instructive — and will perhaps highlight a “never again” moment for many — looking ahead is the only thing most of us should do. There’s a new team on the field and it’s time to watch what they will do.

There’s always next year - but not for us

As I write this, the world of baseball is preparing for a massive celebration in one Midwestern city as another will be mired in misery for at least another year. Candidates across the United States are facing a similar fate — either they win or they lose on November 8^th and the day will either go down in their personal histories as a good day or a bad one. In many races the voters are ambivalent about who they elect, particularly in local races where they may be choosing between neighbors or long-time acquaintances in a small town.

In the race for President, feelings are not as friendly and there is no lack of passion among the supporters of the two candidates. This race has gone beyond the most unrealistic movie script that could have been written and now has hit upon every -ism and many words not okay to print. Stories on the campaign include charges of treason, espionage, infidelity, voter fraud and money laundering. At this point, it’s hard to separate fact from fiction and I have to believe that many voters are so disgusted that they are committed to sitting out this election. It’s a sad state of affairs when both candidates have a more than 50% unfavorable rating. That’s right - as of this writing, 59% of those polled had an unfavorable opinion of Donald Trump and 53.4% had an unfavorable opinion of Hillary Clinton.

If voters are so inclined, they can also write in a candidate for President — or any office. It’s fun to go back and look at what candidates are written in each year. There are always those who lost in the primary and we can expect many to write in Bernie Sanders and Mitt Romney this year. Daffy Duck and Mickey Mouse are perennial vote getters along with None of the Above. I think Tom Brady might be a good choice this year.

If it’s any consolation, there are some interesting local races and ballot initiatives in Rhode Island, so there’s still a reason to show up. I have been impressed with the number of local races that are contested and with the spirited — but good-natured — debate that has ensued. I will add a shameless plug for the ethics reform campaign I’ve been working on and ask people to approve question 2. It gives the Ethics Commission oversight of the General Assembly and allows it to investigate and prosecute violations of the Code of Ethics. If ever there was an issue that we can all agree on, I think it’s this one: Rhode Island deserves a more ethical government. I am hoping it can win with at least 75%.

For baseball teams, players and their fans, there’s always next year. Next year brings another 162 games of opportunity and the chance to win it all. It will be no solace for the fans of the Indians or the Cubs but there is at least the hope for redemption. No such luck for the American electorate. Barring a resignation or impeachment, we’ve got four long years of acrimony, anxiety and anger until we have a chance to make a change in the White House. Let’s make the best of it.

Don’t forget to vote!

Reversing another curse

Even though there’s no baseball being played in New England right now, I have been glued to the playoffs and will be thrilled to watch an Indians-Cubs World Series. I’m sure I am not the only Red Sox fan to be a little excited to see what I think of as a Theo-Tito-Lester-Lackey-Coco-Ross reunion, bringing together players and managers who were part of our three World Series wins. I’ll be rooting for the Cubs because I still have phantom pains from being a pre-2004 Sox fan and am hoping that Chicago can enjoy the same catharsis that spread across New England twelve years ago.

I’m also hoping that having a new President-elect in less than two weeks will also give us the mental cleansing need after being subjected to the most negative and brutal campaign in modern times. This has been an exceptionally bad campaign and I am hoping that it is the exception and doesn’t become the kind of campaign that Americans expect. It would be hard to find two worse candidates or ones with more mud to toss at each other.

For the winner and his or her followers, the real work will begin when the votes are finally counted.  No matter who wins this campaign is destined to end with some very angry voters on the losing side and no clear mandate for governing. It’s probably hard for them to believe, but governing is much harder than campaigning.  Governing while trying to win a second term is even more difficult as campaign promises often collide with the politics of Capitol Hill or what can conceivably be accomplished in a four-year term. While most readers will groan at the thought that the new President is thinking about a second term already, I can guarantee that re-election is at the top of the first term agenda. And governing effectively when close to half the electorate voted against you and thinks you’re unfit for office? Nearly impossible.

For the loser and his or her followers, I hope that they recover quickly. Few disappointments are as stinging as being rejected by the electorate and all the “what ifs” and “you shouldas” roll in every day. If we have any hope of moving forward and away from the unpleasantness of this campaign, we will need some leadership from the loser. He or she will need to set an example for his or her followers, be gracious in defeat and then be quiet for a while. The country does not need — and certainly voters do not want — to have a heckler mocking the new President’s every move.

What I like about baseball is that no matter how hard-fought the games are, there’s always some grace in losing because you were beaten fair and square. The curse of this campaign cycle is that there’s been nothing fair about the process on either side and it yielded two candidates with very little common ground and even less appeal. It’s going to take some time to bounce back, but there’s always hope. After all, we’ve got a Cubs-Indians World Series, making it a very special year.

Don’t blame the locker room

It’s been more than a week since the Red Sox were eliminated from the playoffs by getting swept by the Cleveland Indians in the ALDS and I’ll admit that I am still recovering. It was depressing to see David Ortiz retire without a final World Series send off, but with three huge World Series rings on our fingers because of his awesomeness, it’s hard to be sad for too long.  Unlike so many other baseball fans, we’ve seen plenty of champagne-soaked locker rooms and have lots of winning moments to remember.

I am having a harder time trying to process some of the “locker room” talk that seems to have infected this year’s presidential campaign. I have a high tolerance for bad language and have been known to use it myself at times, but this latest chapter in “how low can we go” has brought us to a new sad spot. Just as the Monica Lewinsky scandal introduced new words to water cooler chatter, Donald Trump’s bragging about being to assault women as he sees fit has caused Republicans at every level to disavow his comments and has caused a wave of un-endorsements as well.

I don’t pretend to know what goes on in men’s locker rooms, but considering that jokes about wives, mothers, sisters and girlfriends have often lead to locker room fights, I have to believe that Donald Trump’s bravado might get him a punch in the face in a real locker room. Also, I do not know any men (thankfully) who would publicly brag about assaulting a women, so I think we need to reject the excuse this this was locker room talk altogether and just call it what it is: offensive, perverse and perhaps even the last straw for Donald Trump’s presidential campaign. When pollsters look back on the 2016 presidential campaign, it will probably be considered an outlier because Hillary Clinton will likely win with a higher unfavorable rating than any President before. Likability matters in politics and the “who would you rather have a beer with” question can be a good indicator of who wins the race. Let’s face it, no one wants to have a beer with a pervert.

With this interminable campaign coming to a close in a matter of days, the revelations of the last few weeks have left many voters without a candidate to support. I share your sadness and disgust and simply say… Go Cubs!

We need more Papi in politics

I get emotional about the Red Sox. I curse when they lose and jump up and down they win, so it was for the best that I was alone at home when Sunday’s pregame featured the culmination of David Ortiz’s year-long retirement celebration. With a lump in my throat and tears on my cheeks I was glued to the screen and thinking about how lucky I am to have been a Sox fan in his time. He carried his teams to three World Series wins — a bounty that no pre-2004 fan could have thought to imagine.  But more importantly, he inspired us to want to be like him: relentless, resilient and kind. With that huge smile and giant swagger he taught us to push away doubt and to think that something good could happen if we could believe in ourselves. And when terror struck, he was the leader who embodied Boston Strong and helped the city bounce back. His departure leaves a huge hole in the Red Sox lineup and reminded me that we have very few inspirational leaders in our country right now, particularly in the race for President.

There are nearly 319 million people in the United States and the two people who have been nominated by the major political parties to be president are probably the two worst candidates in U.S. history. This campaign has turned into a "he said she said" about non-issues and both candidates have wasted time and effort name-calling, making accusations and labeling the other unfit and dishonest. The din of the discord is so loud that even careful observers have lost track of the insults being volleyed back and forth. It's disheartening to think that we've been left with these choices and that the next four years will be long ones if only because nearly half the country will be upset and the outcome of the election.

All is not lost. Regardless of who gets more electoral votes on November 8th, I know two things to be true: first, the outcome of this race will not derail our democracy. After 240 years, the Republic will survive 48 months of an unpopular president. Second, the founding fathers saw 2016 coming and made the President of the United States a relatively weak executive. Because Congress holds the purse strings, a President can only do so much without the cooperation of Congress. Even Supreme Court nominees need approval from 60 members of the Senate, ensuring that a party-line vote is not possible by either party. Neither one of these candidates can — or will — ruin this country as president, but the damage done to this electorate by this divisive campaign will last for a long time.

From beginning to end, this campaign has lowered our standards in what we want in a president. Because the major party candidates are so badly flawed, we have dropped our standards to meet what they are giving us in terms of temperament, integrity, character and judgment. Because each one is still working so hard to motivate their own base of supporters, neither is working to appeal to anyone outside of their own camp. Even worse, strong supporters are using the opponent’s negatives to get votes. If it’s not, “you have to vote for him, she’s a liar,” it’s “you have to vote for her, he’s a pig.” Ack.

It’s too late for 2016, but if we have any hope of pulling American politics out of the gutter, we need some better prospects and we must have higher expectations for our candidates. It might be too much to hope for a David Ortiz-type to rise up politics and bring us back from the abyss, but Big Papi did it in 2004, so it can’t hurt to believe.