Reads
On VRA
I was asked recently what existential crises have been on my mind. Given it’s a take your pick world on that front (global wars, AI, gutting of various golden gooses like funding science research institutions, education, energy infrastructure and aid), it feels like so much of what we deal with is due to the circumvention of the democratic process, made clear by a string of Supreme Court rulings the past few years, most recently with the recent negation of a key part of the Voting Rights Act.
The New York Times published an opinion column by a couple of Harvard law professors shortly after that I think everyone should read. It offers historical clarity for the importance of the Civil Rights Movement, which ultimately was attempting to right the wrong of the failure of Reconstruction and the subsequent Jim Crow era. It also connects the dots on Chief Justice John Roberts decades-long aims to diminish and/or dismantle the VRA. Even if you’re not a history buff, this one’s short enough to be the cliff notes version to understanding our current moment.
In my view, the “woke” post-George Floyd moment really speaks to the desires of a nation to have a fully participatory, multiracial democracy, with equal protections. And everything that is considered “anti-woke” backlash has more in common with the Confederacy than anyone will admit.
A little extra credit/helpful visual - look at this series of maps that lays out some stakes when we say voters are being disenfranchised, and proceed to let that disenfranchisement (in this case, a glut of gerrymandering cases) happen.
I am a little sad baby bear here won’t ever see certain toy stores we grew up with. Still, after a decade in private investing world, nobody has laid out the PE model with clarity the way @greeenwell.bsky.social does in this book
Even though this book is almost 20 years old, I found it instructive to many questions we have today. Why do people follow others, even when they promise to do bad things? What does it mean to be authoritarian, and to follow those that are?
The Authoritarians by Bob Altemeyer 📚
Two of the big takeaways from the authoritarian book for me was that the author was pointing out that “conservatives” were being swapped out for authoritarians starting many decades ago. In his view, conservative principles should stand on their own merits and defend democracy. The trojan horse has been religious fundamentalism, particularly evangelical christians with their values against gays, immigrants, etc. Those values have usurped any traditional conservative values. So we really shouldn’t be calling those people conservatives anymore. He pointed out John McCain was staunchly against the Jerry Falwell liberty university types, but the evangelicals organized so well, by the time 2008 rolled around, he had to accept them to get the republican nomination
The other main takeaway was about his authoritarian scale (inclined to believe or follow authoritarians): Dems were all over the scale, but largely grouped lower on the scale. Whereas, just about all Republicans were higher. About 40 points higher on average than Dems