politics | Chris Aldrich

📖 Read pages 193-219 of Just My Type by Simon Garfield

📖 Read pages 193-219 of Just My Type: A Book about Fonts by Simon Garfield (Gotham Books, 2011, ISBN: 978-1592406524)

Highlights, Quotes, & Marginalia

Not the least significant of their innovations was to produce a $ sign; previously, printers had used a long ‘S’.

Highlight (yellow) – 14. American Scottish > Page 197

in reference to Archibald Binny and James Ronaldson of Binny & Ronaldson
Added on Thursday, December 28, 2017 morning

Binny & Ronaldson’s best known font is Monticello, which they called Pica No. 1. This was a modern hybrid of Baskerville and Caslon.

Highlight (yellow) – 14. American Scottish > Page 197

Added on Thursday, December 28, 2017 morning

Many American book publishers, including Scribner and later Simon & Schuster, favoured what was known as Scotch Roman for their books,
a slightly more modern transitional face showing heavy influences of Bodoni and Didot.

Highlight (yellow) – 14. American Scottish > Page 197-198

Added on Thursday, December 28, 2017 morning

Franklin Gothic, a typeface named after Banjamin Franklin and first published in 1905. […] made by Morris Fuller Benton […] had its roots in the German Akzidenz Grotesk…

Highlight (yellow) – 14. American Scottish > Page 200

Added on Thursday, December 28, 2017 morning

(The German designer and head of Fontshop, Erik Spiekermann, co-wrote a book called Stop Stealing Sheep & Find Out How Type Works).

Highlight (green) – 14. American Scottish > Page 202

Added on Thursday, December 28, 2017 morning

But they [Obama campaign posters not set in Gotham] looked slightly wrong in Gill Sans and Lucinda, and they only fooled some of the people some of the time.

Highlight (yellow) – 15. Gotham is Go > Page 219

A solid reason not to be cheap on fonts or substitute well-known fonts for others. This chapter had some interesting branding thoughts on type for politics. The tangential reference here to Abraham Lincoln’s quote is well couched, but only vaguely funny.
Added on Thursday, December 28, 2017 morning

Guide to highlight colors

Yellow–general highlights and highlights which don’t fit under another category below
Orange–Vocabulary word; interesting and/or rare word
Green–Reference to read
Blue–Interesting Quote
Gray–Typography Problem
Red–Example to work through

👓 Everyone Should Have the Right To Bear Mathematical Arms | Slate | Edward Frenkel

Read Don’t Let Economists and Politicians Hack Your Math: Of course kids need to learn algebra by Edward Frenkel (Slate)

Imagine a world in which it is possible for an elite group of hackers to install a “backdoor” not on a personal computer but on the entire U.S. economy. Imagine that they can use it to cryptically raise taxes and slash social benefits at will. Such a scenario may sound far-fetched, but replace “backdoor” with the Consumer Price Index (CPI), and you get a pretty accurate picture of how this arcane economics statistic has been used.

Tax brackets, Social Security, Medicare, and various indexed payments, together affecting tens of millions of Americans, are pegged to the CPI as a measure of inflation. The fiscal cliff deal that the White House and Congress reached a month ago was almost derailed by a proposal to change the formula for the CPI, which Matthew Yglesias characterized as “a sneaky plan to cut Social Security and raise taxes by changing how inflation is calculated.” That plan was scrapped at the last minute. But what most people don’t realize is that something similar had already happened in the past. A new book, The Physics of Wall Streetby James Weatherall, tells that story: In 1996, five economists, known as the Boskin Commission, were tasked with saving the government $1 trillion. They observed that if the CPI were lowered by 1.1 percent, then a $1 trillion could indeed be saved over the coming decade. So what did they do? They proposed a way to alter the formula that would lower the CPI by exactly that amount!

📺 Linguist and Cognitive Scientist George Lakoff on Tavis Smiley (PBS)

Watched Linguist and Cognitive Scientist George Lakoff from PBS

The esteemed academic discusses Trump supporters who stay faithful to him even when he works against their material best interests and well-being.

Dr. Lakoff does a solid job of dissecting Trump’s communication style and providing some relatively solid advice to journalists and media outlets who aim to disrupt what Trump is attempting to accomplish. The discussion of morality and its role in our political system, albeit brief, was incredibly interesting.

In the last third of the interview, Lakoff provides an interesting reframing of much of the public/private case that Jacob Hacker and Paul Pierson make in their recent book American Amnesia.

Apparently there is another interview Smiley’s done with Dr. Lakoff. I can’t wait to watch it. I certainly would have appreciated an extended hour or two of their conversation.

I can see people like Jay Rosen and Keith Olbermann appreciating these interviews if they haven’t seen them.

This was so solid that I actually watched it a second time. It may also be time to dig into some of Lakoff’s other writings and research as well. Some of it I’ve read and seen before in general terms, but it’s probably worth delving into more directly.

👓 Why Does Jared Kushner Still Have a Security Clearance? | Politico

Read Why Does Jared Kushner Still Have a Security Clearance? (Politico)

Anyone else would have been fired long ago, if not worse.

📺 Global Political Expert and Author Dr. Brian Klaas on Tavis Smiley (PBS)

Watched Global Political Expert and Author Dr. Brian Klaas from PBS

The political expert and author discusses his latest book, The Despot’s Accomplice: How the West is Aiding & Abetting the Decline of Democracy. Dr. Brian Klaas is an expert on global democracy, democratic transitions, American politics, Western foreign policy, political violence, and elections -- and the security and economic risks of all these challenges. Klaas is the author of The Despot's Accomplice: How the West is Aiding & Abetting the Decline of Democracy. He is a Fellow in Global and Comparative Politics at the London School of Economics. Klaas has advised governments, US political campaigns, the European Union, multi-billion dollar investors, international NGOs, and international politicians.

It seems like every time I watch this show I need to buy another book. This time it’s The Despot’s Accomplice: How the West is Aiding & Abetting the Decline of Democracy.

📺 Gerrymandering: Last Week Tonight with John Oliver (HBO) | YouTube

Watched Gerrymandering: Last Week Tonight from HBO

Lawmakers often reshape voting districts to shift the balance of political power. That's unfair to voters, even those of us with questionable judgment.

Gerrymandering has become a very precise science, and interestingly it’s one of the few remaining types of science in which the republican party currently believes.

–John Oliver

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A-4dIImaodQ