Tag: belief

John Hibbing’s political research is bipartisan in that it aggravates both sides of the aisle. “Our research is not really very popular,” Hibbing said. Hibbing is branching off from their research about conservatives and liberals and is preparing to collect data about President Trump’s supporters in order to study how they differ from other conservatives. “There are these nationalist, nativist concept leaders everywhere,” Hibbing said. “So, I thought having access to Trump supporters and really digging in deep to figure out what’s going on with them would help us understand these kinds of populist, nativist movements.” A company will send out Hibbing’s survey at the beginning of February, and he said he will analyze the data to better understand Trump supporters. “I think a lot of their policy attitudes are not necessarily driven by ‘Oh my God, the Mongol hordes are coming to get us,’” Hibbing said. The data collected about a participant’s physical symptoms could have many different meanings, so Hibbing is careful not to make generalizations about conservatives or liberals as a whole. Both Hibbing and Smith understand their research will not change the polarized political environment, but Smith said he thought it would help people understand that other people’s political beliefs were based on biology and not the “wrong” opinion. “Maybe I’m not 100 percent correct. People thought I was crazy for turning down other, maybe higher-ranked, universities, but I’d do it again in a heartbeat.” Smith said the team will continue to conduct research on the physiological differences between conservatives and liberals.

Lani Skipper, who has served as county attorney or interim county attorney since January 2015, said politics likely played a role in the decision after she quietly supported the campaigns of the three incumbents who lost re-election bids in 2018. “I have been told on several occasions, but as early as the day after the elections, that I would not be appointed,” Skipper said. “Based upon that timing, I believe it was a political decision.” Skipper has worked on a contract basis as interim county attorney since March 2017 following her departure from a law firm which formerly represented the government for an estimated three decades. The position oversees a variety of functions — from reviewing contracts to being county commissioners' chief source for legal opinions and what the county code of ordinances contains. She said it was her “understanding” the board of commissioners intended to appoint a new county attorney “and it will not be me.” “I do not plan to attend the (Tuesday) meeting as a result,” Skipper said. Skipper served as the primary attorney representing the county attorney -- Dallas law firm Talley, Richardson & Cable — for its county government client in the 2000s during the administration of County Chairman Jerry Shearin. She returned as the firm’s primary attorney for the county government at the urging of former commissioners Vernon Collett, Tony Crowe and Todd Pownall after they took office as a majority on the commission in January 2015. Commissioners in March 2017 then voted to terminate the Talley law firm and hired only Skipper on a contract basis as interim county attorney. The termination followed a controversial land transfer four of five commissioners opposed between the county and Paulding airport authority at Silver Comet Field airport. Requests for comment by email from other new and returning commissioners about the changes were not returned last week.

Former Irish professional boxer Christina McMahon believes that promoter politics are preventing Katie Taylor from securing world title bouts with fellow female champions Delfine Persoon and Rose Volante. Bray native Taylor currently holds two world title belts, the IBF and the WBA, while the WBC and WBO are held by Belgian Persoon and Brazillian Volante respectively. Taylor successfully defended her world straps on Saturday night at the iconic Madison Square Garden, defeating Eva Wahlstrom by a unanimous decision, and now she had set her sights on becoming undisputed champion. However, making the fights with the other two champions is proving more difficult than expected with manager Brian Peters revealing that huge money has been offered but they have yet to get a commitment. "Katie is 100 per cent right," said McMahon, speaking on 2fm's Game On. "If you are world champion, step up to the mark. Persoon has been in possession of the WBC belt for over four years and has only lost once in 43 professional fights, a defeat to Zelda Tekin over eight years ago. And McMahon explained that it has been the norm in women's boxing in recent time, where challengers would always travel to fight for the belt, while she also welcomed the spotlight that Taylor is now shining on the women's fight game. The girl that I fought had 54 wins and had never fought outside Mexico, except once and the only time she fought outside Mexico, she lost. "The politics side, the money side of things, let them tell the truth as to why this is happening and why aren’t they fighting outside their own country."

The governing First Presidency of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints again is saying that is not the case — but does say members should be more active in politics, including attending party caucus meetings next week to help elect convention delegates. “We are concerned that citizen participation rates in Utah are among the lowest in the nation,” they wrote, “and urge greater involvement by members of the church in the 2018 election cycle.” Their letter ordered members to cancel all church meetings March 20, when most parties are scheduled to hold caucuses, “so that members may participate in a caucus meeting of their choice.” Their final paragraph — which church leaders have essentially repeated many times in recent years — is a favorite of non-Republican parties in Utah. “It is important to remember that engaging in the election process is both a privilege and a significant responsibility regardless of one’s political inclinations, and that principles compatible with the gospel may be found in the platforms of each of the various political parties.” Alex Cragun, executive director of the Utah Democratic Party, said that line shows “the myth that in order to be a good member of the church you have to be a Republican is patently false.” Richard Davis, chairman of the United Utah Party (and a political science professor at LDS Church-owned Brigham Young University), said, “The sense that you have to be in one party is folk doctrine. That’s what they enforced with the message yesterday. That’s wise to say again — and again and again and again.” He said his small party — formed by former moderate Democrats and largely anti-Donald Trump Republicans — may be attractive to Mormons partly because “we do have a religious plank that supports religious freedom for all.” A Dan Jones and Associates poll in January for The Salt Lake Tribune and the University of Utah’s Hinckley Institute of Politics found that among “very active” Utah Mormons, 66 percent are Republicans, 22 percent are unaffiliated, 5 percent are Democrats and 7 percent belong to other parties. He listed two examples. “The sanctity of life and being pro-life [on abortion] is important to us,” he said. Moderates say that rule violates state law and could decertify the party. At Republican and Democratic caucus meetings March 20, neighbors will elect precinct delegates to county and state conventions. Some allow all members to become convention delegates.

Adult film star Stormy Daniels reportedly believes recent comments by President Trump's lawyer open the way for her to discuss publicly her alleged affair with Trump. A manager for Daniels, whose real name is Stephanie Clifford, told The Associated Press on Wednesday that Daniels believes Michael Cohen, the president's personal lawyer, violated a 2016 nondisclosure agreement by telling The New York Times that he personally paid her to stay quiet about the 2006 affair. The Wall Street Journal reported last month that Cohen arranged a $130,000 payment to Daniels shortly before the 2016 election in exchange for her silence on the alleged affair. Soon after the Wall Street Journal story, InTouch magazine ran a previously unpublished 2011 interview with Daniels in which she detailed her Trump interactions, which allegedly occurred shortly after the birth of Donald and Melania Trump's son, Barron. Cohen said Tuesday that he paid the $130,000 out of his own pocket. His comments were an effort to quell accusations that the Trump campaign had paid Daniels. A nonprofit watchdog group filed a complaint with the Federal Election Commission earlier this year claiming the payment violated campaign finance law. “Neither the Trump Organization nor the Trump campaign was a party to the transaction with Ms. Clifford, and neither reimbursed me for the payment, either directly or indirectly,” Cohen said in a statement to the Times. “The payment to Ms. Clifford was lawful, and was not a campaign contribution or a campaign expenditure by anyone.” Though she reportedly spoke openly about the alleged affair in past years and in her interview with InTouch, Daniels has sidestepped questions about it in recent weeks.

WASHINGTON (The Borowitz Report)—Breaking his silence on Alabama’s embattled Republican nominee for the U.S. Senate, Donald Trump warned on Wednesday that dumping Roy Moore could start a “dangerous trend” of believing women. “This is not just about Roy Moore. This is about our country deciding that we are going to start believing women, something that we have never done before. “This is a very dangerous road we’re heading down,” he said. Trump cautioned that, if instituted, a new practice of believing women would “totally destroy” the system that the country already has in place. “It’s worked very well. It’s done a great job.” He said that he was considering a number of measures to stem the tide of women’s credibility, including an executive order banning women from giving believable accounts to the press. Trump painted a doomsday scenario of what might happen if the “very bad trend” of believing women gained traction in the country. “If people believe Roy Moore’s five accusers, what happens to a man who has, say, about twenty accusers?” he asked. “I don’t like where this is going.”

Rep. Nita Lowey, D-N.Y., responded by invoking The Handmaid's Tale, the Margaret Atwood novel, now a Hulu series, set in a patriarchal dystopia where the government controls women's bodies and forbids them to read, write or work outside the home. Lowey is not the only critic of the new regulations who conflates freedom from coercion with a right to forcibly extracted subsidies. Writing for the majority, Justice Antonin Scalia said letting the First Amendment's guarantee of religious freedom trump a "neutral, generally applicable law" such as Oregon's peyote ban would create "a system in which each conscience is a law unto itself." That decision rejected the approach that the Court had taken in earlier cases, which required the government to justify substantial burdens on religious freedom by showing that they were the least restrictive means of serving a compelling state interest. The peyote ruling provoked strong criticism from across the political spectrum and inspired the Religious Freedom Restoration Act, which Congress passed nearly unanimously in 1993. Although the Court ruled in 1997 that RFRA cannot be constitutionally applied to state and local laws, it is still binding on the federal government, and it was the main basis for legal challenges to the contraceptive mandate. The American Civil Liberties Union, which immediately filed a lawsuit against the new, broader religious exemption, supported RFRA. The organization's birth control lawsuit, which argues that the new rules "give employers license to discriminate against women," does not even mention RFRA. The ACLU claims the new birth control regulations let businesses, nonprofit organizations and universities "impose their religious beliefs on their employees and students." They are trying to avoid the government's imposition of a legal obligation that violates their religious beliefs.

. Detroit — Seven months into his 2018 bid for governor, Democratic gubernatorial candidate Abdul El-Sayed says he’s confident that his grassroots movement challenging establishment politics is gaining traction. The 32-year-old former director of Detroit’s health department is sharing a message, he says, is focused on investing in people, and said he’s not discouraged by the endorsements or polling lead of the race’s Democratic frontrunner, Gretchen Whitmer. El-Sayed has come out as a supporter of the national push for a $15 minimum wage and the legalization of marijuana in Michigan. He believes more investment is needed in the public school system and the state’s roads and bridges. Tax increases for the state’s highest earners will be in order as well as other and creative revenue sources, he added. “At the end of the day, there’s something exciting about somebody who really represents the future that you see yourself living,” he said.