The Daily Parker

Maine governor Paul LePage, who is certifiably insane, thinks we need authoritarian rule in the U.S. to "re-establish the rule of law," even though authoritarian rule is, by definition, its opposite.

Fortunately, we probably can breathe easier that Donald Trump's self-immolation continues apace, though Josh Marshall and Jeet Heer both raise alarms about what might happen November 9th, particularly given Trump's weeks-long ranting about how the election is rigged against him.

After 50 years of assaulting our institutions, the Republican Party have nominated someone who wants to overthrow those institutions altogether. He's not alone. I just hope the country doesn't come apart completely before I can get someplace safe from it.

Last night the Cubs came back from a 3-run deficit to beat the Giants 6-5 and win the National League Division Series. This puts them in the National League Championship Series for the first time since 2008—4 wins away from their first pennant in 73 years and 8 wins from their first World Series win in 108.

I haven't let myself get excited about these possibilities until now, because I've been a Cubs fan for a very long time. But Saturday they're at Wrigley in the playoffs. And two weeks from Saturday, on October 29th, they could conceivably cause millions of Chicagoans' heads to explode.

(The location tag for this post is accurate. I'm on a train heading to a client site. I love living in the future.)

I'm a little disappointed with the Cubs' 6-5 loss to the Giants last night, but they get another crack at them tonight. I'll probably watch—while writing software. Meanwhile, here are some articles I wish I'd had more time to read:

• CityLab has an excerpt from a new book about Jane Jacobs.
• The Republican Party, unable to win a majority of voters on the merits, has been on a decades-long quest to keep "those people" from voting in the first place.
• Sterling has taken a beating because of Brexit, which Krugman argues is normal and The Economist says "we told you so."
• Apparently, Theodosia Burr had an interesting life.
• And wouldn't you know it, murder looks like an evolved behavior, generally more common in primates than in other orders.

Go Cubs, and back to work.

Pretty good, from space. Benjamin Grant, who runs the Daily Overview feed, has put together a "greatest hits" collection in book form, which will be available October 25th:

The best images appear inOverview: A New Perspective of Earth. The book reveals the many ways humans shape the world. Groves of bright green olive trees stand ready for harvest. Deep blue and purple caverns cut into the earth at a uranium mine. Iron tailings turn a pond bright pink. Grant uses juxtaposition to underscore the point, placing, say, a deforested rain forest alongside a paper mill. “You’re able to make comparisons within the chapters, in a way that you can’t if it’s one image per day on the Instagram feed,” he says. The last chapter celebrates remote places, like the reptilian ridges of Rub’ al Khali, the world’s largest contiguous sand desert.

Many of the images are aesthetically beautiful in the abstract, but troubling in context: the aligned grids on a rust-red landscape of the Dadaab Refugee Camp in Kenya, or the yellow stripe and black ridges of a coal shipping terminal in Qinhuangdao, China. Grant hopes to show that tension. “You have an overwhelming sense of the time that would be required to create these staggering landscapes—erosion, build up of mountains—compared to what we’ve developed in the past 100 years,” says Grant.

I pre-ordered the book as soon as Grant posted he was publishing it.

Some beauties, and some that I wasn't expecting, from:

• Calculated Risk (who almost never comments on politics)
• Brian Beutler
• Jeet Heer
• Josh Marshall
• James Fallows
• Nigel Farange (comparing Trump—favorably—to a gorilla)
• The Economist
• The Washington Post
• Bill Kristol
• The Guardian
• The Toronto Star

And, not for nothing, the voters.

All in all, just about everyone who weighed in on it said it was a disaster for Trump, for the Republican Party, and for American Democracy. I concur.

I was out of town all weekend without much Internet access. Lots of driving, some hiking, and a very fun wedding instead of blogging? Well, duh.

And here we are, a few minutes from the second presidential debate, watching "Frontline" on both of the candidates. It's not changing any opinions at Inner Drive Technology World Headquarters, nor, do I expect, will the debate itself. Buckle up.

21:02 EDT: "This could be one of the most repulsive debates in American history."—David Brooks. And here we go.

21:05: "I've heard from parents and teachers about their concerns about things being done in this campaign." Yep.

21:08: "I agree with everything she said." I hate to say it, but that's because she didn't say anything controversial. And then...inventing statistics about Obamacare, the Iran deal, etc.

21:10: "You bragged that you committed sexual assault." "No, it's just locker-room talk. ... We're going to defeat ISIS with locker-room talk." Donald Trump did not deny that he assaulted women. I'll have transcripts tomorrow.

21:14: "This is who Donald Trump is." Yes it is. Can't wait for the response...

21:15: Oh. Of course. He's simply not going to address what she just said at all.

21:20: "He never apologized." This is a good refrain, and it lets her get all his crap into the debate. And it gets right to his narcissism.

21:23: The Roman Republic fell, in part, because people kept getting sued and prosecuted the moment they left office—so they stopped leaving office. So basically, what we're seeing is the beginning of that here in the U.S. Trump very likely has committed crimes; he's saying he'll prosecute Clinton if he wins. Great.

21:29: "Oh, he can answer it first. Go ahead, Donald."

21:33: Watch out! The government is going to give you free health care if you vote for Hillary!

21:37: I don't have enough booze in my house to make this pain go away.

21:39: "Islamophobia is bad, and that is why my administration will make all of them wear yellow crescents on their clothes."

21:44: Hillary Clinton plays chess. She just moved her bishop to Russia-4. Watch for the knight...and watch Donald Trump try to jump the queen.

21:50: Clinton's linking of Putin to influencing the election might sound crazy to people. But it's true. Does anyone care?

21:51: "I think it would be great if we could get along with Russia, because maybe they could help us fight ISIS." Trump doesn't understand this, but the President might say exactly the same thing right now.

21:55: "He lives in an alternative reality. ... It's amusing hearing someone who hasn't paid taxes in 20 years tell us what he's going to do. ... Donald always takes care of Donald." And then she used math.

21:58: "Of course I do."—Trump answering the question about whether he used his $915m loss to avoid taxes. But it's OK, because everyone else does.

22:02: "Because you have to be able to get along with people to get things done in Washington." Zing.

22:06: "We're old and tired in terms of nuclear." Russia has about a third of the submarines and half the bombers we have. And we have an attack boat about a hundred meters behind every one of their submarines, and a satellite looking at every one of their bombers. But you see, in order to understand what that means, you'd have to know what the triad is.

22:08: "Mr. Trump, let me repeat the question."

22:09: "You disagree with your running mate." Not a question; just summarizing what he said.

22:09: Aleppo has already fallen. So fuck 'em.

22:11: Did Patton and MacArthur endorse Trump? Weren't both Patton and MacArthur fired for insubordination?

22:14: "Do you believe you can be president to everyone?" "Yes, I'll grab all their pussies."

22:17: Shorter Trump on inner cities:

22:21: Trump's answer about the 3am Tweet...I mean, I just...What? The? Fuck?

22:28: So, he's "invested" $100m of his own money in becoming president? "Invested?" What an interesting thing to say by a person who views the world transactionally. What will he consider a return on that investment?

22:31: "China is illegally dumping steel in the United States and Donald Trump is buying it." This hurts, if you care about policy. If not, eh?

22:34: "Would you say one thing that you respect about your opponent?" Hardest question of the evening. And I'm cringing in advance of his response...

22:39: What do I think about this debate? Splash of Vermouth, jigger of gin, 30 more days of this...

22:43: Mark Shields on PBS: "He doesn't have an embarrassment gene in his body. ... I was amazed he showed up tonight."

Wow, my blogging velocity has been crap this month. And here I go, doing it crappier:

• The U.S. invaded Afghanistan 15 years ago today. How's that working out for us?
• The Chicago Cubs offered 10 tickets to tonight's game to each member of the city council a while ago. Yesterday an ethics panel ruled that aldermen who took the tickets must attend the game, and the Cubs must announce their presence. Oh, the humanity.
• Josh Marshall is freaking out over the coming anti-Semitic storm from the Republican party.

There will be more later, I'm sure.

This has been my computer's lock screen image for a very long time. It's hard to believe I took this photo that long ago:

Details: Canon EOS 20D, f/6.3 at 1/250, ISO 800, 18mm.

I took the unusual step of driving to work this morning, and regret it profoundly:

The problem was that Google Maps said to turn from Lake Shore Drive onto Jackson. Unfortunately, Jackson and Balbo are closed because of Sunday's Marathon. So from the river down to Roosevelt, the Drive was a parking lot. (That bit took about 25 minutes.) With Roosevelt no help, I drove down to I-55 and then up State, and from there it was a quick half-hour to go the remaining 24 blocks to the office. Keep in mind, I've walked the equivalent of home to work in under 90 minutes.

Can my day get better?

The International Civil Rights Center and Museum in Greensboro, N.C., has received threats of violence since denying Donald Trump's campaign access to the building for a photo-op:

“We made it known to Mr. Trump’s campaign that we were not going to grant a request of suspending our operations so he could somehow try to legitimize his ideological positions,” [Museum CEO John] Swaine told The News & Observer. “The landmark is very important – it’s not just a political backdrop.”

The museum is in the former F.W. Woolworth building, the site of the 1960 lunch counter sit-in protest against segregated eating establishments. The facility seeks to commemorate the historic sit-in and to promote equality today.

He said that since news of the museum’s decision broke last week, museum staff members have received threats via phone calls and social media.

“The callers were threatening to come over and burn down the building and to shoot up the building,” he said. “They’ve lessened in frequency this week, but they’re still coming in.”