Author Archives: Tin Man

Going to Paris

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Matt and I are going to Paris on Sunday for a week. It will be Matt’s first trip to France — and, in fact, his first trip to a country where the main language isn’t English. I was in Paris for three days when I was a teenager, but that was years ago and it’s kind of a blur in my mind. (Here are some photos I took of Jason Bateman in Paris.)

We’ll be landing in Paris Monday morning, and flying back the following Sunday evening. In addition to Paris itself, we also plan to visit Versailles — as well as Disneyland Paris. Matt and I are Disney theme park nuts, so we couldn’t go to Paris without seeing it. Part of me feels like it’s a waste of a day when we could be seeing more world-renowned treasures, but I’m sure it will be fun, and there are some rides and attractions there that the other Disney parks don’t have.

Even though I’m really looking forward to the trip, I’ve been stressing out about it lately. In fact, I’ve been stressed out because I’ve been looking forward to it. I’m worried we won’t have time to see everything I want to see. But I also don’t want to feel rushed. I’ve made a mental list of things I definitely want to do, which should help. (Matt doesn’t really have any must-sees other than Disneyland Paris — he’s cool with whatever.)

I love history, so last week I started reading a book about the history of Paris: Seven Ages of Paris, by Alistair Horne. It’s longer than I’d realized – 422 pages, with smallish print — and I’d been hoping to finish it before we left for our trip, so I could know as much as I could about the history of the various sites before we got there. So I was sort of stressing about that, too.

But yesterday I realized that I’ve been treating our trip to Paris like some sort of exam. I don’t need to know everything about a site before we go there. That’s what guidebooks are for. I can read more about it after. Matt gets stressed out enough about travel; I don’t need to add to it.

So I’m going to try to just chill the hell out about all of this and try to enjoy myself. When you travel, it helps to go with the flow, and to not worry too much if things don’t go according to plan. Part of the point of traveling is having new, unexpected experiences. You can’t plan everything out ahead of time.

And it’s not just a city of the past: it’s a city of the present. People live there. We’ll want to spent time just people-watching, and taking in the atmosphere of the city.

And after all, it’s supposed to be a vacation. So I’m going to try to just enjoy what happens.

Women in the 2012 Senate Elections

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I’ve been trying to figure out how many women could be in the next U.S. Senate.

Right now, 17 senators are women.

Two of them are retiring: Olympia Snowe of Maine (R), and Kay Bailey Hutchison of Texas (R). So that’s -2.

But in Hawaii, where Daniel Akaka is retiring, the next senator from Hawaii will definitely be a woman, because both major party candidates are women: Mazie Hirono (D) and Linda Lingle (R). So that’s +1.

In California and New York, the incumbent and the challenger are both women: Dianne Feinstein (D) is being challenged by Elizabeth Emken (R), and Kirsten Gillibrand (D) is being challenged by Wendy Long (R). Feinstein and Gillibrand should have easy wins; in any case, that’s +0.

So far, that’s net -1.

What about other races?

There are three races where women are running and are not likely to win (according to Nate Silver): in New Mexico, Heather Wilson (R) vs. Martin Heinrich (D); in North Dakota, Heidi Heitkamp (D) vs. Rick Berg (R); and in Maine, Cynthia Dill (D) vs. Charlie Summers (R) vs. Angus King (I). So, that’s +0.

That leaves six races.

Five of those six races could increase the number of women:

Nebraska: Deb Fischer (R) vs. Bob Kerrey (D). Deb Fischer is way ahead and will likely win, according to Nate Silver. So that’s a likely +1.

Connecticut: Linda McMahon (R) vs. Chris Shays (D). Nate Silver says Shays is likely to win, so that’s a likely +0. (My instinct says: who knows with this one, but I’ll trust Nate.)

Three of those five appear to be tossups right now:

Massachusetts: Elizabeth Warren (D) vs. Scott Brown (R): 0/+1.

Nevada: Shelley Berkeley (D) vs. Dean Heller (R): 0/+1.

Wisconsin: Tammy Baldwin (D) vs. Tommy Thompson (R): 0/+1.

And there’s one race that could decrease the number of women:

Missouri: Claire McCaskill (D) vs. Todd Akin (R). Despite Akin’s implosion, Nate Silver gives McCaskill just a 65% chance of winning — which is still pretty high, but who knows. So, -1/0.

Tallying this all up, and I don’t know if I’m doing this right, but:

Women in the Senate now: 17
ME (Olympia Snowe retirement): -1
TX (Kay Bailey Hutchison retirement): -1
HI (Hirono vs. Lingle): +1
NE (Fischer): +1
MA (Warren), NV (Berkelely), WI (Baldwin): +1.5 (based on probabilities?)
MO (McCaskill): -0.33 (based on probabilities?)

That works out to 18 plus a fraction. So it seems like there could be a net gain of at least one Senate seat, and maybe even two or three. The next Senate will most likely have 18-19 women. If McCaskill and all three tossups lose (which is possible), there will be just 16. If McCaskill and all three tossups win (which is also possible), there will be 20.

If all women running against men lose their races, the next Senate will have just 16 women; if they all win, even the long shots (CT-McMahon, NM-Wilson, ND-Heitkamp), the next Senate will have 24 women.

So the possible number of women in the next Senate is 16 to 24, with 18-19 most likely.

[Update: I forgot about Debbie Stabenow (D) in Michigan and Amy Klobuchar (D) in Minnesota, who are both heavy favorites for re-election. If they somehow lost along with all the other women, there would be only 14 women in the next Senate, but that’s not gonna happen.]

Krugman Quote

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Great paragraph from Paul Krugman:

The truth is that Romney based his whole campaign on the belief that he could blur his way to the White House, mouthing right-wing slogans, fudging the math, and counting on voter disillusionment with Obama to do the rest. Now that this doesn’t seem to have worked, he has no plan B.