Super Tuesday... and WFH Wednesday

Well, possibly quarantined reader, it's been an unprecedented week. With Coronavirus spreading around the globe, and companies and governments mustering to react, there has been plenty to make things stressful. Fortunately, we had Super Tuesday in the middle of it all to provide some relief. And hey, Steph Curry is back!

Super Tuesday is the latest, and possibly pivotal, piece of the Democratic primary elections. Voters in Alabama, Arkansas, Colorado, Maine, Massachussetts, Minnesota, North Carolina, Oklahoma, Tennessee, Texas, Utah, Vermont, Virginia, and yes, even the Golden State of California, went to the polls to register their support for their candidate of choice. Super Tuesday doesn't decide the race - it allocates about a third of the delegates who actually vote in the Democratic Party Convention in the summer - but in this bizarrely-run campaign, the mythical momentum is everything, and a candidate that is either on the ropes or on a charge can have their fate sealed long before the race is run.

I use the word bizarre to cover a multitude of sins. Firstly, there's the plethora of different voting systems, on which I've previously opined. But perhaps the biggest difference in how this election is conducted is timing. Back in the UK, the whole country votes on the same day, in secret; it is legally forbidden for news outlets to comment on polling or publish an exit poll until the polls have closed everywhere, and a result is not a result until it is final. Here, the fact that the primaries are scheduled over a two month period means earlier results clearly influence later ones. Thus you had the spectacle of former South Bend, Iowa mayor Pete Buttigieg dropping out of the race after what looked like a fairly minor defeat last weekend. The momentum wasn't with him and he wanted to avoid splitting the moderate vote with Biden.

Secondly, the news outlets openly speculate about the results. In fact, they don't speculate, they declare the results before they're even close to final. So we had national broadcasters telling us that Biden had won Oklahoma, with 2% of votes counted. Now, I'm not the most qualified mathematician in the world, and I paid so little attention to my 2nd year Statistics lectures that I went and repeated the course in the 3rd year, but I can tell you fairly confidently that a 2% sample could well be subject to some bias. The idea that it's declared early, when it can still influence the way other voters vote, is not how I'm used to seeing elections run.

Wild speculation, or accurate and unbiased reporting? I'm not the one to judge.

Anyway, when it all shakes out, Biden made an impressive comeback as a result of all the other moderates dropping out, and now leads the race. It seems as if he's likely to win the nomination, although with Coronavirus knocking around, let's hope he opts for a slightly younger running mate.

And that, gentle reader, is what we call a seamless segue into what I'm retroactively calling Work From Home Wednesday. And Friday. And all the days for the next few months. As the virus spreads, tech employers here and worldwide are conscious that our jobs have us travelling a lot, and sitting in enclosed spaces with a lot of other people... a lot. We're also fortunate that our connected way of working also allows us to work from home, so as widely reported this week, most of the tech giants are on some part of the spectrum of either full mandatory or voluntary work from home. I was at home on Friday (which meant I had the edifying pleasure of meeting my wife out of her yoga class, and eating lunch on the veranda), and it looks like I'll be here for at least some time to come. General panic levels here are not too bad, and as yet all of Helen's volunteering activities are still running.

Adventures this week include Helen's choir concerts (one in Campbell last night, Palo Alto tonight, San Francisco tomorrow), and the flea market is back up and running next week. It's also cleanup day soon (a day when we get to put all sorts of junk out for kerbside collection), which should provide some wonderful Kondo-esque opportunities. The fun never stops when you're working from home!