It’s supposedly my day off, though with the weather being Arctic, there’s not much to do outside—or even a reason to go outside. But I’ve read a few things that I’ll recommend if you too are housebound today.
First, a good column—especially the first part—from Andrew Sullivan in New York Magazine (h/t Simon). It’s worth keeping up with him, as he’s becoming a voice of reason in this increasingly demented era of hatred and tribalism. Click on the screenshot:
This is about the Covington Mess and how both social and mainstream media, by going with their confirmation bias, is ruining America. And I agree. I’ll give a couple of good quotes:
Yes, the boys did chant some school riffs; I’m sure some of those joining in the Native American drumming and chanting were doing it partly in mockery, but others may have just been rolling with it. Yes, they should not have been wearing MAGA hats to a pro-life march. They aren’t angels; they’re teenage boys. But they were also subjected for quite a while to a racist, anti-Catholic, homophobic tirade on a loudspeaker, which would be more than most of us urbanites could bear — and they’re adolescents literally off the bus from Kentucky. I heard no slurs back. They stayed there because they were waiting for a bus, not to intimidate anyone.
. . . To put it bluntly: They were 16-year-olds subjected to verbal racist assault by grown men; and then the kids were accused of being bigots. It just beggars belief that the same liberals who fret about “micro-aggressions” for 20-somethings were able to see 16-year-olds absorbing the worst racist garbage from religious bigots … and then express the desire to punch the kids in the face.
. . . Across most of the national media, led by the New York Times and the Washington Post, the narrative had been set. “I’m willing to bet that fifty years from now, a defining image of this political era will be that smug white MAGA teen disrespecting a Native elder and veteran. It just captures so much,” Jessica Valenti tweeted. “And let’s please not forget that this group of teens … were there for the March for Life: There is an inextricable link between control over women’s bodies, white supremacy & young white male entitlement.” This is the orthodoxy of elite media, and it is increasingly the job of journalists to fit the facts to the narrative and to avoid any facts that undermine it.
There’s a reason why, in the crucial battle for the legitimacy of a free press, Trump is still on the offensive. Our mainstream press has been poisoned by tribalism. My own trust in it is eroding. I’m far from the only one.
The other night I was having a drink with a friend who said he believed that the Trump threat was essentially over, as the shutdown took its toll. He noted what might become an inflection point in the polling. He was heartened by the midterms. He might be right. But I think that misses the core point about this presidency. From my perspective, the Trump threat to liberal democracy is deepening, largely because its racial animus and rank tribalism are evoking a response that is increasingly imbued with racial animus and rank tribalism, in an ever-tightening spiral of mutual hostility.
I especially like this bit:
What was so depressing to me about the Covington incident was how so many liberals felt comfortable taking a random teenager and, purely because of his race and gender, projected onto him all their resentments and hatred of “white men” in general. Here is Kara Swisher, a sane and kind person, reacting to the first video: “To all you aggrieved folks who thought this Gillette ad was too much bad-men-shaming, after we just saw it come to life with those awful kids and their fetid smirking harassing that elderly man on the Mall: Go fuck yourselves.” Judging — indeed demonizing — an individual on the basis of the racial or gender group he belongs to is the core element of racism, and yet it is now routine on the left as well as the right. To her great credit, Kara apologized profusely for the outburst. The point here is that tribal hatred can consume even the best of us.
And this is what will inevitably happen once you’ve redefined racism or sexism to mean prejudice plus power. It’s reasonable to note the social context of bigotry and see shades of gray, in which the powerful should indeed be more aware of how their racial or gender prejudice can hurt others, and the powerless given some slack. But if that leads you to ignore or downplay the nastiest adult bigotry imaginable and to focus on a teen boy’s silent face as the real manifestation of evil, you are well on your way to creating a new racism that mirrors aspects of the old.
This is the abyss of hate versus hate, tribe versus tribe. This is a moment when we can look at ourselves in the mirror of social media and see what we have become. Liberal democracy is being dismantled before our eyes — by all of us. This process is greater than one president. It is bottom-up as well as top-down. Tyranny, as Damon Linker reminded us this week, is not just political but psychological, and the tyrannical impulse, ratcheted up by social media, is in all of us. It infects the soul of the entire body politic. It destroys good people. It slowly strangles liberal democracy. This is the ongoing extinction level event.
Andrew writes further about the legalization of marijuana, which has led to “dabbing”, or vaporizing concentrated weed resin. He decries this practice mainly because it leads to somnolence rather than facilitating good conversation, which is what he wants out of the drug. I am on his side, as I tend to become more gregarious when I partake. A few years ago tried dabbing in a state where it was legal to buy and smoke recreationally, and it blitzed me out for about 8 hours, in a way that just made me withdraw and want to sack out rather than chat. Our new governor has vowed to make marijuana legal in Illinois, and we’ll see if that happens. His third segment is about Brexit.
Speaking of Covington, one of the venues that’s tried its hardest to maintain its narrative in the face of changing facts is the Guardian, a site I rarely visit any more. Have a gander at this headline, from a story posted last Wednesday:
The article, and the Guardian as a whole, makes me ill; they’re presenting a caricature of the Left. When Wilson writes something like this, did he ever care about the truth? I don’t think so; he just wanted to maintain that the Covington students were still pariahs while dissing the conservative media that painted them as heroes. Nobody was a hero in that narrative, but neither were the boys nor the Native Americans pariahs. Wilson:
On Tuesday night, Fox News hosts continued to feast on the controversy, which was sparked by a standoff between Covington Catholic high school students and a Native American veteran called Nathan Phillips. Footage show students wearing pro-Trump Maga hats taunting the Omaha tribe elder. The relentlessly repeated talking point – that there was a collective “rush to judgment” on the boys because they were Trump supporters – was used by conservative anchors Tucker Carlson, Sean Hannity and Laura Ingraham to attack mainstream media and left leaning social media users.
. . . As of Wednesday, as a result of these well-worn tactics, liberal media has almost completely backed away from their initial, justified take on the story.
When will we ever learn?
Yep, use the kids to go after your favorite targets. And “initial justified take on the story”? I don’t think so!
Speaking of social-media outrage, here’s a good article in The Atlantic by Conor Friedersdorf:
A quote:
For example: I’m sitting in a coffee shop as I write this. Imagine that a man sitting at a nearby table spilled his coffee, got a phone call just afterward, and simply left, so that staff had to clean up his mess, a scene that culminated in a haggard-looking barista drooping her shoulders in frustration. Was the call a true emergency? We don’t know. But if not, almost everyone would agree that the man behaved badly.
Yet almost all of you would react with discomfort or opprobrium if I followed the man back to his office, learned his name, spent half an hour waiting to see his boss, adopted an outraged tone, explained his transgression, felt righteous, then commenced a week-long mission to alert his extended network of friends, family, and professional contacts to his behavior, all the while telling masses of strangers about it, too.
On the other hand, if that man spilled his coffee, leaving that same haggard barista to clean it up, and if I captured the whole thing on my phone camera and posted it to Twitter with a snarky comment about the need to better respect service workers, some nontrivial percentage of the public would help make the clip go viral, join in the shaming, and expend effort to “snitch-tag” various people in the man’s personal life. Some would quietly raise an eyebrow at my role in that public shaming, but I mostly wouldn’t be treated as a transgressor.
One cannot help but wonder whether there are better norms. . .
From Inside Higher Ed, Alan Sokal, author of the Great Hoax, criticizes the persecution of philosopher Peter Boghossian by his employer Portland State University (PSU) after Peter, James Lindsay, and Helen Pluckrose submitted fake articles to humanities journals, exposing the egregiously low standards of those journals—and the disciplines as a whole. PSU found Peter guilty of violating rules about experimentation on human subjects—in this case, the subjects were journal editors and reviewers—without following “human subject research” policy. Found guilty, Peter may be fired. Yet the federal regulations apply only to federally-funded research, which wasn’t behind Boghossian et al.’s work. Portland State just decided as its policy to follow the federal rules. Read on:
Sokal thinks this punishment is dumb, and I agree, but those who think the excesses of the humanities are just fine, thank you, are going for Peter’s throat. Vindictiveness reigns.
And Portland State University, like many other universities, has decided, as a matter of its own internal policy, to apply federal IRB rules to all research carried out by PSU employees or students — though such treatment is legally mandatory only for projects sponsored by the federal government, which Boghossian’s was not.
But common sense suggests that something has gone seriously awry here, when rules initially written to protect subjects in biomedical research from physical harm — and later extended to social-science research, where the harm could be psychological — are applied blindly and literally to an “audit study” aimed at testing the intellectual standards of scholarly journals. As Singal observed, “the potential for harm came in the form of reputational damage and humiliation to journal editors and reviewers.” But so what? The journal editors are professionals undertaking a public responsibility, not people in the street. If they screw up, why shouldn’t this be publicly known? Moreover, the journal editors are not voiceless: if their actions were defensible (as they may well have been), they and their supporters can set forth their reasons, and the rest of us can evaluate the competing arguments with our own brains.
Please note that the issue here is different from the one addressed in two recent articles, where it was proposed that research projects deemed to pose “low risk” might be exempted from IRB review (an issue that is quite delicate, as the comments on these articles show). Here I am not contending that the reputational risk to journal editors caught publishing grossly deficient articles is low. Quite the contrary: this risk can, depending on the circumstances, be severe. What I am contending, rather, is that journal editors do not deserve to be protected from this type of risk.
What we see here is a guy being punished not for violating sensible rules, but for violating senseless ideology.
Finally, The Washington Post calls out Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez for telling whoppers, which she does habitually. And it’s a shame, as I like many of her policy recommendations. But she keeps shooting herself in the foot with misstatements and a fulminating love of the limelight (h/t Heather Hastie for the link):
The Post:
Ocasio-Cortez deserves credit for using her high profile to bring attention to income inequality. However, she undermines her message when she plays fast and loose with statistics. A lot of Americans do not earn enough for a living wage, but we cannot find evidence that it is the majority. Amazon and Walmart pay well above the minimum wage, contrary to her statement, and it is tendentious to claim those companies specifically get some sort of a wealth transfer from the public when such benefits flow to all low-wage workers in many companies. Overall, she earns Three Pinocchios.
The new Representative is awarded three Pinocchios for her misstatements, which, on the Post’s ratings, represent “significant factual error and/or obvious contradictions. This gets into the realm of “mostly false.”
The Covington set-to should have been nothing. It happened miles away from most of us, and no one was hurt. The kids got on their bus and left. The native elder went on beating his drum. The Black Israelites went back to their bibles. Few of us are teens, few native Americans, few Black Israelites. But the media took it as some kind of Rorschach test and pitched their readers against each other based on which stereotype they chose: maga hat, tom-tom, bible with star of David. Where do we turn these days for facts without interpretation?
I would prefer facts with honest interpretation. In a sense the Covington video was a fact. The event was not staged and the video wasn’t altered. Unfortunately, it led to erroneous conclusions as it wasn’t the whole story.
There is no single source to turn to for facts without interpretation. The best one can do is to seek out sources from multiple points of view. I firmly believe that if you don’t regularly avail yourself to quality opinion from “the other side” you’re living in an ever strengthened bubble.
Sullivan brings up a good point. Trump has opened the door for people like Ocasio-Cortez, Tlaib, and Beto O’Rourke, who actually display characteristics of his which are otherwise decried daily in the press. They are inexperienced, rude, dishonest, and petty. CNN runs an article, ostensibly news, every time Trump makes a speech or does a press conference labled ‘x-number of outrageous/unbelievable things that Trump said.’ Their pronouncements are never treated with the same disdain. Ocasio-Cortez’s Green New Deal is treated as if it isn’t just a green wall. We are in a race to the bottom, and both parties need to step back, and remember what governing means. I don’t that is going to happen, and I am more and more convinced that Trump will win re-election.
This is more false equivalence. Trump is President and his lies get made into policy. He has also responded to being called on his lies by accusing the media of “fake news”. AOC is just exaggerating like virtually all politicians do. I am not trying to justify AOC’s lies. I wish she wouldn’t lie and I hope that she corrects this character flaw in the future.
Respectfully disagree, Paul, because all of these people are members of our government, and O’Rourke is running for President.
Respectfully disagree, DrBrydon, because Beto O’Rourke is not running for POTUS.
He did say that he is considering a run, and he is doing stuff to create a buzz about it. But of course that is far from an official declaration of running.
What’s wrong with calling out fake news? It’s rampant and we’ve just witnesses two stunning examples within the last few days. There is absolutely fake news, it’s damaging to our country and Trump is right to call it out.
You have to be kidding me. We are looking to Trump to tell us about fake news?
Well, I’m not saying he’s an infallible source but yeah, he’s accurately called out fake news many times.
His problem is he lies.
Yes. All politicians lie.
And they should be called out on it.
Fair enough.
Everyone lies. It is human nature. We all of us lie to ourselves and other people constantly. It is probably essential for our mental and social health. At least Trump is comfortable enough with his own human failings to admit that he is “no angel”. I certainly consider this an enormous saving grace and assume Trump voters do too. The mystery to me is why anti-Trumpers tend to be so extremely anti. I’m tempted to think it is largely snobbery.
“Yes. All politicians lie.”
Another false equivalence.
Almost all politicians prefer to tell the truth, or at least something close to it. Almost all politicians would prefer not to perpetrate a brazen outright lie, and hate to be caught out in one. That goes for everyone from Dubya to Clinton to Nixon.
tRump lies all the time and he *doesn’t care*. He can’t even be bothered to keep his story straight. He is the most barefaced, blatant liar in politics today.
cr
Ya got a real gift for understatement there, fella.
Thank you!
I absolutely agree with your assessment DrBrydon. I see Ocasio-Cortez as the anti-Trump, riding the same type of populist wave and displaying many of the same characteristics. Questions remain: can she match his political talent and is her message compelling enough to win over the electorate?
Jesus H. Christ, man, AOC’s a 29-year-old freshman congresswoman who’s destined to spend the next decade as a backbencher (assuming she even stays with this politics thing).
Trump is a 72-year-old grifter who’s spent his entire life working the long con. He’s miring this nation in the worst political scandal in its history and its worst constitutional crisis since the Civil War. He’s a corrupt, incompetent boob who happens to be commander-in-chief of the most fearsome military in world history and has sole discretionary authority over the nation’s nuclear arsenal — all while likely being compromised by a hostile foreign power. As such, he represents an existential threat to the Free World.
So, yeah, completely comparable. Sheesh.
You tell ’em, Ken!
+1
Dude, I’m referring to the similarities in their political dynamics, not claiming they’re comparable in every way. Sheesh indeed. She’s 29 and he’s 72? Wow, I never thought of that before!
You’re predicting AOC is destined to be a political backbencher? Are you unaware of the intense national attention she’s generating? She’s successfully authoring a large part of the narrative on the left these days. That gives her a great deal of power. What she ultimately does with it is up for grabs. I think she’ll probably (hopefully) not be able to rise too far, but because her ideas will be exposed as vacuous, not because she’s wallowing on the backbench.
“assuming she even stays with this politics thing”
Yeah, the siren sound of bartending will probably claim her once again.
“all while likely being compromised by a hostile foreign power.”
oooohhkaaaay.
If you’ve got a plausible alternative explanation for the known facts regarding Donald Trump, his campaign, and Russia, let’s give it a listen.
I don’t know what you’re talking about.
Obvs.
Here’s a primer for your edification.
That’s pretty funny Ken. I don’t need a primer. You were the one who put out the “Trump, Russia” allegations. I specifically asked you to give me your single, best example of what you’re alleging rather than an ungainly laundry list of alleged malfeasance (which is often a warning sign for a conspiracy theory) and yet…..you paste a link to an ungainly laundry list of alleged malfeasance that spans decades. Sorry. Won’t play. Want to provide that one best example?
That’s like Johnnie Cochran telling Marcia Clark to put on her one best piece of evidence against OJ, then let’s go straight to jury deliberations.
What’s most damning about Trump and Russia is the interweaving of the longstanding, multitudinous ties between Trump, his inner circle, and Russia; Trump’s otherwise-inexplicable actions and statements benefiting Russia and Vladimir Putin; and Trump’s unceasing stream of lies and deceptions to cover up those contacts and actions and to obstruct the investigation.
If you can’t be bothered to learn those facts, that’s your business. But you do your credibility no favor by flaunting your ignorance.
This is exactly how conspiracy theorists work. They present an unending stream of innuendo, coincidences, questions, etc. yet when challenged to examine the particulars of a single one the paucity of their argument is exposed.
Take your vague list for example: “…the interweaving of the longstanding, multitudinous ties between Trump, his inner circle, and Russia…”
What, you mean there’s evidence of international businessmen doing business internationally? Gasp! Prime the firing squad!
Or another: “…Trump’s otherwise-inexplicable actions and statements benefiting Russia and Vladimir Putin…”
You mean like maintaining sanctions against Russia, imposing tougher new sanctions against Russia, heavily arming Ukraine, expelling Russian diplomats, shutting down Russian consulates, challenging Europes dependence on Russian oil, opposing the Kremlin-approved leader in Venezuela?
This is why dealing with conspiracy theories is tedious. You debunk a core tenet and you’re just presented with another.
And if you’re tempted to give a laundry list of supposed malfeasance, don’t. Just give the strongest single piece of evidence for what you’re alleging, and we can go from there.
Ocasio-Cortez is 29 years old and bit naive. It’s unfair to compare her to Trump. Give her a time to mature.
I didn’t read Sullivan’s article, only the excerpts shown here, but it seems an overreaction to an overreaction. When I saw the Covington video, I was disgusted by the MAGA kid but I don’t feel too guilty about it. I assumed it had been fairly investigated by the media but it looks like it wasn’t. We all know by now that we can be fooled by memes, videos, and bad reporting. And we must accept some responsibility ourselves to vet sources and avoid getting taken in by provocative and fake images. Still, some things are bound to slip through our filters. We will occasionally be reminded that we can be fooled. I’m not going to beat myself up over it. Sullivan’s tone seems to be way over the top.
Paul Topping, I like your post. My reaction is “A pox on all three houses.” The Black Hebrew Israelites seem to be the most obnoxious, but being black and religious puts you near the top of the “oppressed peoples” pecking order, so I have seen little condemnation of them. The native American seems to have some factual accuracy problems, but I will grant he may be telling the truth about he was just trying to defuse the situation. And I think I know an arrogant smirk when I see one, but the Covington student says he was just trying to smile. He needs to practice his smile. And I think the Guardian sub-head was quite accurate: conservatives have become good at getting their alternate reality accepted by the main stream media.
Except the Guardian is talking about a very specific “alternate reality” in this case, and it’s not an alternate reality. The Guardian decided that, rather than apologize and retract, it should blame conservative media for making them look wrong. Well, they were wrong, they were engaging in creating an alternative reality, and now they want to blame the other side for that as well.
Conservative and liberal media (and conservatives and liberals generally) are both guilty of constsntly creating their own alternative realities at this point, and it’s one of the things that’s tearing the country apart. If we can’t even agree on what reality is (especially after all the facts about Covington came out and proved just how wrong The Guardian and it’s ilk were), how the hell can we even have a functioning democracy? And what ever happened to liberals trying to be better than conservatives, rather than simply employing the same tactics?
The guardian just wants to blame conservatives for anything, even mistakes made by liberal publications and people. Everyone on both sides needs to step up and stop acting like children in cliques.
I still think that the “liberal reality” – these kids are arrogant jerks – is more true than the “conservative reality” – these kids are just victims of liberal slander.
I agree but it is a complex function. Some liberals definitely overreacted based on their social media statements. My own feelings were of the “I’d like to smack the smirk right off that kid’s face” variety. Of course, people would overreact to that statement and accuse me of calling for violence. However, I don’t do everything I would “like” to do.
“My own feelings were of the ‘I’d like to smack the smirk right off that kid’s face’ variety.”
Just a question out of genuine curiosity: are those still your feelings since the reality of the situation became apparent?
Mostly. The kid was still being a jerk and I have little respect for the MAGA hat. But, just in case you missed it, I wouldn’t actually slap the kid or encourage anyone else to.
But how was he being a jerk? All he did was stand there and smile while someone walked up to him and banged a drum in his face.
Also, nervous smiles often look like smirks. He had every reason to be nervous given the situation.
Well, it’s the most natural thing in the world for fifteen year old boys to be jerky on occasion but extremely troubling and potentially dangerous for a lockstep liberal press to publicly slander them for doing so.
I don’t know how you can say it’s definitely reality that they’re arrogant jerks, as it seems the only evidence for that is (1) that one kid smiling, and (2) them wearing MAGA hats. All the other stuff initially reported — that they were shouting “build the wall”; that they had surrounded Phillips to intimidate him and did the same to the Black Hebrew Israelites; that they were standing their ground in a display of animosity rather than waiting at their agreed upon spot to be picked up by their charter bus — have been proven false.
But let’s say they are arrogant jerks. So what? The “liberal reality” was all the things I just mentioned above, all of which were proven false, and instead so much of the liberal community is defending their initial treatment of these kids.
The kids certainly aren’t heroes either. But I don’t care. And, frankly, they showed an enormous amount of restraint for a group of people that had been suffering constant slurs, racism, and homophobia through a loudspeaker for quite a long time. Most adults wouldn’t even react as placidly as they did.
Furthermore, the most important reality we should be discussing here is how the media completely fucked this up, how adults — from celebrities to journalists to everyday people — called for violence, doxxing, and harassment of a bunch of teenagers, and how many of these publications, journalists, and everyday people are still refusing to admit to being wrong.
+ 1
They were victims of slander, for they were harassed by adult bigots, were labeled “arrogant jerks” for not being respectful enough to these bigots, and then one of the bigots (Nathan Phillips) spread lies to glorify himself and character-assassinate the kids day after day, using the most respectable media.
The mere fact that people like you continue to vilify these innocent kids speaks volumes about the alternate reality.
I don’t think it was a smirk.
I think it was a bemused smile, but who knows really.
People have different natural expressions of their face and you really need to know someone before you start judging their facial expressions.
Or at least observe the person in a range of different environments.
There was nothing in any video that showed that kid to be disgusting, or anything wrong, unless you were looking for it, expecting it, demanding it even, which is the mentality that started and drove the storm.
And, it is all too familiar.
Are you comparing Trump to a storm? If so, I can’t wait for it to be over, silly MAGA hats and all.
The storm is the media storm, the twitter storm, the mob storm.
Trump has little to do with anything going on here.
Unless it is the so called Trump derangement syndrome.
And, I think being at a pro life demo is worse than wearing a hat, which may have been done as stir, but these are still kids.
They were brought to the pro-life demo by their school.
And i reiterate, the way I see it is that the only way anyone can view that kid as doing anything wrong is if they are looking through the lens of some dogma that warps reality to fit the narrative.
White, male, evil.
I called it as I saw it. You calling me names isn’t going to change anything.
He didn’t call you any names. But I’d also like to see a justification for saying this kid is some kind of disgusting jerk besides the fact that he has different political beliefs from yours (and mine).
If someone came through a crowd drumming, I would assume it was some kind of parade and step aside. Instead, this kid stood his ground and had a nasty sort of grin. I could see his buddies in the background, many with MAGA hats. I know from being a teenage boy once myself that his behavior was partly encouraged by the presence of his buddies. The fact that several had MAGA hats told me that affinity with Trump and all his bad policies was most likely something his group had in common. The belligerence to the drummer is part of that way of thinking and encouraged by Trump’s rhetoric, especially with impressionable young kids. And there you have it!
Although I thought, as many did, that I would like to slap the grin off the kid’s face, it is just an expression and I wouldn’t ever act on it. Though if I was present and the kids physically threatened the drummer, I like to think I would have intervened.
I feel my reaction was a natural and honest one based on the only video I’ve seen. My judgement of his behavior was not that of a judge and jury or a proper investigation but based only on seeing the video. This allows me and others to judge without doing a proper investigation. We’re not condemning the kid to prison and not doing a proper investigation. We leave that to others.
Now more details of the event have become known, it really doesn’t change my opinion. He’s still just an empty-headed teenager being a jerk and part of a MAGA-hatted group of jerks. Kids don’t get punished for that.
It’s pretty remarkable how many assumptions are packed into your idea of what this kid was doing, why, and what it meant. There’s no evidence for any of it. You’ve simply indicted him based on your feelings.
As I said, it was an opinion based solely on viewing the video. It is not my responsibility to determine punishment, if any, for this kid. We don’t jail adults for being jerks, let alone a 15-year-old kid, so I can’t imagine giving him more than a “don’t be a jerk” talking to. He’s wearing a MAGA hat, as are several others of his group, so we can safely assume his politics which include a strong white supremacy component. Trump supporters, at a minimum, are ok with racism and xenophobia as it features strongly in his policies and in his speech. Regardless of who walked up to whom, the kid stood his ground and wore a shit-eating grin. He is definitely confronting the drummer. The drummer’s demeanor is more that of someone confronted. If the kid felt threatened or merely inconvenienced by the walking drummer, he would not be smiling and would have stepped aside. Even after all the details have been revealed, these facts still hold.
So, because Sandmann reacted differently than you said you would react in this situation, he is “an empty-headed teenager being a jerk and part of a MAGA-hatted group of jerks”.
To me, the drummer is a jerk, and far worse. He is a vile old lier who tried to destroy a bunch of high school kids because they silently, peacefully resisted his bullying. (There is circulating information that he has a criminal record, but I have not yet seen it confirmed by a reliable source; and anyway, most people with criminal records are more benign than Phillips.)
I make almost no comment on the MAGA story because it just does not interest me. The over reactions of the so-called media on all sides of the issues stopped bothering me long ago. I just cannot make time for it.
I believe Ocasio-Cortez, the new congress woman from NY will have a hard time being taken seriously by most of the people in the country who would normally give her a break. She talks way too much and as shown here, can be over the top. To find yourself in the same region as Trump with the facts is not a good place to be. She should shut up and maybe take a few lesions from others in her party. If you want to change the world this is not the direction that will get it done. Since she has been given a very nice position on the intelligence committee in the House I hope she gives her comments more thought.
Correction – Oversight committee (Elijah Cummings)
“She talks way too much and as shown here, can be over the top. To find yourself in the same region as Trump with the facts is not a good place to be. She should shut up and maybe take a few lesions from others in her party. If you want to change the world this is not the direction that will get it done.”
This is a surprising statement. She should shut up? Seriously? Yes, she needs to get her facts right. No, she does not need to shut up. This country has long lacked visionary and idealistic leaders. That’s a big reason why the country is in trouble and is stuck so far to the right.
I think she should keep her head down, her ears open, and her mouth closed (except for the central issues she campaigned on, or key issues she feels aren’t being addressed by House leadership) while she learns the statecraft of being a US congressperson.
All this obsessive attention isn’t doing her, or her Party, or her nation any good (though I readily admit, I generally get a hella kick outta her). 🙂
I think she is doing what you said she should, Ken. These are the kinds of issues she campaigned on. We need people talking about radical ideas, to move the center of discussion more to the left. The only caveat is that she needs to get her facts right.
This “increasingly demented era of hatred and tribalism” is starting to look very similar to the medieval theological disputes. They have in common the demented element and the fact that they deal with imaginary problems.
However, the hatred and tribalism, even if starting from imaginary problems, creates very real ones.
The Boghossian affair was getting opaque to me. Why were they going ‘after’ the researchers? But this information really clarified things.
I thought he was getting in trouble for falsifying research data and then giving it to reviewers? I don’t know that I’d go as far to say he is being ‘persecuted’. Seems that perhaps he is flouting the rules and the institution finally got tired of it.
The rules have never been used in this way and we’re never intended to. He’s being persecuted for embarrassing humanities journals and editors.
Really? On the false data front? He made up data for his pretend papers and submitted them, I thought.
He is not being punished for falsifying data (in fact, as far as I’m aware, there was no real “data” in his article like statistics that were falsified). As the article Jerry posted notes, “Portland State is accusing Boghossian of experimentation on human subjects — namely, the journal editors and reviewers — without IRB approval.”
An article I was reading on it said the following:
So I think there are two issues here – both of which PSU is investigating.
Well, I’ll be interested to see how this plays out. Could you give me a link to that article? I want to know what data was supposedly falsified.
Sure thing, I’ll be interested to see how it plays out too. Couldn’t remember what PCC(E)’s rules for links were, but I’ll imbed it here.
Thanks for the link. I look forward to reading it later.
Just FYI, I’ve noticed that the auto-moderator only moderates comments if you post more than two links.
Professor Boghossian is being sanctioned by the Portland State administration for not applying federal rules on the protection of human subjects in medical research to the editors of journals to which he submitted ludicrous papers to test their ability to detect bullshit. If the boy who observed that “the emperor has no clothes” were at Portland State, he would no doubt be subjected to the same inquisition–especially if the emperor were in a department of Grievance Studies.
Meanwhile, the editors at the journals get to happily go about their business. If anyone should be sanctioned or fired, it’s them.
I’m guessing those rules were adopted in light of things like the Milgram and “Stanford prison” experiments back in the Sixties and Seventies.
I suspect they’ve been wrenched from that context and used against Boghossian because he’s embarrassed powerful academic interests (and made others nervous enough about what could come next to want to make an example of him to deter others).
Yes, apparently, once “studies” are established, there is no way back.
Are we supposed to congratulate WalMart for
“paying more than the minimum wage”? All new WalMart employees are given an orientation which instructs them on how to apply for food stamps.
AOC is arguing for a “living wage”, which means a wage which does not require you to seek public assistance to supplement your income.
AOC is not telling whoppers habitually – she makes occasional (occasio?) mistakes, sure. It’s not surprising – she has a lot more on-air and ad-lib time than average. But she posts corrections on-line and does not repeat them. Beware of the multiple campaigns trying to put this fearless woman into a box.
Guess who also make occasional mistakes? Answer: fact checking organizations. And not just factual mistakes. Many of the issues being discussed by AOC are complicated,context is important and context can be misinterpreted by so-called fact-checkers.
Each instance of a supposed fact fail must be analysed on its own merits.
These seem like good points. Many say, and I say as well: She is young and I hope she grows into the job.
My thoughts exactly. And I love how (like Pelosi) she riles up conservatives.
Yes, I agree, minimum wage is so ludicrous that paying just above it only means you not totally inhuman.
There is an argument to be made showing that taxpayers are subsidizing these companies.
Food stamps would be one example.
Agreed. AOC made some misstatements — it’s a substantial minority (rather than “majority”) of working people who don’t bring home a living wage. And Walmart and Amazon aren’t the only companies whose employees depend on public assistance to get by, but they’re among the worst malefactors in this regard. Characterizing these as “whoppers” is a whopper-like exaggeration itself.
Criticizing Amazon may have hit a bit close to home for Jeff Bezos’s WaPo.
Don’t forget we only have twelve years left to live!
That is a perfect example of how an innocent slip of tongue is blown out of all proportion and context.
And what she had to say is, perhaps, the most important thing any politician has said in decades. And that is, the consensus of most climate scientists is that humanity has about a dozen years to drastically eliminate carbon burning, or we will likely hit tipping points that will take control of snowballing AGW more and more out of our hands.
Interestingly, around year 2030 is also the year that many people have predicted we will see a convergence of events that will truly end the status quo for our comfortable society.
People are guessing – and it is just a guess – that 2030 is when we may see the first year when we may not grow enough crops because of weather changes; that we will start to see water depletion in our ancient aquifers which will also affect crop success; that we will reach degrees of higher temperature and drought levels that will also decrease crop success.
Aligned with these possibilities are also trends which speak to economic instability, the price of gasoline and heating oil, problems with drinking water supply, the price and availability of food in stores, etc.
IOW, 2030 is when we may reflect back as a species and say “That is when the **** really first hit the fan”.
I agree that slips of the tongue should not be taken too seriously.
Sullivan’s previous piece, on gay men in the Catholic priesthood, is also well worth reading. He can be aggravating sometimes but, damn, can he write.
The Guardian can’t die quickly enough. It’s a fucking embarrassment. If it was a dog in that state and you didn’t put it down you would be banned from keeping pets.
AOC has become a symbol for both the left and the right. For the left she stands for the young, progressive future of the country. For the right she is a radical, a threat to the status quo, which is in the process of crumbling. She is not to be blamed for this condition; happenstance favored her. After defeating a longtime Democratic representative, high in the Democratic hierarchy, the media deemed her worthy of great attention. Undeserving of it, she nevertheless took advantage of it, doing what any politician would do: grabbing attention whenever one can.
Some of her ideas, based on probably nothing more than they sounded good, are nevertheless worthy of serious discussion. For example, her call for a much higher marginal tax rate (a concept conservatives do not understand or consciously lie about and sends Sean Hannity apocalyptic) on the very rich has support among many economists, Paul Krugman being one of them.
AOC may not be a policy geek, but her opinions have raised awareness of issues that deserve to be considered and debated, which is a good thing.
https://www.nytimes.com/2019/01/05/opinion/alexandria-ocasio-cortez-tax-policy-dance.html?action=click&module=Opinion&pgtype=Homepage
Forgive me if I don’t take seriously anything Paul ‘Broken Clock’ Krugman has to say.
Yeah, I don’t think AOC’s critics care much about what policies she advocates, and even less what some pointy-head economist thinks of them. The critics are more in tune with that old lefty Aaron Sorkin who pontificated, “I really like the new crop of young people who were just elected to Congress. They now need to stop acting like young people.”
Elizabeth Warren has also come out with a “tax the rich” policy. It’s nothing America hasn’t done before. The tax policies that built the greatest middle class in the history of the world is now seen as “radical”. As a historian, it must drive you a bit crazy.
It’s ironic that these tax-the-rich policies from 50+ years ago went a long way toward making America great. If politicians like Warren, Ocasio, and others can get us back to those policies, it will go a long way to bringing back a real middle class.
Trump was on tv yesterday saying that the Democrats would never be satisfied with a marginal tax rate of 70% — that, if they got control, they would want “double that.”
Add basic arithmetic to the subjects Donald J. Trump knows fuck-all about.
Well, it could technically work! Every year, you need to make more money than the last, so you can pay an additional 40% of the income you made the previous year, plus your full income. So, in year one, you give 100% of your income to the government, which, for the purpose of simplicity, let’s say is $100,000. In year two, you give have to give the government $140,000. In year three, assuming the Democrats are just the worst people on earth, the 40% is calculated based on the total amount from the previous year (rather than the income from year one), so you’d have to pay $196,000. And so on…
It works!
At some point, probably two years ago but who can keep track, Walmart set out baskets at Thanksgiving and/or Christmas, soliciting donations to help Walmart employees have a decent holiday. The fact that the employees needed help because they did not make enough on their own working at Walmart was apparently not enough irony to phase the management responsible for this action.
Arguing that lots of companies have employees on food stamps reinforces AOC’s point, rather than weakening it. No one with a full time job or its modern “36 hours/week part-time” equivalent should need to be on food stamps.
Also AOC is not a spreadsheet policy wonk. She is not arguing detailed facts, just general trends and observations.
“A lot of Americans do not earn enough for a living wage, but we cannot find evidence that it is the majority.”
The point is “a lot of Americans”, not whether it is over or under 50%. It should be less than 10%, and it really should be 0%. Whether it is a majority is irrelevant. Willfully missing the point is lame.
We shouldn’t expect companies to give employees a living wage when laws don’t require it. Nor should we expect rich people to let go of their money willingly. Both should be taken care of by legislation, tax policy, etc. People and companies seek to maximize their situation while playing within the rules set by government. Government’s role in a capitalist system is to set the rules and define the playing field.
And the massive corruption of government by big money to ensure legislation to ban or reduce the ability of the low paid to get a decent wage, unions for example?
And, I do expect companies to pay a living wage.
But how does your expectation make this happen? Do you really think that we’re going to get a living wage for all workers by shaming every single company into it?
Yes, big money corrupts government. The GOP’s plan to gradually eliminate government is not the solution. Companies would be even less likely to pay a minimum wage. Instead, we need good government to keep the playing field in working order.
Expectations are what motivate people.
An expectation that companies in a modern civilized country ‘should’ be socially responsible would move people to vote for a party that advocated that.
Propaganda over the years has been quite successful in persuading people to vote against their own best interests.
Anti communism has been a deep well to use against people advocating for unions and the like.
Expectations that companies be socially responsible do have an impact.
The environment is a big one at the moment.
So yes, my long winded way of saying that expectations matter.
Nice speech but I still don’t see how you are going to shame every company in the US into giving people a wage that is not demanded by the marketplace or by law. Every company has competitors. If you shame one company, their competitors will take advantage. What you are talking about is Trump-style bullying. As soon as the glare of media attention moves on, companies will simply fall back to their previous behavior. The only thing that will work is economic structure enforced by laws with penalties for violations. Minimum wage laws help at the low end but do little to bring a living wage to all or deal with gross executive pay and income inequality in general.
Look at the people our “populist” President Donald Trump has put in key economic positions in his cabinet — Steve Mnuchin, Wilbur Ross, Mich Mulvaney (the list could go on and on). A plutocrat’s dream team.
That Sullivan article (at least the part you quote) articulates some huge points beautifully, and with extra force by placing them in the context of a real life example, complete with horrific reactions from left and right. So glad you posted that.
AOC seems to be the glam freshman of the moment, but I hope due attention is given to Elizabeth Warren’s proposals. To me they go to the heart of addressing income inequality in a way that might work, are based on more than passion, hold up to scrutiny – and she has her facts straight.
“Elizabeth Warren has her facts straight” is the funniest thing I’ve heard all week.
I’m curious, Matt. Of the crop of candidates so far, who are you leaning towards?
Sherrod Brown. I will never ever cast a vote for Warren in any election. The more I learn about Beto, the more I fear he is yet another untrustworthy demagogue. The rest range from ‘meh’ to ‘uggh’.
My money is on Kamala Harris, cuz she’s smart and ruthless.
I have to say, without having done exhaustive research, I quite like Kamala Harris. The whole ‘but she’s a cop!’ thing just doesn’t bother me. I suppose I am generally pleasantly inclined towards folks in law enforcement. She’s a hell of an interrogator and sharp as a tack.
One can be impressed by Harris, but I don’t know if it’s possible to truly like her. As I said, she’s ruthless.
On the Guardian’s thunk piece, the reporting on the Covington mess was actually unethical so far as I can see.
The youths involved were 15, so publishing their pictures without their parents’ consent was iffy all on its own, as was the failure to verify sources.
The first point on minimising harm on the USPA code is:
https://uspressassociation.org/page.php?57
There was no sign of this in the initial reporting on Covington.
The Guardian’s code of conduct also urges special caution be taken with any story that involves children – which it defines as those under 16.
What gets me is in South Africa, we also have a rule against reporting the identities of kids in this circumstance (being defined as under 18 here) and yet I saw this on South African media too.
That’s interesting.
Not just the reporting either eh, all those jumping to rally violence against them were going up against children.
The whole thing is beyond disgusting.
On the Guardian’s thunk piece, the reporting on the Covington mess was actually unethical so far as I can see.
The youths involved were 15, so publishing their pictures without their parents’ consent was iffy all on its own, as was the failure to verify sources.
The first point on minimising harm on the USPA code is:
https://uspressassociation.org/page.php?57
There was no sign of this in the initial reporting on Covington.
The Guardian’s code of conduct also urges special caution be taken with any story that involves children – which it defines as those under 16.
What gets me is in South Africa, we also have a rule against reporting the identities of kids in this circumstance (being defined as under 18 here) and yet I saw this on South African media too.
Eh, double post. The storm here must have done something weird.
I don’t see Ocasio-Cortez using the word “majority” instead of “a large number of”(I think the actual number was 30 or 40%) to be a significant error. She may have been exaggerating to make a point, but, compared to Donald tRump and his White House staff and Cabinet, it’s microscopic. I’d give her one Pinocchio.
agreed
+1
One point of contention for me in Sullivan’s article is “Yes, they should not have been wearing MAGA hats to a pro-life march.”
That’s an odd opinion to me as the First Amendment gives everybody the right to wear whatever they damn please.
He’s obviously talking about it being a bad idea, not illegal. That’s a huge distinction that is often lost these days.
Why is it a bad idea to wear a piece of clothing with the slogan of your preferred politician?
I didn’t say it was a bad idea. Sullivan said that. Ask him. That said, I am no fan of MAGA hats.
Uh, ok. What I said in the first place still holds for me: That’s an odd opinion to me as the First Amendment gives everybody the right to wear whatever they damn please.
The left only sees MAGA hats as a signal of support for trump. But MAGA has transcended trump and is now an icon for the pushback to the Regressive Left’s Kulturkampf.
The point is that wearing a hat that honors a thrice-married roué who spent his weekend in Tahoe raw-dawging pornstars and playmates while his new wife was at home nursing their newborn child may not be entirely consistent with the Christian values ostensibly espoused by Covington Catholic High.
Right. A MAGA hat represents much more than a nod to their “favorite politician”. It represents all the lying, bad policies, xenophobia, racism, institution destroying of the worst president in US history.
I guess a “Yes We Can” t-shirt represents interventionist foreign policy, drone strikes, extrajudicial sentencing and execution of American citizens, mass deportation…
My point is how easy it is to do this with any President. And I happen to think Obama was a pretty good one and Trump is the worst President in modern history. But to ascribe every problem Trump has and that you have with Trump to anyone who wears that hat is to do the same as I just did in my first paragraph.
I had to think for a second which politician used “Yes We Can”. It is hardly equivalent to MAGA in symbolic value. Both are stupid slogans, IMHO. MAGA was promoted by Trump in many of his disgusting rallies where he hypes up his crowd of know-nothings with lies. It is also really doubtful a crowd of teenagers visiting the Lincoln Memorial would have worn “Yes We Can” hat regardless of who won the presidency. Big difference.
I’m reminded of Ronald Reagan’s slogan: “Let’s Make America Great Again”. In part his strategy was the same as tRump’s. Build a constituency out of the people who are unhappy, who feel they’ve lost out in the jobs and money department. Logically, it has to start by instilling resentment and claiming a vote for ME is the only way to take revenge.
That was not at all the point. The point was that, if a piece of apparel supporting the current President represents every reprehensible thing that President has ever said and done and that every person that says or wears the slogan of that President must believe in all those things, a Yes We Can t-shirt or chant represents support for mass deportation, interventionist foreign policy, drone killings, and extrajudicial sentencing and assassination of American citizens on foreign soil, etc.
An opinion piece on CNN goes into detail about
Why Trump’s MAGA hats have become a potent symbol of racism
By Issac Bailey
Why the hats matter…
Exactly!
Hogwash.
So Trump apologists say.
Trump purposely made the hat a symbol of his administration and his policies. People who wear the hat can’t now claim it is only because they voted for Trump. Now they know Trump’s policies, the hat is a way to let everyone know they agree with them. Sure, wearing the hat doesn’t signal agreement with every last thing Trump does. That would be ridiculous.
Paul, I agree with you that wearing MAGA is a symbol of support for him and his policies, and as you point out, that doesn’t have to mean 100% support across the board. I think we would just disagree about the nature of his policies. That CNN piece above is ludicrous.
I didn’t read the CNN piece but I am curious as to why you think it is “ludicrous”. If it is based on “Trump isn’t a racist” then we have nothing to talk about.
Well, I guess we have nothing to talk about then.
But, if you believe that ending abortion is the most important issue, then it makes perfect sense to support Trump because he’s appointing conservative judges all over the country.
Furthermore, one could say that supporting Obama, who proved to be an interventionist and deported the most people of any President in history, is inconsistent with the ostensible values of many liberals who supported him.
In the end, most people support who they support because they think they’re supposed to and because they’re tribal creatures. Most people don’t really think these things through the way you and I do.
I was simply responding to rustybrown’s apparent puzzlement over why Andrew Sullivan might think it incongruous for Catholic school boys to wear MAGA hats to a pro-life rally.
You’re right that the ultimate justification always comes down to the appointment of anti-abortion judges. But the majority of judges appointed by Trump (excepting for some downstream stinkers even GOP senators couldn’t hold their noses and support) could as easily have been appointed by any of the other 937 contenders for the 2016 Republican presidential nomination. That’s certainly true of Trump’s two SCOTUS appointees.
As such, it seems thin gruel to justify the hypocrisy of evangelicals and right-wing Catholic in their support of Trump — you know, the very same people who went apoplectic over the appalling example being set for their little kiddies when they found out Bubba got a blowy in The Oval.
Hmmm. I think I made it pretty clear at the outset that my objections to what Sullivan said were about free speech issues and not about religious or subjective considerations.
Sullivan was addressing the wisdom of wearing such garb, not the constitutional freedom to do so, which is not in doubt.
He said they shouldn’t have worn it. I’m saying that’s a wrongheaded opinion whether he’s talking about legality, wisdom, or clashing colors. It’s a free country and I see no problem with somebody wearing the slogan of our duly elected President. I guess I’m a radical.
You see no contradiction between the sleazy character Trump has continually displayed over the course of his lifetime and the virtues espoused by evangelicals and Catholics?
You can’t see why a devout Catholic like Sullivan might think that wearing MAGA hats to a pro-life rally might imprudently emphasize those contradictions and, thus, be counterproductive?
Or are you just playing obtuse for the spite of it?
I’ll try to be as clear as I can. My initial reaction to his statement was freedom of speech but in my opinion. “They shouldn’t have worn those hats” is a silly assertion to make on any grounds.
Sure, maybe the religious contradictions are the paramount concern for Sullivan as to why he thinks they should not have worn those hats. Not sure, he doesn’t really explain. But if that’s the case, I still think it’s fatuous. Maybe the Covington kids place a higher priority on defending the lives of the unborn from a decades long systemic genocide (as they might put it) than slamming someone for past marital indiscretions? Seems plausible.
My take on Sullivan’s “they shouldn’t have worn the hats” is simple. The kids were supposed to be there to demonstrate against abortion, not hold a mini Trump rally. Of course they had the right to wear the hats but it wasn’t consistent with their supposed intent.
So you’re quite sure of their intent, are you? Interesting.
I guess I prefer a live and let live approach to apparel rather than “your hat is not consistent with your intent, comrade” but to each his own.
I think we can safely assume that their hats were indicative of their intent, their thinking. And, in fact, a result of deliberate coordination. The probability is low that all those MAGA hats in the video were the result of a random process where each kid chose a hat at random from a pile of hats as they left on their trip or from their hotel that morning. Same for the theory that all the MAGA-wearers thought to themselves, “Hmmm. This is an anti-abortion rally. Which hat in my pile most says ‘anti-abortion’? Ok, I’m going with MAGA.” As Occam would say, it is likely that they are ardent Trumpers and wanted to show that to the world. Perhaps the non-Magas are not Trumpers or simply forgot to bring their hats.
“…it is likely that they are ardent Trumpers and wanted to show that to the world.”
And what in blazes is wrong with that?
I don’t think it’s hypocrisy, just as I don’t think anti-war, pro-immigration liberals loving Obama is hypocrisy. Hypocrisy implies a level of knowledge and thought to the point where one understands that the person they’re supporting contradicts what they believe in. I simply don’t think the average person thinks things through to that point. I think the average person basically has a dichotomy in their head of “Democrat good, will do what I want; Republican bad, will do things I don’t want,” and vice versa.
Hell, I know that most average people I’ve spoken to really don’t think beyond such simple dichotomies, and I live in a corner of the world where most people I talk to are usually of above average intelligence. Most people don’t even know the actual policies of the candidates they support, nor how their system of government works, nor whether or how the things they want done can/will be done.
I don’t think it takes much thought or awareness of current events to be aware that Donald Trump isn’t a paragon of the virtues evangelicals espouse. Certainly, it is no secret to the thought-leaders of the evangelical community who’ve thrown their unwavering support behind Trump — such hypocrites nonpareil as Jerry Falwell, Jr., and Robert Jeffress and John Hagee. These “pastors” long asserted the nation’s need to have a “godly man” of righteous Christian rectitude in the White House.
Now they’ve sold their souls worshiping the golden calf behind the Resolute Desk.
I think we both know we’re not talking about the Jerry Falwell, Jr.’s of the world here. They don’t believe in anything but the power of the almighty dollar.
But, with regard to that first sentence: like I said about Obama, nobody is a paragon of the virtues most people who vote for them care about. I feel like you’re really dancing around what I’m bringing up in these comments.
Maybe I’m not clear on what exactly we’re discussing here, BJ. This sub-thread has been about why Andrew Sullivan thought it imprudent for Catholic schoolboys to wear MAGA hats to a pro-life rally.
My comments here haven’t been directed to the underlying kerfuffle at the Lincoln Memorial.
Sorry, I assumed that we were talking at this point about the average person, and about how, if we try to model the mind of the average person, they’re not engaging in hypocrisy because their thought process doesn’t go as far as you’re suggesting.
If we’re talking about people like Jerry Falwell Jr., I think people like him on both sides do nothing but engage in hypocrisy. They build power by making connections with and promoting people who don’t actually comport with the values they espouse, and they don’t really hold any values at all besides self-enrichment and gaining more power/followers. A good example of this on the Left is the leaders of the WMI.
Politics is, as the cliché has it, the art of compromise. But if you’re willing to compromise on values you’ve spent a lifetime loudly and proudly espousing as sacrosanct, that’s hypocrisy.
Evangelicals have damaged their brand, probably beyond repair (politically speaking), by embracing a character like Trump. And it’s going to get worse from here as they struggle to decide at what point they must abandon Trump’s sinking ship.
The evangelical’s main reason for staying with Trump at this stage (beyond the sunk-cost fallacy) is their anticipation that RBG may croak, and Trump will get another appointment to SCOTUS, one that will ensure that there’s a conservative, religious majority to overrule Roe v. Wade. They may yet decide, nonetheless, that, as the flood waters rise against Trump, they’d just as soon have Mike Pence — one of their own, after all — make that appointment.
As a former criminal defense lawyer, you must be very good at modelling the minds of the average Joe and Jane (unless you were a really bad lawyer, which I don’t think was the case 😛 ). If you get past your hatred of Trump and his supporters and think about these situations logically, I can’t imagine you would disagree that most people don’t come close to breaking these things down the way we do.
We have no reason to think that the high schoolers hold Christian values (or are Christian in any respect). Their parents placed them in a Catholic school, and the school dragged them to a pro-life rally.
These kids are as likely to be echoing their parents’ political support for Trump as they are to be echoing their parent’s religious beliefs.
Teenage children tend to embrace both their politics and their religion either by adopting those of their parents or by rebelling against them. I’d bet that the embrace or rebellion goes in tandem, politics and religion, both or neither.
What was it the great Russian novelist wrote, “happy families are all alike; every unhappy family votes for Trump”? 🙂
I am actually surprised by US Catholics supporting Trump. I’d expect them to support the largely Catholic illegal immigration that, if sustained, may eventually make the USA a Catholic-majority country.
I ran across this today:
https://metro.co.uk/2019/01/26/man-interrogated-police-liking-transphobic-tweet-8395224/
Man interrogated by police for liking a tweet that mocks transsexuals. The officer told him it would be recorded as a “hate incident”.
One would think the police would have better things to do. To be clear I have no problem with transsexuals, I just think this is the police going well over the line.
Yes, the British police seem to having a case of acute SJW poisoning.
Bugger. Now I want to know what the limerick was. So I can post it all over the net. You know, Streisand Effect…
This is definitely some cop going way over the line into Thought Police territory.
cr
This is scary. Reminds me how a year or two ago that same police was looking for some guy who ranted against Muslims in a but. The same police that habitually overlooks Muslim gangs enslaving native girls.
Spittle cleaning products must have spiked through this episode of availability heuristic turbo powered biases.
Given the track record for Illinois governors, he’s probably more likely to do time downstate.
I mean, who’s Pritzger to fracture good order? 🙂
I dunno, since Nancy Pelosi broke a heel off in his lumpy orange ass on the government shutdown, Trump seems to be playing defense, and his “base” to have grown restive.
With all his brilliant moves, culminating in the government shutdown, Donald Trump seems bent on wrecking the Republican Party, and assuring a Democratic sweep in 2020. Why, I could almost forgive Vladimir Vladimirovich, Julian Assange, and Jill Stein for doing all they did to help The Donald get into a position to provide this service.
Agree completely, Jon.
The scales may be falling from some of his subjects’ eyes, such that they can no longer ignore their emperor’s nakedness.
On marijuana.
The mechanism of ingestion, dabbing vs bong vs joint, doesn’t make a difference. As with different alcohols, you must alter quantity with concentration when using marijuana. A vape pen can be a simple tool to easily control your intake, something difficult with other mechanisms, but you can’t smoke it like a joint or you’ll end up immobile. It’s kind of an odd thing for Andrew Sullivan to complain about and I think he’s off base. Choose the appropriate tool for the job and have fun (though I think various forms of resin use are actually better for therapeutic use).
Don’t get too excited, they are only going back to work for three weeks. If there us no compromise by both parties, then were are shut down again for at least another month. This is not settled or over yet.
True but it is hard to imagine Trump wanting to shut down the government again, regardless of his threats to do so. He will try to go the emergency funding route but I suspect he has gotten a lot of calls from GOP politicians begging him not to do that. He’s still stuck himself between a rock and a hard place.
I don’t know who Trump listens to. Senators McConnell, Isackson and a few others were influential in getting the three week extension.
The insiders say Trump is increasingly alone in his decision making. Still, I have to think Trump considers his shutdown as a failure. If he did it again, virtually everyone would question his sanity. He will threaten it again as taking it off the table would be tantamount to admitting its failure the first time around. His story on restoring gov’t funding for 3 weeks is to give Congress more time to negotiate. My guess is that Congress will come up with something. As long as it contains something that Trump can spin into a wall and claim a win, he’ll sign it.
I agree. And that us whet U meant by compromise by the democrats. But so far they have shown no indication that they will give him anything that he can spin. If they don’t, he may sign tgs budget and try to go tge national emergency route. We are currently under about thirty or more still active national emergeries. Congress did not define in the law what defines a national emergercy. I don’t see why he could not use that yo repaired some of the old fence that needs repair and build a few more miles of new fence. That would hive him his spin that he built the needed wall.
You are right that Democrats don’t want to give him anything that he can rightly call a wall. Still, I think both Dems and Reps (but not Trump) want truth-based border policies, which undoubtedly will contain some physical barrier. Trump has already indicated he doesn’t need much in order to call it a wall. I’m still hopeful that a compromise can be reached since one was already. Only Ann Coulter and others of her ilk spoiled it. I’m tempted to think that Trump can’t afford to repeat that mistake.
It’s really up to Fox News, and ultimately, Vladimir Putin. 😎
You would think this would be an alarming development for the social sciences.
How about fake resume studies that look for bias? Would they need “subject consent”? How would that work? “We will submit fake resumes to see if you are biased against minorities/women/transgenders/muslims. Are you willing to participate?” “We want to find out if you are a racist, sexist, or transphobic or are a nazi. Okay?”
Good point! Never thought of that.
I guess whether or not this is relevant is based on whether such studies must first go through the IRB for approval.
Such studies would definitely have to go through the IRB for approval. And they would definitely pass, provided that the subjects were protected in obvious ways like anonymity. This is a non-issue.
Thanks for the info.
Well, if you follow the links to the Portland State IRB above, and look at the forms, and following them in the order required, answering the questions presented and doing as you are directed (like I did), you will find that, in fact, studies like that would *NOT* be exempt from getting consent. Try it yourself!
I don’t read enough US (surely not “America”?) media to judge, but it sounds like a strong claim with no or at best weak support. Here in Europe it was apparently enough that media tends to be liberal for populists to win over some voters (or at least use it as political propaganda).
But, oy:
Exactly what we [do not] need, more “recreational” drugs that generate smoke around people. There is AFAIK no harmless level of burn smoke in recent research. Why not eat the stuff [ https://science.howstuffworks.com/science-vs-myth/what-if/what-if-eat-marijuana.htm ]?
This is why we (in Canada) have similar rules for the two popular smoked drugs.
Are journal editors human subjects? That’s an easy one: yes. Is it a good idea for a university “to apply federal IRB rules to all research carried out by [its] employees or students”? Yes. Should Peter Boghossian be fired? No. But maybe the psychology department should provide some remedial education to the philosophy department, or at least those members who want to dabble in such research.
So that such research is never done again, and the “Studies” departments and pseudoscience continue to flourish.