Category Archives: Politics

Media, Mystics, and Two Key Republican Obsessions

Posted on Friday 3 November 2023 by Mark R. Kelly

Two curious items from Facebook, about learning new media, and scientists as “mystics”; Three items, one by Paul Krugman, about the Republicans’ naked obsession with benefiting the ultra-wealthy; Three items, or maybe four, about Republican obsession with other people’s sex … Continue reading →

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How Psychology Trumps Everything

Posted on Thursday 2 November 2023 by Mark R. Kelly

The hierarchy of sciences in which, in terms of human beliefs about the real world, psychology trumps everything; The New Yorker on the plausibility of impossible beings (from 2017); Recalling that Venn Diagram of Irrational Nonsense; How “more than half … Continue reading →

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More About Things People Believe That Aren’t True

Posted on Wednesday 1 November 2023 by Mark R. Kelly

“It ain’t what you don’t know that gets you into trouble. It’s what you know for sure that just ain’t so.” —Mark Twain Jonathan V. Last about how most voters are “disconnected from reality”; How Google’s Pixel phone could destroy … Continue reading →

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Disconnects from Reality

Posted on Friday 27 October 2023 by Mark R. Kelly

The economy is doing great and yet conservatives deny it; Heather Cox Richardson contrasts worldviews, one leading to our economy, the other to mass shootings; More about House Speaker Mike Johnson: hate for LGBTQ+ people; allegiance with “debunked faux-historian” David … Continue reading →

Posted in Economics, Epistemology, Politics, Religion | Comments Off on Disconnects from Reality

The New Speaker of the House and Delusional Reality

Posted on Thursday 26 October 2023 by Mark R. Kelly

Items about newly elected Speaker of the House Mike Johnson from the NYT editorial board, Paul Krugman, and the LAT editorial board; Specific items about Johnson’s claims that fossil fuels don’t cause climate change, that the US is not a … Continue reading →

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Misapprehensions of Reality

Posted on Wednesday 25 October 2023 by Mark R. Kelly

The new House Speaker is an election denier who would criminalize homosexuality; How Christian conservatives are flatly wrong about homosexuality being “unnatural” or that “creed” is part of “what you are”; and the evolutionary reason why they resist homosexuality, cross-dressing, … Continue reading →

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The Twilight Zone of Religion and Conservative Politics

Posted on Tuesday 24 October 2023 by Mark R. Kelly

Adam Lee counters Christian claims that “new atheism” has collapsed; it hasn’t Greta Christina patiently explains the vacuousness of “Pascal’s Wager” Religious presumption and “our religion” Republicans look to Jesus Republicans can break promises if God tells them to Short … Continue reading →

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Dysfunctional American Politics and Speculation About Root Causes

Posted on Sunday 22 October 2023 by Mark R. Kelly

Paul Krugman on the decline of Pax Americana; New Republic on why the Republicans are dysfunctional: they have no policy ideas or purpose; NYT’s Jamelle Bouie on how the Republican Party got Southernized; And a note about Jonathan Rauch’s The … Continue reading →

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Checking in on the Wackadoodles

Posted on Wednesday 18 October 2023 by Mark R. Kelly

Several items about Jim Jordan; How the Bible disproves climate change; how people in wheelchairs lack faith in God; how Trump claims (falsely) that flypaper is illegal because cruelty to animals; how tap water is birth control; More seriously: Items … Continue reading →

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Current Events and Religion

Posted on Thursday 12 October 2023 by Mark R. Kelly

Adam Lee on Israel vs. Hamas, with a series of “yes, but”s, and how religion makes peace impossible; Phil Zuckerman calls for the end of Zionism; With my careful comments about the reasons Americans support Israel; Hemant Mehta on how … Continue reading →

Posted in Morality, Politics, Religion | Comments Off on Current Events and Religion