Politics is as much about human psychology as about policy or ideology.
OnlySky, Jonathan MS Pearce, 8 Nov 2024: Triumph of the feels, subtitled “Our UK contributor looks at the American disaster with recently acquired humility.”
OK, I can’t help but follow the political news, but for today’s post I’m sinking links about that to the bottom. Let’s start with something more thoughtful. Here’s a discussion of a serious long-term issue. Is progress a myth? No doubt it depends on one’s definition of progress.
OnlySky, Dale McGowan, 13 Nov 2024: Letting go of my last big myth, subtitled “Burying the myth of god was easy compared to freeing myself from the myth of progress.”
The writer begins by discussing his reaction to the 2024 presidential election, compared to his reaction to the 2016 election.
A Fox News host for Secretary of Defense. Stephen Miller. Matt Gaetz for…. anything. We shouldn’t be surprised.
Remember how Trump said he was going to end the war in Ukraine on Day One?
Slate, Fred Kaplan, 13 Nov 2024: Trump Thinks Putin Is His Friend. The Russians Just Issued a Humiliating Statement to the Contrary., subtitled “The psychological warfare has begun.”
Many topics today.
AlterNet, 12 Nov 2024: ‘Purge anyone who will not be a yes man’: Trump readies order allowing him to fire top generals (from Wall Street Journal)
The pundits (and the Democrats) have been warning people about the potential consequences of Trump’s planned policies for months, if not years. Most people see higher grocery prices and don’t care about all those theoretical consequences.
NY Times, Paul Krugman, 11 Nov 2024: Why Trump’s Deportations Will Drive Up Your Grocery Bill [gift link]
A few more comments on the current situation.
The Guardian, Rebecca Solnit, 7 Nov 2004: Our mistake was to think we lived in a better country than we do, subtitled “Americans will be stuck cleaning up after Maga’s destructive streak because men like this never clean up after themselves”
Answer: No.
NY Times, Jamelle Bouie, 9 Nov 2024: What Do Trump Voters Know About the Future He Has Planned for Them?
It happens after every election, I’m sure, but this time the Monday-morning-quarterbacking (is that the right term?) seems especially extensive. Everyone has their own theory about what the Democrats did wrong, or what Kamala did wrong, or why voters cared about this and not that. The trouble with these is, they’re all ex post facto. If the problems were as obvious as the commentators seem to think, why weren’t they pointed out ahead of time? On the contrary, most Democrats and commentators seemed quite optimistic leading up the election…
So let’s start with Robert Reich’s piece. (In another couple days, maybe, I’ll move to non-political subjects. Maybe even science fiction!)
Robert Reich, 8 Nov 2024: The Lesson, subtitled “The real lesson we should draw from what occurred Tuesday”
To cut through the opinionated commentaries about what happened in this week’s election, here’s historian Heather Cox Richard’s very matter-of-fact account.
Letters from an American, Heather Cox Richardson, 6 Nov 2024: November 6, 2024
Astonishingly, Trump won the presidency again. Despite everything.
Or to the rest of the world, this is what Americans are. This too shall pass.
Slate, Christina Cauterucci, 6 Nov 2024: Americans Just Voted to Burn It All to the Ground, subtitled “This is an even more decisive turning point than 2016.”
