End of Year Summaries

  • David Brooks’ favorite essays include one about how Trump’s people have no clue about how to fix complex problems, and one about why people believe *true* things;
  • Two pieces from The Atlantic about 77 facts from 2024, and important breakthroughs in 2024;
  • And Heather Cox Richardson’s take on the civil war among MAGA Republicans.
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NY Times, Opinion by David Brooks, 26 Dec 2024: The Sidney Awards

These are “awards” that Brooks personally announces for his favorite essays of the past year, from “small and medium-size publications,” i.e. avoiding the big papers and magazines. I’m noting this to note a couple of his selections that appeal to me and my big themes. First this:

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Driving the I5, and Varieties of Dining Experience

Another quick trip from the Bay Area to LA over the past few days of the Christmas Holiday, constrained as usual by work schedules.

It’s a 370 mile trip, from our place in Oakland to the West LA area where we stayed. We had good fortune in that our drives there and back slipped between the series of rainstorms that have hit Northern California over the past couple weeks. Continue reading

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Muddling Through Somehow

Since today is Christmas Eve, yesterday must have been Christmas Adam, right? (First I’ve heard about this.)

NY Times, 22 Dec 2024: Behold! ‘Christmas Adam’ Is Born., subtitled “First there was Christmas Eve … and then a new celebration was created.”

This is how religion works. Similar to the way everyone knows that Jesus was born on December 25th.

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The Certitude of the Religious

  • David French asks and tries to explain why Christians are so cruel;
  • David Brooks writes about his experience of faith;
  • And Kurt Gray about misunderstanding human nature.
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Of course I’m sure they would deny this. Passing the truth along to other people, even imposing it on them, isn’t cruel, it’s kind, to their way of thinking. This is what all the missionaries thought, and still think.

NY Times, Opinion by David French, 22 Dec 2024: Why Are So Many Christians So Cruel?

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Children, Adults Who Think Like Children, and Adults Who Don’t

  • Trump doesn’t need to keep his promises because he’ll just claim that he has, and blame his enemies when it’s obvious he has not;
  • How the threat of government shutdown reveals the Republicans as the party of “no”, recalling William F. Buckley;
  • In Louisiana, don’t say vaccine;
  • How to reduce crime via proven solutions, and not prayer.
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NY Times, Frank Bruni, 19 Dec 2024: What if Trump Doesn’t Need to Keep Any of His Promises?

Short answer: all Trump has to do is tell his fans that he *has* kept his promises, and they’ll believe him. Continue reading

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So Are We to Live in an Authoritarian Oligarchy?

  • The un-elected Elon Musk seems to be running the country this week;
  • How the Drone Panic reveals a need to believe, in *something*.

So not only is our incipient administration authoritarian, it’s authoritarian and being run by an oligarch!

NY Times, 19 Dec 2024: Elon Musk Flexes His Political Strength as Government Shutdown Looms, subtitled “The world’s richest man led the charge to kill a bipartisan spending deal, in part by promoting false and misleading claims about it.”
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Psychological Underpinnings

  • The drone panic is about human psychology;
  • So is the fear of vaccines.
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Once again, the drone panic is not about drones.

NY Times, Zeynep Tufekci, 19 Dec 2024: How to Make the Drone Panic So Very Much Worse

The writer begins by recalling a similar panic from decades ago that I only recently heard about.
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Tim Urban, Out of Left Field

  • About a writer I’d never heard of, Tim Urban, and his book, and their connection to Luigi Mangione;
  • The psychological motivations of the drone alarmists.
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NY Times, David Wallace-Wells, 18 Dec 2024: Can Anyone Make Sense of Luigi Mangione? Maybe His Favorite Writer. (gift link)

Luigi Mangione of course is the guy implicated in the murder of the UnitedHealthcare CEO in New York City a few weeks ago. Continue reading

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Notes from Inside the Universe

  • Vox answers questions about the drones;
  • A piece by Rahm Emanual inspires my own thinking about how much it matters which party is in power, every election cycle;
  • Trump wants to expel immigrants but is happy to hire them;
  • Nancy Mace is worried that the drones might be coming from “outside the universe”;
  • Once again about vaccines, safer than they have ever been.

One more piece about the drones, from Vox, which fancies itself a site that “explains” things. (Curiously, it’s filed under “politics.”)

Vox, Li Zhou, 17 Dec 2024: What’s up with all these drone sightings?, subtitled “The 7 biggest questions, answered as best we can.”

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The Drones! The Drones!

First let’s finish the second Robert Reich item we began yesterday. Then the drones.

Robert Reich, 13 Dec 2024: America’s four stories (Part 2)
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