Link Dump from Recent Days

Posted on Wednesday 13 December 2023 by Mark R. Kelly

Catching up on links from the past week, in no particular order. Subjects are:

  • Another take on why people are pessimistic about their economic futures;
  • Trump’s dictatorship: “History shows that autocrats always tell you who they are and what they are going to do. We just don’t listen until it is too late.”;
  • How the benefits of home schooling were based on flawed research;
  • Thom Hartmann on how America will never forgive the GOP’s embrace of Donald Trump;
  • How those Hallmark Christmas movies appeal to MAGA women;
  • Another Supreme Court case, where conservative lawyers defend the wealthy, that is “built on shameless lies”;
  • Right-wingers are outraged that Elon Musk’s AI chatbot isn’t transphobic;
  • Right-wing anti-woke has come for George Orwell;
  • Recent events in Texas show that the GOP’s abortion exceptions for medical emergencies are a sham;
  • A Republican senator makes claims about Democratic “fake electors” with no evidence he can cite;
  • Big NYT piece on the “Troll Army Waging Trump’s Online Campaign”;
  • And a NYT piece about “American’s Thirst for Authoritarianism” which I will pick up with tomorrow.

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Red and Blue, and Cancel Culture

Posted on Tuesday 12 December 2023 by Mark R. Kelly
  • A succinct characterization of the different cultures of red and blue states, from Jamelle Bouie of NYT;
  • How the kerfuffle between Congress and university presidents is an example of cancel culture from the right, who only believe in free speech for themselves;
  • Jerry Coyne and Steven Pinker on how to save Harvard: a fivefold way of free speech, institutional neutrality, nonviolence, viewpoint diversity, and DEI disempowerment;
  • Paul Krugman on the shoplifting story and how it reflects peoples’ false beliefs about the economy;
  • And the latest example of Trump lying many times a minute.

I’m leading with this item because writer ends with an especially succinct characterization of the red/blue divide.

NY Times, Opinion, Jamelle Bouie, 12 Dec 2023: Red States and Blue States Are Becoming Different Countries

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Christmas Presents and Consumerism; Beauty in the Universe

Posted on Monday 11 December 2023 by Mark R. Kelly
  • Christmas presents, consumerism, and Adam Lee’s take on minimalism;
  • The idea of ‘beauty’ in the universe, as another component of science fiction’s “consilience”;
  • First take on the new Peter Gabriel album.

Like many people as we get older, when Christmas comes around and people (well, my partner) ask what I want to for Christmas, I’m inclined to say “nothing.” I don’t need more stuff. No more kitchen gadgets. My car is fine. My computer set-up is fine. I have enough shoes. Shirts and socks and underwear, well, maybe, these things do wear out and get frayed. But not every year. I can go for an entire year without buying much of anything for myself — except books. Actually, this past year I did replace my laptop (see here), right about on schedule considering my history of a new computer roughly every six years. And bought a new mouse. But my monitors, my desktop radio/CD-player, they’re just fine, and close to a decade old.

As for books, I buy as many books as I want, throughout the year, so at the end of the year don’t really “need” any. That doesn’t mean I wouldn’t appreciate the thought, but no one in my family (or group of friends who would give me a Christmas present) is particularly interested in books, let alone would have any idea what would pique my interest. It’s been ages, ages, since I was a teenager and actually put book titles on my “Christmas wish list” that circulated among my family as suggestions for potential gifts. I did get some significant books that way, among them Carl Sagan’s THE COSMIC CONNECTION. Way back in 1974/

With all this in mind, here is an Adam Lee essay from a few days ago. His experience reflects mine to a degree.

OnlySky, Adam Lee, 5 Dec 2023: How to be happy with less: A minimalist holiday manifesto

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Two Economic Matters

Posted on Sunday 10 December 2023 by Mark R. Kelly

Just time for a couple items tonight.

  • How alarming statistics about shoplifting (especially by brazen gangs) aren’t actually true;
  • How the ideal of the “free market” unhobbled by regulations is simplistic.

Here’s an example where it turns out you can’t trust the data after all. When the people providing it have a motive to be biased.

NY Times, Eduardo Medina, 8 Dec 2023: Retail Group Retracts Startling Claim About ‘Organized’ Shoplifting, subtitled “The National Retail Federation had said that nearly half of the industry’s $94.5 billion in missing merchandise in 2021 was the result of organized theft. It was likely closer to 5 percent, experts say.”

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Small-town America and Democracy; Competitive Exclusion; and How that Flat Earth Debate Worked Out

Posted on Saturday 9 December 2023 by Mark R. Kelly
  • How small-town America hasn’t been good for democracy;
  • How conflicts like Palestine/Israel might be resolved through evolutionary concept of “competitive exclusion”;
  • Quick takes about that flat Earth debate based on scripture; how different Christians claim diametrically opposite things; and Slate’s “Totally Normal Quote of the Day.”

Catching up on items from the past couple weeks. These are items I saved the links to, since they sounded interesting, but didn’t read at the time. Now I’m reading them.

AlterNet, The Conversation, 24 Nov 2023: Small-town America’s never-ending struggle to maintain its values hasn’t always been good for democracy

Really? Why would this be true? Some part of the conservative/liberal divide?

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Dictatorship Promises; What America Actually Is; and Visions from God

Posted on Friday 8 December 2023 by Mark R. Kelly
  • A Republican critic of journalist Robert Kagan, who wrote about how a Trump dictatorship (see previous posts) would harass journalists, make Kagan’s point by threatening to harass Kagan;
  • Maybe Trump and his followers *are* what America is;
  • More about Mike Johnson’s and Donald Trump’s visions from God;
  • And three items — about migrant debit cards and the actual strength of the economy — about which conservatives believe things that are not true.

Washington Post, Philip Bump, 8 Dec 2023: J.D. Vance tried to troll Trump critics. He helped make their point.

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Trump, Fascism, and Mike Johnson’s Visions from God

Posted on Thursday 7 December 2023 by Mark R. Kelly
  • Robert Kagan sequelizes his editorial from a week ago with ideas about how to stop a Trump dictatorship;
  • Robert Reich looks at the GOP’s death cycle, its descent into fascism;
  • A former Prime Minister of the UK foresees what will happen if Trump wins again;
  • Short items about Vivek Ramaswamy’s far-right conspiracy theories; how Nikki Haley “won” last night’s Republican debate; how Fox News, lying again, touted as a “Democrat voter” someone who hates Democrats; and several items about House Leader Mike Johnson’s visions from God.

More from Robert Kagan. Let’s see what he has to say. This time he attempts to offer a solution to the problem he described last week.

Washington Post, Robert Kagan, 7 Dec 2023: Opinion | The Trump dictatorship: How to stop it

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In Plain Sight

Posted on Wednesday 6 December 2023 by Mark R. Kelly
  • More on Trump’s dictatorship plans– “only on day one” — and how his fascist plans are out there in plain sight;
  • How “pro-life” has different meanings to different people;
  • How Russia’s crack-down on gays as “extremists” echoes values of the MAGA folks;
  • Jerry Coyne on intercessionary prayer and the so-called “purity spiral”.

Oh, only for a day, then.

Salon, Igor Derysh, 6 Dec 2023: Trump tells Fox News he won’t be a “dictator” — “except on day one”, subtitled “Host Sean Hannity asked Trump to vow that he won’t ‘abuse power as retribution.’ It didn’t go well”

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Latest from the Impending Dictatorship Watch

Posted on Tuesday 5 December 2023 by Mark R. Kelly
  • Recalling the “Good Germans” who didn’t pay attention to Hitler’s rise;
  • Salon’s Chauncey DeVega on how Americans are sleepwalking into a Trump dictatorship;
  • The Atlantic‘s Jeffrey Goldberg on the danger of a second Trump term;
  • Steve Bannon’s promise to prosecute and imprison people in government and journalists;
  • And examples of how people besotted by ignorance and superstition have firm opinions about the gays.

It’s been said that there were many “Good Germans” in the 1930s who did not pay close attention to politics and so were complacent about the rise of Hitler and Nazism. Thus Hitler was *elected*; he didn’t take over in some kind of coup, as in so many military dictatorships that happen around the world. He appealed to the same kind of conservative resentments as Trump has done in the US. With this thought in mind…

We might wonder why there is not more attention and outrage to the rise of MAGA and Trump’s stated plan to become, essentially, a dictator– to wipe out the “deep state” and indict on any grounds whatsoever anyone who opposes him. There is attention, but only in the highbrow press, as documented here. Even the main-stream media (MSM) are afraid to acknowledge the issue, for fear of being accused of being partisan. Though Liz Cheney on 60 Minutes the other night, and on the Today Show this week, were positive steps.

Salon, Chauncey DeVega, 5 Dec 2023: Americans are sleepwalking into a Trump dictatorship, subtitled “Everyone but MAGA is blind to the truth. They know the evil that they do and are doing it with their eyes wide open”

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Conservative Disregard for Science; Projections and Untruth; That Famous British Take-down of Trump

Posted on Monday 4 December 2023 by Mark R. Kelly
  • Update to my Projects page;
  • The Supreme Court’s disregard for science;
  • Anti-vaccine conservatives’ disregard for science;
  • More about Trump’s and the GOP’s projecting about which party is trying to destroy democracy;
  • How even Fox News is now fact-checking Trump’s “untruths”;
  • And recalling that famous take-down of Trump by a British Writer: “he has no class, no charm, no coolness, no credibility, no compassion, no wit, no warmth, no wisdom, no subtlety, no sensitivity, no self-awareness, no humility, no honour and no grace”

First of all today, I updated my Projects page, in the drop-down menu under “About” at the top of every page. First update since June 2021. Making progress.

Second for today, I have another round of takes on the current political scene. Which is all about psychology and human nature, over and over again.

Slate, Steve Kennedy, 4 Dec 2023: The Supreme Court’s Utter Disregard for Science Is Somehow About to Get Worse

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