Tribalists, Bribes, 9/11 and Tyranny, Fear, and Cheating

Posted on Friday 11 September 2026 by Mark R. Kelly
  • Reading David Pakman, and considering Republican history since Reagan;
  • Trumps is now trying to bribe voters;
  • How the Patriot Act, passed after 9/11 and never repealed, have given Trump the tools to become a tyrant;
  • How Republicans use fear to motivate voters;
  • Trump urges his fans to “cheat like hell”.
– – –

So now I’m reading David Pakman’s book from last year (this one) after several months of seeing his clips on Facebook of commentary about daily politics. The first chapter aligns neatly with Heather Cox Richardson’s history of 20th century American politics, though Pakman begins his account in the early 1950s, the era MAGA apparently thinks was the golden age, and shows how conservative resistance to civil rights (especially) triggered the trend through Ronald Reagan and Gingrich to Trump. Will report more when I finish the book.

It reminds me that my attention to daily politics in this blog is about the same thing, but in a grander sense: the sense of how warring factions of human nature are seesawing us back and forth for dominance throughout history. Currently the tribalists (Trump and MAGA) are reigning in America. Given the potential existential threats humanity faces, if the tribalists prevail, humanity is doomed.

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Salon, Brian Karem, today: Trump wants to bribe voters. This is how far we’ve fallen in 25 years, subtitled “Our president’s attempts to play emperor now seem normal. It might be the worst result of the 9/11 era”

Continue reading →

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Jamie Whyte: CRIMES AGAINST LOGIC

Posted on Friday 11 September 2026 by Mark R. Kelly

Subtitled: Exposing the Bogus Arguments of Politicians, Priests, Journalists, and Other Serial Offenders

(UK 2003 as Bad Thoughts: A Guide to Clear Thinking; US edition here McGraw-Hill, 2005, xi + 157pp; no index)


Here’s a small book from the mid-2000s that overlaps with numerous books I’ve read on psychological biases, but cast them rather as matters of logical flaws.

Continue reading →

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Rejecting Reality, and Truth

Posted on Thursday 10 September 2026 by Mark R. Kelly
  • More about the new UN map of the world; MAGA preferred the previous, less accurate one;
  • Trump is now bribing American voters;
  • Republicans defend lying;
  • Robert Reich calls Trump completely bonkers;
  • Heather Cox Richardson expands on Trump’s lies;
  • Trumps talks out of turn with Iran;
  • Grindr outage at the GOP convention.
– – –

Salon, Troy Farah, today: Our world map is wrong. MAGA likes it that way, subtitled “Because the US rejects reality, it voted against the UN’s Correct the Map plan”

Excerpts:

Perhaps this resolution wasn’t as minor as it seemed at first glance. In fact, it could be that the Mercator map explains President Donald Trump’s strange obsession with seizing Greenland. Maybe he really does think it’s that gigantic? Of course, ignorance isn’t Trump’s only possible motivation — knowing Greenland’s presumed vast troves of natural minerals, some of it comes down to plain old greed.

Continue reading →

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Neil deGrasse Tyson with James Trefil: COSMIC QUERIES

Posted on Thursday 10 September 2026 by Mark R. Kelly

Subtitled: StarTalk’s Guide to Who We Are, How We Got Here, and Where We’re Going
(National Geographic, 2021, 311pp, including 22pp acknowledgements, further reading, illustrations credits, index, and about the authors.)

Like Tyson’s one-year later book, TO INFINITY AND BEYOND (reviewed here), this is a heavily illustrated book published by National Geographic and associated with his podcast StarTalk (https://startalkmedia.com/) which I only see snippets of on Facebook. The coauthors of the two books are different; the later one was Lindsey Nyx Walker, this one is the rather more prominent James Trefil, an author of books and photography books himself.

This one is more fundamental that the 2023 book, focusing on the basic big questions about humanity, our place in the universe, the size and age of the universe, and its past and future. Continue reading →

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The Battle

Posted on Wednesday 9 September 2026 by Mark R. Kelly
  • How the erosion of the 20th century’s “liberal consensus” began to crumble under Ronald Reagan;
  • Conservatives lying with fake photos, photoshops, bogus census reports, and more.
– – –

Heather Cox Richardson has told this story. (See my review.)

NY Times, Jonathan Kaufman, today: Blame Ronald Reagan

Richardson told of a so-called “liberal consensus” arising out of the post-World War II era that was steadily attacked by conservatives, especially racists and religious right, in the 1960s. This writer finds another key moment.
Continue reading →

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Adam Kirsch: THE REVOLT AGAINST HUMANITY

Posted on Wednesday 9 September 2026 by Mark R. Kelly

Subtitled: Imagining a Future Without Us
(Columbia Global Reports, 2023, 100pp, including 2pp of further reading.)

Here’s a small book with some provocative ideas I didn’t anticipate from the title. It’s from a publishing imprint of Columbia University called Columbia Global Reports, and indeed it reads like a survey of ideas, citing many particular writers and books, more than it reads like a thesis by the writer. And he’s read a lot more books than I have, and he’s summarizing them. The author is described as a poet and literary critic.

The gist is the conflict between two visions of humanity that both entail the coming nonexistence of the race as we know it: Anthropocene antihumanism, that says our climate is doomed and humanity should welcome its own extinction, and Transhumanism, that looks forward to how genetic engineering and AI will lead to new forms of life superior to humans. Continue reading →

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Star Trek at 60

Posted on Tuesday 8 September 2026 by Mark R. Kelly
  • The 60th anniversary of Star Trek, and some personal recollections;
  • Items about AI solving a math problem; how Trump doesn’t understand what trade means; how Trump claims more and more countries, and also the moon; Trump objecting to Canadian Bombardier planes, which support thousands of US jobs; how Hegseth encourages “Have a blessed day” and the like on US bases.
– – –

NPR, today: 60 years later, ‘Star Trek’ continues to ‘live long and prosper’

and

LA Times, today: ‘Star Trek’ is celebrating its 60th anniversary. Why its optimistic vision of the future endures

  • As “Star Trek” marks 60 years, the creatives, stars and fans of the franchise reflect on its lasting influence and enduring legacy.
  • The original series used diverse crews and allegorical storytelling to champion inclusion, collaboration and optimism — tenents that continue today.

I see today is the 60th anniversary of the premiere of the original Star Trek show, back in 1966. Continue reading →

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Is the World Becoming Too Complex for Ordinary Human Cognition?

Posted on Monday 7 September 2026 by Mark R. Kelly
  • The “time tax” and the unavoidable complexity of society;
  • The value of liberal education;
– – –

Here’s more about the new book about the so-called “time tax.”

The Atlantic, Adam Harris, today: How the Government Wastes Our Time, subtitled “What do we lose in the hours spent filling out paperwork?”
Continue reading →

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Alain de Botton: RELIGION FOR ATHEISTS

Posted on Monday 7 September 2026 by Mark R. Kelly

Subtitled: A Non-believer’s Guide to the Uses of Religion
(Pantheon, March 2012, 320pp, including 8pp acknowledgements, picture credits, and index.)

This is a book by the pop-philosopher (I don’t think that’s an unfair term) and writer best know for HOW PROUST CAN CHANGE YOUR LIFE in 1997 and THE CONSOLATIONS OF PHILOSOPHY in 2000. This book has its own Wikipedia entry, which summarizes its mixed reviews. I’m not so much concerned as whether reviewers found it incomplete or facile, as whether there are any good ideas. And more broadly, to suggest how religion is just a variation on theme of human nature sometimes put toward other ends.

Continue reading →

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A Defense of Evangelicalism?

Posted on Sunday 6 September 2026 by Mark R. Kelly
  • Two items about an evangelist defending her faith;
  • Mahler’s 3rd.
– – –

Two pieces about an evangelist who is defending her ‘culture.’ Reading them now. What is she defending exactly? Anything about her actual religion?

First, from the evangelist herself.

Washington Post, Bonnie Kristian, 4 Sept 2026: I’m an evangelical. My faith isn’t ‘a cancer.’, subtitled “The stereotypes don’t line up with reality.”
Continue reading →

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