What a week! When Chang'e took off with samples from Luna's far side (congratulations!)...
... and Boeing's Starliner capsule finally made a crew delivery to the space station (with subsequent Helium leaks, alas)...
... and with epic success of the SpaceX Big Rocket system achieving soft (wet) landing... and its orbital stage surviving re-entry to do the same... which means the system WILL work, even if there are more bugs. Which means the cost of doing most things out there is about to plummet! (Oh, and I suppose we'll also get silly "Artemis" footprint stunts. Whatever. Zzzz...)
Meanwhile, let's get on with some news from 'out there' that you may not have noticed.
NASA is seeking public input on how to prioritize nearly 200 topics in space technology to improve how it invests limited funding on them. This is part of an effort by the agency’s Space Technology Mission Directorate (STMD) to provide a more rigorous approach to how it supports technology development. (I served STMD for 12 years as part-time advisor to NASA’s Innovative & Advanced Concepts program – (NIAC).
Hey, just because I am (very!) skeptical of the snake oil that’s touted out there about (mostly-nonexistent) ‘lunar resources,’ that doesn’t mean there aren’t great riches , just a little farther out!
One company that got several highly touted projects from us at NIAC – TransAstra – is reviving interest in asteroid mining. (There had been a fad of early investors a decade ago - a bit premature, as I said at the time.) Now TransAstra is selling a telescope and software designed to detect objects like asteroids moving through the sky. And others are interested in the space rock ore-loads, like a Chinese corporation Origin Space that has an asteroid-observing satellite in orbit and is testing its mining-relevant technology there. Meanwhile, Colorado company Karman+ plans to go straight to an asteroid in 2026 and test excavation equipment.
Bouncing around out there... The brightest object in the universe? A Quasar – a galactic center black hole tucking in so much matter that it outshines whole galaxies is a monster visible in light from the earliest days… in this case 12 billion years ago, blaring 500 Trillion times as bright as our poor sun. Woof.
The Space Show is a mostly audio podcast run by David Livingston.* I especially recommend the episodes featuring my friend Joe Carroll, the most innovative and agile independent space engineer I know, who pioneered the use of tethers and long cables in orbit and has wise insights into problems like space debris, space power and how to create artificial gravity in the near term, out there.
*(I named a space station after Joe … but did I name the main character of Existence after this “Livingston”?)
== And yet MORE from out there! ==
Even more organic molecules than we previously realized are spewing from water volcano-jets out of Saturn’s moon Enceladus.
Uranus spins around its own axis at a highly unusual 98-degree tilt, giving it the "most extreme seasons in the solar system," per NASA. That means one pole spends 21 Earth years completely plunged in darkness as the Sun shines upon the other pole. This makes it a fascinating test of ideas bout tidal locked worlds, long a staple of SF. These images from the James Webb are truly amazing. Looking past the tiresomely tedious double entendres.
Researchers have found that key molecules needed for life (nucleic acid bases) are stable in concentrated sulfuric acid, advancing the notion that the Venus atmosphere environment may be able to support complex chemicals needed for life. (Thanks James Norris.) Note that Prof. Doug Van Belle’s fine novel “A World Adrift” is set amid human-built cloud cities floating amid and harvesting Venusian stratospheric life in a steam punk delight.
(And I have both a novella and a cool screenplay set under the oceans of Venus! Shall we say after some serious terraforming. ;-)
Wow. The recently-returned samples of asteroid Bennu appear to contain unexpected minerals that seem likely to have come from contact with liquid water! It suggests the parent-body - a planetoid that was shattered to form much of the asteroid belt long ago - might have been like Enceladus, Saturn’s moon that spumes water jets from a liquid ocean through volcanoes in an icy ‘roof’.
Side note: Our ability to peer back through time is amazing, like the Y-Chromosome ‘bottleneck’ telling of a brutal era for male-humans 8000 years ago…. Or new methods letting us read the charred scrolls recovered from Vesuvius-buried Herculaneum. Or your own 23&Me ancestry results.
And more to come… if the War on Science can be soundly defeated, that is. There are forces who especially don’t want us peering the other way, into the future. My specialty.
268 comments:
«Oldest ‹Older 201 – 268 of 268The thing I deem most unfortunate about Hayek was ignoring the fundamental truth of the last 6000 years… that the creativity of markets is destroyed above all by the frenetic efforts of powerful males to ensure that their sons will be winners, despite any labor, innovations or genius by sons of the working class.
Yes, he warned of the dangers of a paternalistic state fostering dependency on the part of a lumpenproletariat… and that warning was certainly called for – though more chillingly illustrated in BRAVE NEW WORLD. But THE ROAD TO SERFDOM was such a stunningly hypocritical title for a work that ignores how serfdom happened on every continent for 300+ generations! Or how a paternalistic state that delivers universal sanitation, food and education is at least equipping millions of children to compete -- if they so choose.
LH: The benign dictator or ruling class have no such constraint.
AD: Nah. They can always be shot.
DB: Whaaaa? Replacing one set of mafia bosses with another? Even total revolution often devolves into new bosses with new ideologies giving every rival the axe. Only calm, moderate revolutions run BY nerdy cadres every loosened to ensure diversity and competition within decision-making processes.
AD: I'm not joking. It's actually harder to overthrow a malignant cadre of professionals.
DB: Bah! Show me. Civil Servants can behave like in YES MINISTER. But generally they make revolutionary change – like 60s civil rights reforms – happen with some smoothness.
AD: ...but we really need a separation of Market and State.
DB: Step #1. Recognize that Amazon is no longer a player in a market. It IS the market. A brilliant innovation of a massive bazaar or souk that benefits all and Bezos deserves credit and wealth for doing it. But it IS the market and should be fair. A public utility would allow him and co-owners to continue profiting, but alongside public representatives bent on eliminating all thumbs on the scale.
Dr Brin:
The root of post-modernist rejection of objecvtive reality, testable by iterative scientific experimentation, is the same as for MAGAs.
Post-modernism makes strange bedfellows. The MAGAts are anti-science and reject verifiable facts such as the age of the planet or the effects of climate change. Yet they do call upon objective reality (and accuse liberals of disregarding it) when they insist that there are only two genders, or that theirs is a superior race.
Alfred Differ:
"The benign dictator or ruling class have no such constraint."
Nah. They can always be shot.
Yeah, but so can JFK or Gandhi if it comes down to that. There are always going to be dissatisfied McVeighs no matter what kind of government you have.
I meant that within the system there is no way to fire a dictator or upend a designated ruling class, since they themselves are the ones who get to decide those sorts of things. See Clarence Thomas and Samuel Alito for modern examples (or is that "post-modern"?).
Alfred Differ:
but we really need a separation of Market and State. Won't happen, though, because we'd have no way to punish cheaters short of vigilantism.
The final lines of Atlas Shrugged had the judge who was part of Galt's cabal penning a new constitution beginning with (from memory) "Congress shall make no law intruding on free trade," or something very much like that. Ayn Rand wanted your Summer Daydream without realizing or recognizing that that's all it could be.
I said:
"Yah. They can always be shot."
Yeah, but so can JFK or Gandhi if it comes down to that.
And on the other side, there are the Hitlers who survive the attempt.
SCOTUS suggestion:
Increase the size of SCOTUS to 13, one each chosen from each of the 13 appellate courts every year, replacing lifetime tenure with mandatory retirement after 13 years on the court (average SCOTUS tenure is about 17 years, Thomas has been on the SC for 30 years).
Each president will nominate 4 judges per term. No refusing to review a nominee like McConnel did to Obama.
Making SCOTUS larger with a constant stream of new blood will make it less ideological.
P.S. Should a justice die before his/her 13 year term, the SC will continue with fewer judges (12 or less if needed) until the year comes by for the replacement of the deceased judge.
DP:
Increase the size of SCOTUS to 13, one each chosen from each of the 13 appellate courts every year, replacing lifetime tenure with mandatory retirement after 13 years on the court
Increasing the size is something Congress can do, but neither party will let the other party be the one to fill those seats.
Eliminating lifetime tenure would take a constitutional amendment.
John Viril said...
"At its core, post-modernism rejects the notion of an objective reality. OTOH, science is built upon the presumption that objective reality exists and can be quantified and understood through experiment."
Just a "by the way . . . "
Science isn't really built on a presumption that objective reality exists. It is simply a set of methods to observe what we experience while limiting common errors due to human cognitive quirks. That it works so well is enough to have confidence in it and certainly suggests that objective reality exists, but presuming that finding is not necessary to do science or have confidence in it.
Larry,
Not lifetime per se....
The opening words of the Constitution’s Article III, describing the judiciary that the original document created at the national level, reads this way (with emphasis added): “The judicial power of the United States shall be vested in one supreme court, and in such inferior courts as the Congress may from time to time ordain and establish. The judges, both of the supreme and inferior courts, shall hold their offices during good behavior…”
The phrase “good behavior” obviously implies that there is no limit on how long a Justice may serve, once approved for serving on the court. That implication is supported by the impeachment provision of the Constitution, contained in Article II. Just as the president and vice president may be removed from office by impeachment, so, too, can federal judges, including Justices of the Supreme Court. But that can only happen if they are convicted of “treason, bribery, or other high crimes and misdemeanors.” Those, surely, are words that describe the opposite of “good behavior” for a judge, so they give meaning to the question of Justices’ right to continue in office indefinitely.
The solution is simple, have Congress perform a ceremonial impeachment of each justice as he/she finishes their 13-year term.
P.S
Or simply have Congress pass a law defining "bad behavior" as sticking around longer than 13-years.
Interesting question:
Can SCOTUS itself appeal to a lower federal court (probably the DC appellate court) that such a law (or any law such as a new SC ethics law) is unconstitutional and then appeal the lower court's decision all the way up to themselves, the SCOTUS - who then decides if a law affecting SCOUTUS is unconstitutional or not?
Or, you could simply switch to Parliamentary government :)
Scidata, will we then have to drive on the left side of the road?
"Science isn't really built on a presumption that objective reality exists."
Science is based on Popperian falsification.
The Falsification Principle, proposed by Karl Popper, is a way of demarcating science from non-science. It suggests that for a theory to be considered scientific, it must be able to be tested and conceivably proven false. For example, the hypothesis that “all swans are white” can be falsified by observing a black swan.
However, Popperian falsification itself can't in principle be falsified.
Therefore science is not based on science.
"Scidata, will we then have to drive on the left side of the road?"
Yes, but the change will occur gradually.
Pappenheimer
Yes, many like to philosophize, especially philosophers, about how "science is not based on science." In many cases the person's goal is to show that science isn't any better at coming up with accurate answers than other "ways of knowing."
In my opinion that's a case of taking navel gazing too far. At base science is simply going with what works. And science does work. In fact it is the only "way of knowing" that has an established track record of coming up with useful explanations for phenomena in our world. So useful that it enables us to make things like smart phones. And that's all the justification one needs to claim that science works.
DP:
The solution is simple, have Congress perform a ceremonial impeachment of each justice as he/she finishes their 13-year term.
Nice in theory.
In practice, no Republican-appointed justices would ever be impeached and convicted by Congress. And in answer to that, probably none at all would.
Interesting follow-up...
Could a Democratic Congress have impeached and removed RBG in time for Barack Obama to appoint her successor? Probably not, but that would be because Senate Republicans blocked the conviction.
DP:
Scidata, will we then have to drive on the left side of the road?
Canada doesn't do that.
Darrell E:
In my opinion that's a case of taking navel gazing too far
The claim that science is not based on science is no better than "turtles all the way down." It's like saying that because all words in the dictionary are defined in terms of other words, then words are all meaningless. It sounds right, except that words are self-evidently not meaningless.
All that "Science is not based on science" really means is that science has not been scientifically proven to work. All we know is what we see with our own lying eyes.
"Gravity will continue to work tomorrow" is not falsifiable (until tomorrow), but I feel comfortable believing it and planning my day without worrying about it. Often in real life, past performance is indicative of future results.
Almost at 200 comments if Dr Brin doesn't put up a new post. Just a reminder, new posts may seem to disappear but they'll really be on the next page.
My wife just suggested that the Caesar Flickerman character from The Hunger Games should be moderating tonight's debate.
Popperian process is just that, a process. One that builds models and builds confidence in them.
Use of the term 'models of the world' frees science from all the airy bullshit ravings about proof and 'objective reality.'
I think THE ROAD TO SERFDOM as a title works just fine. What Hayek described generalizes well enough to cover the primary path. We surrender our liberty incrementally whether or not someone is beating us over the head with a club.
THE CONSTITUTION OF LIBERTY leaves room for the actions of a paternalistic state. He pulled back on a few things ten years later on objects to how the states were handling events and dissidents when service expectations weren't met, but he was far from an absolutist about these services. Later Libertarians were the absolutists and Hayek wanted nothing to do with them.
Yes… they can always be shot, poisoned, stabbed, etc. Especially the top elite.
Yes… that usually leaves other monsters in charge who then have to be shot.
The danger comes from us deciding the next monster isn't so bad. Hello serfdom.
Shooting an entire ruling class is more difficult, but the history books are full of peasant revolts… that got crushed after some blood was spilled. Our innovation was to set the rulers against each other so THEY do most of the blood spilling. Doesn't mean we are out of the game, though.
Civil Servants can behave like in YES MINISTER.
They can also behave like the Chinese Bureaucracy that backed their Emperors. You've referred to boffins elsewhere. That's where I'm pointing.
When push comes to shove, I'll chose a possibly malignant bureaucracy over a king. I'd rather avoid both, but I see an aristocracy as a larger threat. You know why.
———
I think the anarchists have it wrong for exactly the reason you describe. Male behaviors.
I think the minarchists have it better, but the line between them and the core of liberalism (including Hayek) is how we trim coercive functions of the state without brining back coercive behaviors of cheater males.
My idealistic view of things has a separation of market and state, but I admit that cheating males are likely to continue causing problems for a while. A few women too.
Alfred Differ: A few women too.
Jiminy Glick interviewing Bill Maher:
You're like a male version of MTG.
In other words, MTG.
TWO new Stonekettle columns within the past week.
https://www.stonekettle.com/
What misdemeanor could sully a court that has just enshrined the legal principle of 'ut en ventre'?*
But if you do switch to a parliamentary system, of course you shall drive on the left hand side, as narrow wooded roads and free right sword arms intended!**
Sheesh! What are you guys, civilised?
* 'get in my belly'
** this, from a southpaw
Ugh.
Biden has a sore throat or something. I hope the American people don't judge him on that.
They just argued about the border. Biden mentioned the bipartisan border bill, but didn't mention that Trump was the one who put the kibosh on it.
I've got a bad feeling about this.
It's not going well.
Trump says Biden caused inflation. Biden doesn't mention that the entire world experienced inflation because of supply chain disruptions and the effect of the Russian invasion on energy prices. It's just "You did it!" "No, YOU did it!"
I wish they hadn't done this debate. I hope I'm wrong.
I don't think I can watch any more.
Trump gives listeners permission to simply discount every point President Biden makes by asserting that Biden is a liar.
I realize there is twenty minutes left, but no mention of Christian nationalism or dictatorship. Guess those aren't important considerations.
Mountain Dew futures are falling precipitously.
Trump blames President Biden for rioting in Minneapolis and Portland. Wasn't that the George Floyd protests? In 2020? I forget who was president then.
I'm thinking I might as well walk to the nearest concentration camp and pick out a room wi' a view.
The most devastating blow didn't come from JB or DT. It came from Dana Bash when she said that he'd be 86 at the end of his 2nd term. He really looked old tonight.
On the good side, it's June not October.
Not looking good. Hopefully when the fact-checkers get at it, people who aren't already in The Grope's jock strap will see that every word he said was a lie. Hopefully.
On another subject entirely, I just remembered something I read several months back in a book I recommended, especially for Dr. Brin's consumption. This will sound kind of weird, but the author pointed out that in sexually-reproducing animal species, when rape is a common occurrence, the vaginas evolve a labyrinthine shape, creating passages and pockets for intrusive semen to get lost and trapped in. Oddly enough, it turns out that ducks are among the most serious offenders in the Animal Kingdom. The good stuff, though, is the complete absence of these passages and pockets in human vaginas. That shows that for the great majority of human existence, rape was not a common phenomenon. Most likely it became such a major issue only after the rise of "civilization."
There were other things in that book that were pretty revealing, but that's the one I remember right now. Maybe when I'm done with Sexton I'll listen to that one again.
Paul SB
While I gather Biden's performance was not good, I am getting a sense of 'if you can keep your head while those around are losing theirs'
https://www.electoral-vote.com/evp2024/Items/Jun28-1.html
We are simply stunned that the debate went so badly that it put Biden's candidacy in peril. But we think it did, and obviously others agree. Again, once a few weeks have passed, maybe this will all seem like an overreaction. But we wouldn't want to bet big money on that.
For those of you who despondent over Biden's debate performance last night, you all need to be able to look at some harsh reality without flinching.
Should Americans re-elect Trump, the harsh fact is we are no longer a good, decent or great people.
If Americans were a decent and intelligent people than Trump would get no more than 10% of the vote against anyone.
As Franklin said, we have a republic if we can keep it. If we elect an existential threat to democracy like Trump we will be showing that we can't keep it.
And we don't deserve it.
An America that re-elects Trump is a country not worth saving, and should be written off. It's not just a nation that deserves to die, its one that is already dead.
Did not watch the debate, was preparing to work, also no appetite to see or hear "Fred's contraception error". Joe Biden, even with his age & imperfections still seems preferable to the vast right wing conspiracy's meat puppet.
DP: a republic if we can keep it
Agreed. If Americans compare DT and JB and then elect the former, then Fall Caesar!
For those in need of some comic relief, Jon Stewart's debate analysis:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3SJr44m-w1Y
scidata:
If Americans compare DT and JB and then elect the former,...
The angel and the devil on my shoulder are debating.
Bad: 33%-40% of my fellow Americans are indeed deplorable and like what they see in Trump.
Good: Despite the punditry, in recent elections and ballot initiatives, American voters really do seem to care about civil rights and democracy. Bill Maher was sure that there would be a red wave the week before the 2022 election (and he wasn't happy about it), and Kellyanne Conway thought gas prices would trump abortion as the campaign issue. It didn't work out that way.
I'm concerned, but not despairing. Ok, I was a bit last night. Sue me.
Stonekettle on Threads:
https://www.threads.net/@stonekettle
The Press has deliberately failed The Republic for clicks and likes and CEO bonuses. When the fascism they encouraged takes over, they'll be the first ones put against the wall. I only hope my turn comes late enough that I can mock these fuckers before the bullet gets me.
LH: "Trump says Biden caused inflation. Biden doesn't mention that the entire world experienced inflation because of supply chain disruptions and the effect of the Russian invasion on energy prices."
I wonder if what Trump actually meant by "Biden caused inflation" is "because Biden didn't give Eastern Europe to Putin on a silver platter. After all, he who has the fuel makes the rules."
Incidentally, does anyone else here think that the pro-Russia turn of the right wing in the US (and perhaps to a lesser extent in Europe) is about defending fossil-fuel-heavy lifestyles against environmentalists seeking to destroy them? As James Howard Kunstler said way back in 2005, "Americans will vote for cornpone Nazis before they will give up their entitlement to a McHouse and a McCar."
SCOTUS ends Chevron deference 6-3. Fed Soc judges get to decide science, economics, and administration instead of just law.
The USA now has un-elected chuckleheads that get to substitute their theocracy to override any expert.
The Fed Soc project of overthrowing abortion, civil rights, affirmative action, and bureaucratic rules while accepting bribes is now complete.
Looks like sports is the only disputation arena that the Fed Soc doesn't control with an iron judicial fist.
George Carty:
I wonder if what Trump actually meant by "Biden caused inflation" is "because Biden didn't give Eastern Europe to Putin on a silver platter.
He actually said it was because Biden kept spending so much money, presumably on COVID relief programs, but I'm not even sure the "on what" part mattered. There'd be some merit to the argument if inflation had spiked only in the United States. But post-COVID inflation was worldwide (also spurred by Russia's invasion), and the US did better than most.
Incidentally, does anyone else here think that the pro-Russia turn of the right wing in the US (and perhaps to a lesser extent in Europe) is about defending fossil-fuel-heavy lifestyles against environmentalists seeking to destroy them?
While there might be a hint of that, the pro-Russia thing seems to be about white Christian nationalism standing up for traditional gender roles and against minorities. Tucker Carlson's rants in particular are all along those lines.
Larry Hart:
But post-COVID inflation was worldwide (also spurred by Russia's invasion), and the US did better than most.
If the US did better inflation-wise than most other Western countries, how much could that be credited to the fact that fracking had made it far less dependent on imported fossil fuels than European countries?
While there might be a hint of that, the pro-Russia thing seems to be about white Christian nationalism standing up for traditional gender roles and against minorities.
Wouldn't someone have to be pretty gullible to believe Russian propaganda portraying the country as a bastion of Christian morality? Just look at their divorce and abortion rates for starters!
And it's ironic that Russian propaganda tries to win over racist bigots in the West, given that the propaganda they produce for their own people (and for the global South) portrays Russia as a multicultural society fighting against "Banderite" ethnonationalists in Ukraine.
Tucker Carlson's rants in particular are all along those lines.
What do you think of the hypothesis of Phillip Hallam-Baker (who worked on the early WWW at CERN and has later become a cryptography expert) that Russia hacked Fox News's emails in 2014?
He argues that Russia exploited this hack to convince Roger Ailes to stop paying off the women he was accused of sexually harassing, resulting in a sex scandal that took out Ailes, O'Reilly and several other leading Fox personalities, and cleared the way for Tucker Carlson and Sean Hannity to become leading anchors.
The hack was also later used during the 2016 GOP primaries to help Trump win the nomination, by providing him with inside information on his rivals' campaign strategies.
George Carty:
Wouldn't someone have to be pretty gullible to believe Russian propaganda portraying the country as a bastion of Christian morality? Just look at their divorce and abortion rates for starters!
Sorry, but Christian Nationalism is never about the values that Jesus taught. Domestically, it seems to be solely about enforcing traditional gender values. Politically, it's about a subgroup of the population attaching the label Christians to themselves and therefore insisting that the country is their exclusive rightful homeland, and everyone else is a guest, an intruder, or the hired help.
None of the frothing-at-the-mouth proponents of declaring the United States a Christian Nation are salivating over feeding the poor, welcoming the stranger, or loving their neighbor as themselves. What they want is to exert control over their women and to be mean to outsiders.
"Trump gives listeners permission to simply discount every point President Biden makes by asserting that Biden is a liar."
It is THE issue and THE thing JoBee could say and didn't and never does. "LET'S CHECK WHO IS LYING!" Followed by: "What? You're saying no 'fact-checkers' are unbiased? There's NO ONE we can turn to ? You discredit all scientists, 90% of journalists, civil servants, and now even the FBI? The judges who ALL said there was no 'steal'? You are seriously running away from helping find SOMEONE who can make cleart who is lying?
" I demand you step forth and help us create a commission to help voters tell which of us is lying, nonstop! FACT professionals who aren't overtly on either side. And let's start with a dozen randomly chosen, not-overtly political senior retired military officers. And if you don't trust them - like you howl and the FBI and all the intel agencies and civil servants... aren't those all the people Vlad Putin blames for the fall of the USSR... which he called 'history's worst tragedy'?"
Just making that open demand - and triggering Trump's volcano of excuses - would do more good than any mountain of statistics.
I said of "Christian Nationalists"...
What they want is to exert control over their women and to be mean to outsiders.
And their support for Putin is that he proudly does that sort of thing. And Trump's appeal is that he plays the part of someone who does that sort of thing.
If JB had given the performance last night that he gave in NC today, he'd be on track to win all 50 states. He is a great man, and the best President since FDR.
scidata:
He is a great man, and the best President since FDR.
I agree. I just worry that he'll be judged on debate performance, not on presidential accomplishment.
Today's news items seem to indicate that the debate changed little about his level of support. It gave the haters excuses to say, "See, I was right," but they weren't going to be swayed anyway.
I just hope there's a serious review of his 'training' staff. I worry about inside sabotage.
Reports of last night's performance seem... so off-key to me, and calls for Biden to step down as a result came so thick and fast, I feel there was a hint of organisation to it (even though some of those calls came from sources I normally trust)
Anyway, it seems today is another day. Biden's age has always been grounds for a plan B. Last night was not sufficient grounds to enact it.
Tony Fisk:
Last night was not sufficient grounds to enact it.
Yes, but I (don't) look forward to Brett Stevens's next column in the New York Times. He's under the impression that any Democrat other than Biden would easily beat Trump, and that Biden's stubborn insistence on running will doom us all.
Sticking to my 35% chance of the US doing a massive faceplant by electing rumpt or rumpt squeaky-squeaking in by hot rat-on-rat action.
A lot of the people I talk to in my day job blame Biden for inflation and then have no money because of medical bills. Absolutely no idea what happens outside the US (for most of the EU, more inflation, but no medical bankruptcies*).
*UK may be an exception because 14 years of Tory misrule has gutted the NHS
Pappenheimer
Larry Hart:
Sorry, but Christian Nationalism is never about the values that Jesus taught. Domestically, it seems to be solely about enforcing traditional gender values.
Of course I never expected that the left-leaning teachings of Jesus would be embraced by a right-wing movement, even one that professed itself "Christian". That's why I brought up Russia's (high) divorce and abortion rates, because conservative Christians until recently were all about defending marriage and opposing abortion.
Perhaps the increasing importance of misogyny among the contemporary Right (misogyny is definitely the correct word, as they're unwilling to be providers or to restrain their own sexual desires: ie to abide by the male half of the traditional patriarchal bargain) explains a lot, including why Russia's fifth columnists these days are more right-wing rather than left-wing?
Initially the USSR received a lot of support from Western leftists who found it ideologically attractive, but when Soviet tanks rolled into Hungary in 1956 and Czechoslovakia in 1968 the Western left increasingly saw the Soviet evil empire for what it was, with those still loyal to the Soviets increasingly derided as "tankies". The Kremlin thus became increasingly reliant on blackmail rather than ideology to recruit assets.
While the Soviets blackmailed Western gays in the 1950s exploiting that decade's unusually strong homophobia (likely a result of the pro-natalist zeitgeist), the rise of gay rights made this increasingly less effective so they turned to pedophilia instead. The KGB had a mole in British intelligence who informed them of how IRA leader Joe Cahill had been turned (after another IRA leader's little girl had accused Cahill of raping her) and KGB leader Yuri Andropov decided to set up a massive honeytrap operation to industrialize this process, with young teenage girls being awarded Orders of Lenin for this service. The operation was stopped under Gorbachev (likely because Andropov had also used similar blackmail against his own Politburo to become General Secretary), but then revived under Putin.
As a result of this recruitment process, almost all of Russia's male fifth columnists in the West are sex pests: if such personalities are more common on the political right in the first place, it would explain why it's mainly right-wingers simping for the Kremlin these days.
https://www.electoral-vote.com/evp2024/Items/Jun29-1.html
Ultimately, the very most important question is this: If a voter is wavering, and was undecided before the debate, do they now have information that will help them make a choice? Maybe. We don't claim to really understand the double-haters. However, if a person is deeply concerned about the harm Trump will do, then Biden remains the only means of preventing that harm. That is true even if Biden spends 4 years sitting at the Resolute desk, drooling on his desktop calendar. To put this another way, we struggle to fill in the blank in this sentence: "Now that I have seen Biden's decline, I guess I will have to vote for Trump, because at least Trump..."
Some southerners get it...
https://www.nytimes.com/2024/06/26/opinion/wes-moore-jeff-landry-maryland-louisiana.html
...
One of these ideologies — egalitarianism or oppression — will eventually win out in the South, but [Maryland Governor Wes] Moore isn’t passively waiting to see which one does.
He said that he is recruiting teachers from states that are restricting the teaching of history and recruiting businesses from states that are restricting reproductive rights. He wants people who live in states that are suppressing individual freedoms to consider relocating to his state, where an expansive view of liberty prevails.
Moore repeated what has become, for him, something of a mantra: “I want to make bigotry expensive.” He continued, “I want to make sure that there are economic consequences to states that are continuing to restrict the rights of their citizens, and I want Maryland to be the beneficiary of it.”
Well... that is kinda the point of having 50 different states in a federal system. Works in both directions so we can do the experiments.
Works up until one state has a different sense of what a person's rights are. We get awful tempted to force outcomes when those we've proven time and again that hearts and minds have to be won over to get rights recognized.
Still... Rah! Rah! Go Maryland!
(I think I still have cousins over there.)
The trouble with voting with your feet (as Maryland is suggesting) is that what is left behind is the extreme elements: a cult crucible.
Otoh, had a recent conversation with someone about to flee SC. After thirty years, they're just tired of it.
@Tony Fisk,
Yes, but at some point one must recognize the inevitable--that it's already a cult crucible, that nothing you do will change it, and that you don't want to be there.
The cult must at some point "bump up against solid reality, usually on a battlefield".
Weren’t our original colonies a kind of cult crucible? Many of them.
Every son who has girded on their father's sword* amidst the whoopin' and hollerin' soon learns the terrible truth about the quieter enemy they face: its bite is much worse than its bark.
*https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0ssHxZABrpE
Stonekettle on Threads, responding to a church sign that says "If you think it's hot here, imagine Hell!"
https://www.threads.net/@stonekettle
If your religion is so great, how come you have to threaten people with it?
I mean, what kind of miserable god comes up with the idea of eternal torture in the first place? If you have to depend on fear and threats to keep people in line, maybe you're not the good guy.
* * *
I mean, what if you used that sign to invite people into the air conditioning and maybe a free cold bottle of water?
I live in a shitty little Southern town, in the deepest of the Deep South, a Baptist Church on every corner with a sign just like this out front. All hate and fire and damnation. Believe or burn!
Never once -- never one time -- have those signs ever said "feed the hungry, clothe the poor, heal the sick, do unto others as you would have them do unto you, judge not..." Not once.
Regarding the Supreme Court's recent decisions, the one involving the Chevron Doctrine (where courts defer to agency interpretations of statutes) is a big deal. Back in the 90s, a major part of my litigation work involved defending government agencies' actions using the Chevron Doctrine. I have not read the decision so I can't opine on its details. My current job with the IRS has a similar rule but one that is not based on Chevron and probably won't get overturned.
Regarding the January 6th defendant's case, it was interesting to see Associate Justice Jackson joining the majority and Barrett joining the dissent. I am a former prosecutor and I have a negative feeling towards prosecuting defendants using a novel approach to a statute. There is no parallel to Chevron in criminal cases; criminal statutes are narrowly interpreted and are viewed in a light most favorable for the defendant.
Regarding the debate, I did not watch it. My wife and I watched the 1981 film DRAGONSLAYER instead. We've been on a fantasy theme this week. The night before we watched KRULL (mostly because our dog's favorite toy looks like the Glave from that movie). I took a shower and went to bed early; Mae watched the video of the debate on Youtube. She was dismayed (or would that be "Dis-Mae'ed")...oh...I made a funny.
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