Fortifying Democracy: Domestically, it means ballot harvesting and counting mass mail-in vote dumps behind closed doors until the Democrats win. Internationally, it means bombing cities to rubble and suspending elections due to warmongering.
Resistance: When you follow “The Science” dictated by corporations and governments
Unpopular opinion: If you read any non-ideological political philosophy, i.e. that more focused on historical analysis of how systems work than suggesting a direction as Das Kapital would, there is much currency to the concept that populism destroys democracy.
It was well understood by America's founding fathers that a populace making decisions by majority vote has many problems, thus they chose a representative democracy. They didn't even choose a system that selected president by popular vote - the parties simply bastardized the intent of the electoral college.
A major theme in historical political analysis is that two forces - the elites and the broader populace - typically are in a shared power situation, and it's unbalanced to have either have very little power. Think back to Roman republic times and the plebian vs. patrician. Both compromised in terms of power and control.
The extra democratization of open primary voting (removing party power and the veto power over candidates) and the effects of greater media access direct to the people on social media have the elites unbalanced. I'm not saying they are acting well, I'm just saying to seek a proper balance with them not seek total control by "more democracy". Pure democracy is bad and, further, leads to overthrow by the elites who don't want to be out of power. You want to see an autocracy? Just shut out the elites from a greater share of success and watch what they do next. Better to work together and compromise.
Quite. As I have pointed out in many an online forum, when Democrats says "democracy", especially in the phrase "our democracy", they do not mean rule by the δῆμος, they mean rule by Democrats.
I can't agree with this. For instance, there was no Democratic Party or DNC in many countries where the US sought to install *democracy* by force. (Stars (*) because we have a contested or ambiguous term.) The parties using that force were apparently based in the US, but they had more than one "democratic" name. I'll be many of you can name at least one other.
To resolve this puzzle, we might consider a related term, used throughout the later part of the 20th century more or less synonymously with *democracy*, to wit, *free world*. Remember *free world*? It did not have to do with liberal values or practices, like free speech or elections; Saudi Arabia was part of the *free world*, as were many colonial regimes. Let me cut a long story short here: *free world* = capitalism. It is not surprising, then, that *democracy* also means capitalism.
Folks, capitalism is not the exclusive domain of the *Democratic* party. Please, wake up, look around, and figure out what's going on. You're being taken in by a con.
Pretty universally agreed that she lost 2008 by her own arrogance. Only person who disagrees is Hillary. She thinks it ‘twas disloyal democrats who stabbed her in the back. So she sat down before 2016 and rated every democrat member of congress on a scale of 1-7 based on their personal loyalty to “Hillary!”. A seven and you are in line for a cabinet position once Her Turn comes around. A one and it’s a lonely night in Arkancide....
Both sides accuse the other of election fraud. But only one side has enough evidence to actually convene grand juries and convince panels of regular Americans to vote for indictment. The other side has conspiracy theories that get thrown out of court. That's the difference.
Our justice system is strained in this hyper-partisan environment. Home field advantage plays a role in so much of what has transpired.
One side also has control of the major cities, their courts and their jury pools. Notably, these include the crown jewels of Washington D.C. & New York City that hold jurisdiction over the lion's share of political or economic business conducted in America.
I suspect if the Clinton Foundation underwent this level of targeted scrutiny, novel legal theories could convince the good folks of Tyler, Texas.
But since it operates in New York City, it will never have DA's campaigning to hold it accountable.
In our polarized society, this situation reminds me of the justice black people faced in the courts of the racist south. It was hard form them to check their biases at the courtroom door. We are only human.
Right on the surface, there are the statistical anomalies of one side consistently losing, in combination with the known evidence compiled over decades upon decades of corruption, in building compliant legislators, judges, corporate leadership, org leadership, and most importantly (thus far), MSM.
What we on the side of democracy need to do is continue to gather the voluminous evidence, spread awareness of / access to it, and get those who become aware of it to also overcome their cog-dis, which is preventing them from knowing their gov is evil. All three battle fronts are thus fiercely active.
I don't mean Republicans and Democrats, nor Right and Left. I mean the positions and practices of contemporary powers-that-be, and those who oppose them. The ability in an ostensible democracy to confront power by legal means has been gradually but steadily removed since 9/11. That is the side that is "losing". The most serious current issue IMO involves censorship.
The earlier commenter Schmiddy Belts said "But only one side has enough evidence to actually convene grand juries and convince panels of regular Americans to vote for indictment." IMO, from my reading of commentary from both sides, much of this is empowered by corruption rather than evidence.
"... when one "side" wins the popular vote but loses the electoral vote ..."
Anyone is permitted to contest the results of an election, in speech and in legal processes. Hillary and allies spoke against the 2016 results and launched official investigations. Trump and allies spoke against the 2020 results, and then launched investigations and attempted unprecedented legal procedures (to be implemented Jan 6) to prevent the widely-assumed results from being implemented. Their legality continues to be tested, as we know.
Trump did not call on rogue elements of the military and police to take over the Capitol. He did not encourage protesters to commit violence, although a small number of protesters decided to take matters into their own hands. The idea that Trump and allies *actually* intended to illegally take over the country by force *and get away with it* (for more than a few hours) is, IMO, an absurd interpretation of their intent. But currently half or more of the country now believes it, IMO due to propaganda of unprecedented sophistication and power.
"Anyway I thought the USSA was a republic and not a democracy (at the national level)"
It's both. A "democracy" is any gov system whose aim is to involve the majority in decision-making, whether pure or mixed.
"Democracy has only ever existed in this country for a select group of people"
De facto, yes, in many ways. De jure, implementing a form of democracy was the original intent of the Constitution.
The ability in an ostensible democracy to confront power by legal means has been gradually but steadily removed since 9/11. That is the side that is "losing". The most serious current issue IMO involves censorship.
THIS IS GOLD ANTI-HIP! Totally agree with your entire comment but especially this. If we can’t discuss ideas and proposals and politics out loud and uncensored, we’re in 1984 land. With a government, a giant bureaucracy , and a government-owned corporate media to enforce it.
Correction - being used to make an example of any NON-LEFT thinking dissenters/protestors/rioters. How many rioters were prosecuted for burning cop cars on 1/20/2017 during Trump's inauguratoin? For banging on the Supreme Court doors while it was in session??
Show me a recount won by Republicans. I believe it is like 385-2 in my lifetime. Blue districts just keep "recounting" and "finding" ballots until they win. There have been races where more votes were cast than there are registered voters, and we have Obamacare thanks to "found" ballots for Franken.
Where they handed all the ballots over to some partisan dem newspapers after the fact so they could do their own recount, and found that under no scenario would Gore have won?
That one?
I'm referring to actual official "recounts" where a Republican is winning but wait, it was too close, we found some ballots we need to count! and lo and behold the Dem wins. Gregoire. Franken. That's 2 examples off the top of my head.
If only we could have some actual journalists examine ballots and do a physical recount of any 2020 races.
Schmiddy's argument assumes these grand juries are capable of decisions based on evidence, consist of regular Americans, and could be convened by any district attorney. All three are not correct.
There are no rules of evidence in grand jury proceedings, nobody to object when evidence inadmissible in court is offered up, and the grand jury is not informed they may disregard everything the DA says. The target and the witnesses are not allowed to have counsel present when the evidence is offered up. This is why the old saying is you can indict a ham sandwich.
The "grand juries" in DC and Fulton County are as far from regular Americans as they could be, consisting, instead of Trump hating ideologues.
Finally, only rabid Democratic DA's seem to be inclined to use law to defeat political opponents, just as Stalin did, in our two-tiered system of justice. So far, Republican DA's seem to be more interested in the unbiased rule of law.
The court cases you mention were dismissed on procedural grounds. Do you know of any where there was a trial - with discovery, depositions, and a decision based on factual evidence?
There's a famous quote from the attorney Sol Wachtler that the process of presenting evidence to a grand jury was such that a prosecutor could persuade a grand jury to “indict a ham sandwich.”
Namely, there is no proviso requiring the giving defense a say in presenting evidence to a grand jury or in the prosecutor making exculpatory evidence known:
But, per your comment, and in the specific case of Donald Trump, isn't it striking that four grand juries were empaneled and four indictments issued roughly within a year of the next presidential election? In particular, given that none of the indictments concern claimed offenses committed in the last few years?
All of the indictments concern either the 2020 election aftermath or, in the case of the New York indictment, what Trump purportedly did before the 2016 election.
Isn't that coincidence striking? If all these issues were valid and of pressing legal concern, why did the prosecutors choose to pursue these charges in the year before the next election? Why weren't these purported offenses pursued sooner? What amazing timing!
It is precisely this timing that gives credence to the claims that this represents election interference. These accusations are going to play out during the 2024 campaign season and will certainly interfere in Trump's campaign and provide continual fodder to our oh-so-unbiased media.
Additionally, two of the prosecutors are Democrats (Alvin Bragg and Fani Willis) and I believe the other two indictments (the Florida documents case and the Washington DC insurrection case) are being managed by Jack Smith who was selected by Merrick Garland. Not that Merrick Garland is partisan, right? Isn't all this odd?
Addendum: there was a January 6 Commission (https://january6th-benniethompson.house.gov/) that held hearings for over a year. Why arent't there questions as to why Bennie Thompson prohibited Nancy Pelosi from answering questions? For reference, I'd recommend you listen to the interview of former Capitol Police Chief Steven Sund by Tucker Carlson:
I didn't find much of what Sund said surprising but hearing him give such a detailed breakdown of the events only reinforced what I have suspected.
Specifically, why hasn't there been an investigation as to why the National Guard were not immediately called when the riot began? The riot would have been immediately quashed. I think this has direct bearing on some of the charges Trump faces.
“Clear Skies, Health Forests”. All those democrats. Partisan sewage here. Racket tells a “truth” that nobody can handle. So does Trump. So does Biden. The is the land of a thousand narratives. Looks like Yuri has yet another. Any takers?
I never thought I'd see a time in which they'd look like a worthy organization representing the best interests of Americans. Here's a bit of their mission statement: "Our mission is to bring about less government, more responsibility, and – with God’s help – a better world by providing leadership, education, and organized volunteer action in accordance with moral and Constitutional principles."
Nothing in the least objectionable about that.
The leftist establishment succeeded in demonizing them, and I had thought they had disbanded since I have not heard them mentioned in political discussions since the '70s. Anyway, I found this section to be most informative: https://jbs.org/about/facts/
In light of what has been revealed about the CIA and the 60s cultural revolution, praising the Communists and trashing conservatives now looks like the stupid bleating of dupes, not brave defiance of the machine. I'd say the Birch Society has been vindicated.
The Vietnam War was a travesty that should never have happened and would not have, had there been anyone to defend us against the CIA and the Hawks in the Pentagon. But he was murdered and that absolute creep LBJ led us to perdition.
The culture war is absolutely the avenue used by neo-Marxists, as the result of their failure in the '60s to pull off a violent revolution, their failure to capture the American working class.
This is why I become annoyed when anyone tries to trivialize the situation by sneering at the culture war as insignificant, as anything less than the ideological capture of all our institutions.
USSR has NOT collapsed. Because of this inane Ukraine war it will rise again. This is not necessarily good but most of us in the world are fed up with Democracy (authoritarianism) being shoved down our throats.
We certainly have to include "vaccine" and the change away from something that grants you immunity from X to something that grants you protection from X.
------------------
In the before-times:
Vaccine: A product that stimulates a person’s immune system to produce immunity to a specific disease, protecting the person from that disease. Vaccines are usually administered through needle injections, but can also be administered by mouth or sprayed into the nose.
But now:
Vaccine: A preparation that is used to stimulate the body’s immune response against diseases. Vaccines are usually administered through needle injections, but some can be administered by mouth or sprayed into the nose.
------------
They did this because despite the experts claiming the jab STOPPED TRANSMISSION, it did nothing of the sort. Thus the redefinition and the gaslighting about how it was all to keep you out of the hospital. As if anything is a 'vaccine' just because Pfizer calls it one.
We always hear it getting drilled into us to trust "the science". But why should we, when the elites running the NGOs, the politicians, and even the scientists themselves do not? How do we know this? Because they keep changing "the science":
The elites, politicians, and scientists can’t play by their own rules and keep moving the goalposts of this charade pandemic. So far they’ve banned Ivermectin and HCQ which have been on the WHO's list of essential medicines for decades
And have changed the definitions of:
Pandemic: no longer requires mass sickness and death. Disease merely needs to be widespread.
Herd Immunity: now only includes those vaccinated—They removed ‘natural immunity’ altogether
Vaccine: no longer grants immunity from disease. Now merely gives ‘protection’.
So to all of you doctors, politicians, scientists, and talking media heads demanding that we trust "the science" while you constantly change it to fit your narrative - my only reply to you is: You first.
It's always been rigged. We've allowed it. It used to be more subtle. It's now with impunity. They succeeded in tranquilizing you with TV, hypnotizing you with the smart phone. They're going in for the kill with AI and GW (CC).
No Shot. No Compliance. I'm old enough to die my convictions. I've lived them
So true!! I had a conversation w/ my Dr. about this about a year ago. We both said- "I feel like we've been played!" and she was pro-vax in the beginning!
«Vaccine: no longer grants immunity from disease. Now merely gives ‘protection’.»
No vaccine ever granted 100% immunity to a disease, only ever protection. Then one can argue as to the degree of protection, between "overwhelming majority of cases" to "better than nothing".
Let's just cut right to the chase... the Orwellian change is "science."
Before: A process in which a hypothesis is developed and tested. Evidence is gathered and results examined to determine if the hypothesis is supported. Even if it is, it's kept in mind that new evidence may be discovered, which means re-examination may be needed. Don't take received wisdom as the final word, but understand that empirical evidence may continue to support it.
But now: Whatever is determined by top-ranking public health officials to be the proper messaging, influenced in particular by Big Pharma. If evidence runs to the contrary, either say the process changed, question why one would trust a plebian instead of an expert and, if all else fails, declare it disinformaton, misinformation or malinformation.
"I want to pause here and talk about this notion of consensus, and the rise of what has been called consensus science. I regard consensus science as an extremely pernicious development that ought to be stopped cold in its tracks. Historically, the claim of consensus has been the first refuge of scoundrels; it is a way to avoid debate by claiming that the matter is already settled. Whenever you hear the consensus of scientists agrees on something or other, reach for your wallet, because you’re being had.
Let’s be clear: the work of science has nothing whatever to do with consensus. Consensus is the business of politics. Science, on the contrary, requires only one investigator who happens to be right, which means that he or she has results that are verifiable by reference to the real world. In science consensus is irrelevant. What is relevant is reproducible results. The greatest scientists in history are great precisely because they broke with the consensus. There is no such thing as consensus science. If it’s consensus, it isn’t science. If it’s science, it isn’t consensus. Period."
The most notorious use of 'Consensus' was the Nazi book, 100 Authors Against Einstein. When Einstein learned of it, her remarked, ""Why 100? It would just take one to prove me wrong!" The moral and rational basis for consensus arguments has not improved since.
Although accurate, Einstein left out the more foundational assumptions (to any "proof") that were (maybe) once easily and unconsciously assumed, but are today frequently challenged: The other scientists must already accept, in common, a prior load of science (including: language and meanings of the terms they use, the meaning and even the existence of evidences presented, the logic connecting them, etc.), that came before Einstein's claim, no matter how novel his is.
When not all (or nearly all) professional scientists accept all necessary prior claims, concepts, and language, chaos can ensue. It's not just a matter of "looking at the evidence". In many scientific realms affecting public policy, we are unfortunately in that condition now. This why IMO western society currently has more fundamentally an epistemological crisis (over and above political and scientific ones).
Here are excerpts from the Sackler trial – the family who owns Oxycontin. If you’re not already aware – the things that family did in order to get those extraordinarily dangerous and addictive drugs into the bloodstreams of every single person they could – young and old – will chill your blood cold:
Exactly right. Thank you. Scientists do not form consensus. They report results and explain what they mean, and invite other scientists to test these results and report mistakes. Consensus is questionable.
"Science, on the contrary, requires only one investigator who happens to be right, which means that he or she has results that are verifiable by reference to the real world."
Well, unfortunately, that's actually the problem, the one that effectively negates the rest of what he says... Because there is *no such thing* as science that "happens to be [unimpeachably] right". It is ALWAYS open to question because it is ALWAYS just perception and beliefs by imperfect humans. Even if viable questions may not come until decades or centuries later, or never. Ongoing replicability is beside the point, if it is illusions, along with their entire context, that are being replicated.
Thomas Kuhn, I understand, pointed this out in the early 60s in his work on the surprising -- and to many depressing -- de facto history of science over long periods of time. Consensus, or as Kuhn says (or implies), funerals, drive it. Not Crichton's idealized and popular version of the scientific method.
And now, it appears we may be discovering this again in the current replication crises, for different reasons than orderly and infrequent funerals.
For example, read up on the way Freud and allies browbeat people and thus how psychiatry evolved in the early 20th century. Powerful personalities influence science, because perceptions -- yes, even of data, and data constructs -- can always be manipulated on some level.
And don't get me started on economics. 'Nuff said, eh?
Which is why we take scientific discoveries with a grain of salt, and ask for replication and practical applicability. Like the recent room-temperature super conductor. Someone made a claim, it was tested and didn't work out. That's how science should work. Either assuming it was real or assuming it was false was not. Could there be a room-temperature super conductor? Who knows! That's the point, not assuming ahead of time. Maybe they can find a way to make this one work, given time and effort. No reason to take a solid stance on it and act like it's somehow settled.
The problem arises with how to deal with a planetary threat, for example, the opening of an ozone hole. Loss of the ozone layer is a true civilization ending planetary threat. But who gets to decide the threat actually exists? Who do policymakers listen to? I would say they listen to a consensus. Thirty years ago, policymakers listened to a scientific consensus saying the threat of ozone depletion exists. Then scientists worked on a solution. A scientific consensus decided the problem was mostly CFC's used in air conditioners, refrigerators, aerosol cans. Policymakers internationally met in Montreal and based on the scientific consensus about the cause of ozone depletion, banned CFC's. Manufacturers complained, but eventually complied, and the ozone layer was saved.
That process has been destroyed, I believe, by social media. I understand Mr. Taibbi's concern about government suppression on social media, but I believe the spread of misinformation there has completely destroyed our society's ability to confront threats. Experts are just part of determining a problem and its solution, and now everyone with a thought about it are involved whether or not they have any expertise on the subject. Serious threats like Covid and Climate Change become politicized, and policymakers are unable to develop a policy everyone will accept. We have to solve this problem or we face a grim future with worse pandemics and rising seas.
I believe we do need to establish what a scientific consensus is so threats can be identified, solutions arrived at, and policies to solve the problem are implemented.
When a highly transmissible flesh-eating bacteria that kills within a few days emerges and a vaccine is developed that mitigates it, the Taibbi “free speech/guvmint is bad” bunch will refuse it because it’s endorsed by guvmint and everyone on YouTube knows more than scientists and medical professionals, so they will pass it on to everyone they come in contact with before they die horribly.
Freedom!! Fuck common sense, live free or die, do not trust The Man. No middle ground for ideologues. The sooner this stupid species perishes, the better.
This is a good one. The bastardization of the term and the fact that the "vaccine" isn't really a vaccine, but a therapeutic that prevents neither infection nor transmission will contribute to vaccine hesitancy for years to come now.
Exactly. "COVID vaccination" now means, at least to tens of millions of people, "invasive bodily access, with whatever the authorities want, whenever the authorities want it".
The yearly flu shot wasn't yet getting the compliance they needed, so they impatiently killed their golden-egg-laying goose for immediate payoff. But now, they've also f*cked up compliance for traditional (i.e. actual) vaccines. Way to go, tyrants!
«COVID vaccination" now means, at least to tens of millions of people, "invasive bodily access, with whatever the authorities want, whenever the authorities want it".»
How many Real Americans have been grabbed from their homes or on the street by the faucist squads, tied to a chair and then needle-raped?
Only hundreds of thousands? Millions? Tens of millions? The cover-up as to this horror has been so pervasive that only brave people like you dare to mention it.
No, silly. That's not how the West's 21st century totalitarianism 2.x works. Violence is unnecessary when mind control does sufficient prep work on the vast majority. Keeps things clean and orderly, and gets the job done. I don't think I need to elaborate on the COVID fearmongering, and legal and financial arm-twisting campaigns, etc. etc., do I?
Otherwise, you'd end up looking like Bull Connor or Mayor Daley. Assuming (just for argument's sake, that is) that you were a totalitarian or one of their dupes, you don't want that, do you?
Yes, they made the term ‘vaccinated’ meaningless. They chouldn't have killed their credibly any quicker if they doused it in jet-fuel and set it on fire. From the Washington Post 10/2021:
This is a, it is THE must-see-hear synopsis of this travesty we've been enduring for the past several years. I am amazed it has not been taken down by EwwToob, and I swear that is no exaggeration.
The root cause of failure in a supposedly Free Society is a lack of 1st rate citizens.
And the reason we have few 1st rate citizens is the lack of 1st rate Public Schools.
And the reason we don't have 1st rate Public School Education is because the wealthy & powerful don't want a highly educated general public.What they want is a less educated public.
A less educated general public is easier to control & abuse!
That's because it's not really about (the ethical value of) wealth vs non-wealth.
At the core, this relatively new ethic is about the (supposed) moral value of (supposed) intelligence vs stupidity, and wealth (or class) is only a rough proxy for that. Let me emphasize: Not the functional value of being smart (which is obvious), but a supposed *moral* value to intelligence, over and above its functional value in life.
So, if you're smart, then you see around it, and you stealthily wiggle your way out of any danger. All through your life. But if you're stupid, well... too bad, you dumbass -- you had it coming!
True. But whether real or not, intellectual ability is not a characteristic worthy of praise. It just "is", like any other physical characteristic. One has precious little influence in authoring the abilities of one's own mind.
Exactly. A fancy degree from a fancy (expensive) college may represent some retained knowledge -- most of which is forgotten in 5 years -- but it doesn't denote wisdom. And certainly not any moral or ethical superiority over others.
Yet it doesn't keep the poseurs from trying to fake it.
Good point, but I don’t think it’s anything new. Western Education has always been about nurturing the obedient and culling the inquisitive. Story of my life! The same system that gives you brownie points for raising your hand before you speak as the system that pats you on the head for wearing a mask without question.
"Western Education has always been about nurturing the obedient and culling the inquisitive."
Well, this is a different issue. In schools, it's only the mid-wit admins/teachers who want obedience uber alles and crush any who show intelligence. The most powerful (in society at large) of course want the intelligent under their wings, but the best of these have traditionally come in the side door by invitation in college and work.
What I'm getting at above is the contemporary (past few decades) hero-worship of the intelligent, to the point of doling out -- IMO unnecessary, undemocratic, and otherwise societally destructive -- resources for them, e.g. gifted child schools.
It's about deliberately fostering teaching methods that hold back a child's ability to think logically & objectively.This is done at a very early age 4/5 years old.
That's the age when children need their imagination & curiosity stimulated!
Instead the children are stuffed with raw data to believe & most of this data is false.
Much of it the nonsense of john Dewey.
Dewey who formed many of his ideas concerning education while visiting Soviet Schools in Stalinist Russia!
Agreed that this happens. As you note, "the wealthy & powerful don't want a highly educated general public." It's done to channel the classes, not help their individual lives.
If a student rebels in the lower class settings, at least the dimmer among teachers and admins will seek to stifle him/her as you note. But if the student is in an upper-middle to upper class environment, perceptive staff is far more likely to take notes and channel the energy in better ways.
I am not even talking about early Public School,I am thinking of preschool & kindergarten!
These are the basic's for turning future savages into decent students & decent human beings afterwards! Kids need to learn basic discipline,basic social lessons & basic behavior.
Plus stimulation of their Imaginations & Curiosity! Old fashioned basic beginners Reading & Writing!
Public School just does indoctrination for the most part,not how to think objectively but raw data to believe! Without the very basics, humans would be wild beasts, there is nothing in basic human nature for living in a society peacefully with others.
I agree. Public education has to grapple with the entire range of human intelligence, so there's only so much they can teach--the three Rs are about it--literacy, computational skills, and instruction in civics is about all that's useful and practical.
Highly intelligent kids from working class families ought to have the opportunity to opt out of the generic public schools and be awarded entry into rigorous private academies, the schools our rich people have had exclusive access to forever.
All that social engineering bullshit from the founders of US public schools is unfortunate. It set the tone and now public ed is being ruined by dumbass graduates of schools of education, which have become ideological indoctrination centers dominated by that asshat Paolo Friere. I suppose neo-Marxist ideological capture of education is a sort of natural reaction to the schemes of elitist social engineers like Conant and Dewey, but it's an extreme lurch in the opposite and evil direction.
And the powers that be,in order to dumb down the average student used the methods of John Dewey.Dewey who formed his ideas visiting schools in Stalinist Russia!
It's the methods of teaching count & at an early age!
The Problem with the Public Schools is that they don't teach children how to think,.
They indoctrinate them as to what to believe!
Real education starts at a very early age,4/5 years old when a child has his/her imagination & curiosity stimulated & the begin to read written words!
This leads to an ability,later on,to form concepts & reach logical assumptions.
Instead they deal in symbols & predigested truths!
Instead of graduating as adults who can reason & think,they create drones who memorize what to believe! And what to believe is whatever they were told!
One example is the comment section of some blog sites.Most draw their ideas from Sound Bites
State that you don't Approve of Central Bankers & a reply will answer that
"Yes,I don't like those Commie Bums either.
The answer comes from an individual who doesn't know the difference between Globalist bankers & Communist!
He reached his conclusion by thinking that Globalist Bankers are bad & Communists are also bad.If both are bad,than Bankers & Communists are the same!
it is not a question of I.Q. are mental abilities.The real issue is that there are different methods of instruction for real learning & other methods for indoctrination!
This goes back to preschool & methods as used by the Montessori System to encourage & cultivate the minds of 4/5 year olds in Reading,writing & arithmetic,the old fashioned way!
This begins the development of the child's ability to think in an logical & objective manner.to encourage the growth of a child's imagination & sense of curiosity!
Public School are just Indoctrination centers to program students with arbitrary data that may or may not be true! The system produces graduates who have been programmed like a computer hard drive.Turns the brain into a search engine that searches out words rather than ideas!
Turns out adults that can't form concepts,only predigested Ideas!
If you're looking for more altered meanings for your Devil's Dictionary - how about the word Freedom itself? I couldn't believe it the first time I heard the term FreeDUMB. Say what?? Seriously? The Conformists are now equating people who value Freedom with Dumbasses?? What the h...?? And, of course, the ole Freedom = Selfishness became huge. What a turn around! The social engineering has been exceptionally professional - I mean who could have believed that, within the matter of a year or two the always-held-in-high-esteem value Freedom would degenerate into something so measly and so easily trod upon? It's too much...
One of the nutrition podcasters that I have followed for several years became alarmed at the very beginning of Covid madness, and decided to start a Facebook group to organize opposition to vaccine passports/mandates (which she correctly predicted would be eventually coming). Her group originally had the word “freedom” in the name, but she had to change it because she soon discovered that Facebook doesn’t like the word “freedom”.
Any of the judges on the Supreme Court are as corrupt as the day is long. You should spent some time in any Superior Court, then you would realize why judges wear black. They are definitely from the dark side.
A gross, and untrue, generalization WA. There are (a few) corrupt judges, a fairly good number of less than astute judges, but the vast majority of judges put their hearts and souls into trying to be fair and hold society together.
Or how Asians are "white adjacent" when it comes time to play Admissions Office Wokemon but the victims of a terrifying wave of racist violence when it comes time to line up voters for Team D,
Careful, you might be violating the intellectual property rights of the Real Woman (tm) brand, which is a line of elective cosmetic surgeries. I'd just avoid the "w" word from now on. It only attracts harassment from the stans.
One of the most prescient observations by de Tocqueville in 1833: “There are at the present time two great nations in the world, which started from different points, but seem to tend towards the same end. I allude to the Russians and the Americans. Both of them have grown up unnoticed; and whilst the attention of mankind was directed elsewhere, they have suddenly placed themselves in the front rank among the nations, and the world learned their existence and their greatness at almost the same time.
All other nations seem to have nearly reached their natural limits, and they have only to maintain their power; but these are still in the act of growth. All the others have stopped, or continue to advance with extreme difficulty; these alone are proceeding with ease and celerity along a path to which no limit can be perceived. The American struggles against the obstacles which nature opposes to him; the adversaries of the Russian are men. The former combats the wilderness and savage life; the latter, civilization with all its arms. The conquests of the American are therefore gained with the ploughshare; those of the Russian by the sword. The Anglo-American relies upon personal interest to accomplish his ends, and gives free scope to the unguided strength and common sense of the people; the Russian centres all the authority of society in a single arm. The principal instrument of the former is freedom; of the latter, servitude. Their starting-point is different, and their courses are not the same; yet each of them seems marked out by the will of Heaven to sway the destinies of half the globe.”
Not long after de Tocqueville wrote those words, tsarist Russia made it clear that if Britain tried to intervene in the American Civil War on behalf of the Confederacy (as many British politicians wanted), Russia would intervene on the side of the Union.
The Russian Navy also patrolled the California coast, thus freeing up Union ships for blockade duty.
“Democracy” as used by Democrats and Liberals in Canada, does not mean to allow the free flow of information such that each citizen can make up their own mind and vote to their convictions: a cornerstone of Liberalism and The enlightenment. Rather, it means for The State to curate and censor information such that each individual votes according to what’s best for The State: a fascist tenet.
"Rather, it means for The State to curate and censor information such that each individual votes according to what’s best for The State: a fascist tenet."
Which is why they use the phrase "our democracy" which has its own meaning in the technocratic leftist lexicon.
I don’t. And I don’t need to. Mussolini juxtaposes fascism to liberalism, ie western democracy far more eloquently then I :”The Fascist conception of life accepts the individual only in so far as his interests coincide with the State. . . . Fascism reasserts the rights of the state. If classical liberalism spells individualism, Fascism spells government.”
Repeating the observation of a dear friend: "We can't vote our way out of this." Sadly, I suspect that is true, and now the case. Have we have fallen too far down the rabbit memory hole, or is it true "The future is not written."
Democracy: when Democrats win.
Fortifying Democracy: Domestically, it means ballot harvesting and counting mass mail-in vote dumps behind closed doors until the Democrats win. Internationally, it means bombing cities to rubble and suspending elections due to warmongering.
Resistance: When you follow “The Science” dictated by corporations and governments
https://yuribezmenov.substack.com/p/how-to-coin-a-term-part-2
The Science™: Politics in a white coat.
https://www.euphoricrecall.net/p/follow-the-science
Unpopular opinion: If you read any non-ideological political philosophy, i.e. that more focused on historical analysis of how systems work than suggesting a direction as Das Kapital would, there is much currency to the concept that populism destroys democracy.
It was well understood by America's founding fathers that a populace making decisions by majority vote has many problems, thus they chose a representative democracy. They didn't even choose a system that selected president by popular vote - the parties simply bastardized the intent of the electoral college.
A major theme in historical political analysis is that two forces - the elites and the broader populace - typically are in a shared power situation, and it's unbalanced to have either have very little power. Think back to Roman republic times and the plebian vs. patrician. Both compromised in terms of power and control.
The extra democratization of open primary voting (removing party power and the veto power over candidates) and the effects of greater media access direct to the people on social media have the elites unbalanced. I'm not saying they are acting well, I'm just saying to seek a proper balance with them not seek total control by "more democracy". Pure democracy is bad and, further, leads to overthrow by the elites who don't want to be out of power. You want to see an autocracy? Just shut out the elites from a greater share of success and watch what they do next. Better to work together and compromise.
Quite. As I have pointed out in many an online forum, when Democrats says "democracy", especially in the phrase "our democracy", they do not mean rule by the δῆμος, they mean rule by Democrats.
And not just any Democrat -- only those approved by the party gatekeepers.
SO sick of the DNC.....replace them NOW
It’s a private corporation. Starve them of funds.
I can't agree with this. For instance, there was no Democratic Party or DNC in many countries where the US sought to install *democracy* by force. (Stars (*) because we have a contested or ambiguous term.) The parties using that force were apparently based in the US, but they had more than one "democratic" name. I'll be many of you can name at least one other.
To resolve this puzzle, we might consider a related term, used throughout the later part of the 20th century more or less synonymously with *democracy*, to wit, *free world*. Remember *free world*? It did not have to do with liberal values or practices, like free speech or elections; Saudi Arabia was part of the *free world*, as were many colonial regimes. Let me cut a long story short here: *free world* = capitalism. It is not surprising, then, that *democracy* also means capitalism.
Folks, capitalism is not the exclusive domain of the *Democratic* party. Please, wake up, look around, and figure out what's going on. You're being taken in by a con.
“Keep on rockin’ in the free world!
We got a thousand points of light
For the homeless man
Got a kinder, gentler machine gun hand”
Blowback: Hillary Clinton Machine destroying the country because she didn’t get her turn.
She didn’t let Bill publicly humiliate her for decades just to NOT be the first female president! We owe her!!!!
YES! Agree. Big handshake to you from a country gal.
Obama and the DNC cheated her out of her turn in 2008.
Ridiculous. She was hated by Dems and Repubs. The DNC was to blame.
Pretty universally agreed that she lost 2008 by her own arrogance. Only person who disagrees is Hillary. She thinks it ‘twas disloyal democrats who stabbed her in the back. So she sat down before 2016 and rated every democrat member of congress on a scale of 1-7 based on their personal loyalty to “Hillary!”. A seven and you are in line for a cabinet position once Her Turn comes around. A one and it’s a lonely night in Arkancide....
Democracy certainly "won" in Michigan.
https://justthenews.com/politics-policy/elections/michigan-city-police-report-flagged-possibility-nationwide-voter
Both sides accuse the other of election fraud. But only one side has enough evidence to actually convene grand juries and convince panels of regular Americans to vote for indictment. The other side has conspiracy theories that get thrown out of court. That's the difference.
Stalin also had successful indictments with a similar evidential basis and motives back in the 1930s. Guess that makes him right!
Our justice system is strained in this hyper-partisan environment. Home field advantage plays a role in so much of what has transpired.
One side also has control of the major cities, their courts and their jury pools. Notably, these include the crown jewels of Washington D.C. & New York City that hold jurisdiction over the lion's share of political or economic business conducted in America.
I suspect if the Clinton Foundation underwent this level of targeted scrutiny, novel legal theories could convince the good folks of Tyler, Texas.
But since it operates in New York City, it will never have DA's campaigning to hold it accountable.
In our polarized society, this situation reminds me of the justice black people faced in the courts of the racist south. It was hard form them to check their biases at the courtroom door. We are only human.
You poor targeted and scrutinized honky!
Would you agree that the widespread perception of impartial justice is a crucial ingredient of a non-violent, well-ordered society?
Don’t waste your time with that🧌. Perhaps if we’re lucky he’ll go back under his bridge.
Honey, really.
Don't feed the troll.
Yes BUT even Justice is being bought?
Sometimes with currencies other than money.
feldspar agrees with no one. That's his role here.
Not with you, I wouldn't.
Our mascot has returned!
Sorry, we're a little too perceptive for that....
Right on the surface, there are the statistical anomalies of one side consistently losing, in combination with the known evidence compiled over decades upon decades of corruption, in building compliant legislators, judges, corporate leadership, org leadership, and most importantly (thus far), MSM.
What we on the side of democracy need to do is continue to gather the voluminous evidence, spread awareness of / access to it, and get those who become aware of it to also overcome their cog-dis, which is preventing them from knowing their gov is evil. All three battle fronts are thus fiercely active.
"Are Rethugs and Demorats actual 'sides' [?]"
I don't mean Republicans and Democrats, nor Right and Left. I mean the positions and practices of contemporary powers-that-be, and those who oppose them. The ability in an ostensible democracy to confront power by legal means has been gradually but steadily removed since 9/11. That is the side that is "losing". The most serious current issue IMO involves censorship.
The earlier commenter Schmiddy Belts said "But only one side has enough evidence to actually convene grand juries and convince panels of regular Americans to vote for indictment." IMO, from my reading of commentary from both sides, much of this is empowered by corruption rather than evidence.
"... when one "side" wins the popular vote but loses the electoral vote ..."
Anyone is permitted to contest the results of an election, in speech and in legal processes. Hillary and allies spoke against the 2016 results and launched official investigations. Trump and allies spoke against the 2020 results, and then launched investigations and attempted unprecedented legal procedures (to be implemented Jan 6) to prevent the widely-assumed results from being implemented. Their legality continues to be tested, as we know.
Trump did not call on rogue elements of the military and police to take over the Capitol. He did not encourage protesters to commit violence, although a small number of protesters decided to take matters into their own hands. The idea that Trump and allies *actually* intended to illegally take over the country by force *and get away with it* (for more than a few hours) is, IMO, an absurd interpretation of their intent. But currently half or more of the country now believes it, IMO due to propaganda of unprecedented sophistication and power.
"Anyway I thought the USSA was a republic and not a democracy (at the national level)"
It's both. A "democracy" is any gov system whose aim is to involve the majority in decision-making, whether pure or mixed.
"Democracy has only ever existed in this country for a select group of people"
De facto, yes, in many ways. De jure, implementing a form of democracy was the original intent of the Constitution.
The ability in an ostensible democracy to confront power by legal means has been gradually but steadily removed since 9/11. That is the side that is "losing". The most serious current issue IMO involves censorship.
THIS IS GOLD ANTI-HIP! Totally agree with your entire comment but especially this. If we can’t discuss ideas and proposals and politics out loud and uncensored, we’re in 1984 land. With a government, a giant bureaucracy , and a government-owned corporate media to enforce it.
Correction - being used to make an example of any NON-LEFT thinking dissenters/protestors/rioters. How many rioters were prosecuted for burning cop cars on 1/20/2017 during Trump's inauguratoin? For banging on the Supreme Court doors while it was in session??
Show me a recount won by Republicans. I believe it is like 385-2 in my lifetime. Blue districts just keep "recounting" and "finding" ballots until they win. There have been races where more votes were cast than there are registered voters, and we have Obamacare thanks to "found" ballots for Franken.
This never happens in red districts.
You are trolling or do not follow the news.
Where they handed all the ballots over to some partisan dem newspapers after the fact so they could do their own recount, and found that under no scenario would Gore have won?
That one?
I'm referring to actual official "recounts" where a Republican is winning but wait, it was too close, we found some ballots we need to count! and lo and behold the Dem wins. Gregoire. Franken. That's 2 examples off the top of my head.
If only we could have some actual journalists examine ballots and do a physical recount of any 2020 races.
Schmiddy's argument assumes these grand juries are capable of decisions based on evidence, consist of regular Americans, and could be convened by any district attorney. All three are not correct.
There are no rules of evidence in grand jury proceedings, nobody to object when evidence inadmissible in court is offered up, and the grand jury is not informed they may disregard everything the DA says. The target and the witnesses are not allowed to have counsel present when the evidence is offered up. This is why the old saying is you can indict a ham sandwich.
The "grand juries" in DC and Fulton County are as far from regular Americans as they could be, consisting, instead of Trump hating ideologues.
Finally, only rabid Democratic DA's seem to be inclined to use law to defeat political opponents, just as Stalin did, in our two-tiered system of justice. So far, Republican DA's seem to be more interested in the unbiased rule of law.
"Only one side has enough evidence to actually convene grand juries and convince panels of regular Americans to vote for indictment."
Which side is that? And which mythical "panels" in this process consist of regular Americans?
The court cases you mention were dismissed on procedural grounds. Do you know of any where there was a trial - with discovery, depositions, and a decision based on factual evidence?
There's a famous quote from the attorney Sol Wachtler that the process of presenting evidence to a grand jury was such that a prosecutor could persuade a grand jury to “indict a ham sandwich.”
https://www.google.com/search?q=grand+jury+indict+ham+sandwich
Namely, there is no proviso requiring the giving defense a say in presenting evidence to a grand jury or in the prosecutor making exculpatory evidence known:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Grand_juries_in_the_United_States#Criticism
But, per your comment, and in the specific case of Donald Trump, isn't it striking that four grand juries were empaneled and four indictments issued roughly within a year of the next presidential election? In particular, given that none of the indictments concern claimed offenses committed in the last few years?
All of the indictments concern either the 2020 election aftermath or, in the case of the New York indictment, what Trump purportedly did before the 2016 election.
Isn't that coincidence striking? If all these issues were valid and of pressing legal concern, why did the prosecutors choose to pursue these charges in the year before the next election? Why weren't these purported offenses pursued sooner? What amazing timing!
It is precisely this timing that gives credence to the claims that this represents election interference. These accusations are going to play out during the 2024 campaign season and will certainly interfere in Trump's campaign and provide continual fodder to our oh-so-unbiased media.
Additionally, two of the prosecutors are Democrats (Alvin Bragg and Fani Willis) and I believe the other two indictments (the Florida documents case and the Washington DC insurrection case) are being managed by Jack Smith who was selected by Merrick Garland. Not that Merrick Garland is partisan, right? Isn't all this odd?
Addendum: there was a January 6 Commission (https://january6th-benniethompson.house.gov/) that held hearings for over a year. Why arent't there questions as to why Bennie Thompson prohibited Nancy Pelosi from answering questions? For reference, I'd recommend you listen to the interview of former Capitol Police Chief Steven Sund by Tucker Carlson:
https://twitter.com/TuckerCarlson/status/1689783814594174976
I didn't find much of what Sund said surprising but hearing him give such a detailed breakdown of the events only reinforced what I have suspected.
Specifically, why hasn't there been an investigation as to why the National Guard were not immediately called when the riot began? The riot would have been immediately quashed. I think this has direct bearing on some of the charges Trump faces.
is it?
You might remember who said this one.
Democracy means communism. Nobody has an equal vote unless everyone has an equal voice. Therefore communism is the only real democracy.
In communism there's more to it than voting, though.
Brilliant.
“Clear Skies, Health Forests”. All those democrats. Partisan sewage here. Racket tells a “truth” that nobody can handle. So does Trump. So does Biden. The is the land of a thousand narratives. Looks like Yuri has yet another. Any takers?
So the John Birch Society is still around?
I never thought I'd see a time in which they'd look like a worthy organization representing the best interests of Americans. Here's a bit of their mission statement: "Our mission is to bring about less government, more responsibility, and – with God’s help – a better world by providing leadership, education, and organized volunteer action in accordance with moral and Constitutional principles."
Nothing in the least objectionable about that.
The leftist establishment succeeded in demonizing them, and I had thought they had disbanded since I have not heard them mentioned in political discussions since the '70s. Anyway, I found this section to be most informative: https://jbs.org/about/facts/
.......and God said..........
In light of what has been revealed about the CIA and the 60s cultural revolution, praising the Communists and trashing conservatives now looks like the stupid bleating of dupes, not brave defiance of the machine. I'd say the Birch Society has been vindicated.
The Vietnam War was a travesty that should never have happened and would not have, had there been anyone to defend us against the CIA and the Hawks in the Pentagon. But he was murdered and that absolute creep LBJ led us to perdition.
The culture war is absolutely the avenue used by neo-Marxists, as the result of their failure in the '60s to pull off a violent revolution, their failure to capture the American working class.
This is why I become annoyed when anyone tries to trivialize the situation by sneering at the culture war as insignificant, as anything less than the ideological capture of all our institutions.
💯
USSR has NOT collapsed. Because of this inane Ukraine war it will rise again. This is not necessarily good but most of us in the world are fed up with Democracy (authoritarianism) being shoved down our throats.
We certainly have to include "vaccine" and the change away from something that grants you immunity from X to something that grants you protection from X.
------------------
In the before-times:
Vaccine: A product that stimulates a person’s immune system to produce immunity to a specific disease, protecting the person from that disease. Vaccines are usually administered through needle injections, but can also be administered by mouth or sprayed into the nose.
But now:
Vaccine: A preparation that is used to stimulate the body’s immune response against diseases. Vaccines are usually administered through needle injections, but some can be administered by mouth or sprayed into the nose.
------------
They did this because despite the experts claiming the jab STOPPED TRANSMISSION, it did nothing of the sort. Thus the redefinition and the gaslighting about how it was all to keep you out of the hospital. As if anything is a 'vaccine' just because Pfizer calls it one.
You got it SC!
We always hear it getting drilled into us to trust "the science". But why should we, when the elites running the NGOs, the politicians, and even the scientists themselves do not? How do we know this? Because they keep changing "the science":
The elites, politicians, and scientists can’t play by their own rules and keep moving the goalposts of this charade pandemic. So far they’ve banned Ivermectin and HCQ which have been on the WHO's list of essential medicines for decades
And have changed the definitions of:
Pandemic: no longer requires mass sickness and death. Disease merely needs to be widespread.
Herd Immunity: now only includes those vaccinated—They removed ‘natural immunity’ altogether
Vaccine: no longer grants immunity from disease. Now merely gives ‘protection’.
So to all of you doctors, politicians, scientists, and talking media heads demanding that we trust "the science" while you constantly change it to fit your narrative - my only reply to you is: You first.
The game is rigged, folks.
It's always been rigged. We've allowed it. It used to be more subtle. It's now with impunity. They succeeded in tranquilizing you with TV, hypnotizing you with the smart phone. They're going in for the kill with AI and GW (CC).
No Shot. No Compliance. I'm old enough to die my convictions. I've lived them
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b_sEYlTwi54
I will not comply.
I stand with you Shelley. If this is the hill I die on, so be it, I will never get these shots.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nvlTJrNJ5lA yup wont back down
So true!! I had a conversation w/ my Dr. about this about a year ago. We both said- "I feel like we've been played!" and she was pro-vax in the beginning!
«Vaccine: no longer grants immunity from disease. Now merely gives ‘protection’.»
No vaccine ever granted 100% immunity to a disease, only ever protection. Then one can argue as to the degree of protection, between "overwhelming majority of cases" to "better than nothing".
https://tritorch.com/degradation/!CDCChangesDefinitionsOfVaccineAndVaccinations.png
Definition of Vaccine May 16, 2018: The act of introducing a vaccine into the body to produce immunity to a specific disease.
Definition of Vaccine September 1, 2021: The act of introducing a vaccine into the body to product protection from a specific disease.
From: cdc.gov/vaccines/vac-gen/imz-basics.htm
Or perhaps more accurately here and now: “provides no protection and has a demonstrated ability to cause life-threatening illness”.
Let's just cut right to the chase... the Orwellian change is "science."
Before: A process in which a hypothesis is developed and tested. Evidence is gathered and results examined to determine if the hypothesis is supported. Even if it is, it's kept in mind that new evidence may be discovered, which means re-examination may be needed. Don't take received wisdom as the final word, but understand that empirical evidence may continue to support it.
But now: Whatever is determined by top-ranking public health officials to be the proper messaging, influenced in particular by Big Pharma. If evidence runs to the contrary, either say the process changed, question why one would trust a plebian instead of an expert and, if all else fails, declare it disinformaton, misinformation or malinformation.
Michael Crichton On Consensus Science
"I want to pause here and talk about this notion of consensus, and the rise of what has been called consensus science. I regard consensus science as an extremely pernicious development that ought to be stopped cold in its tracks. Historically, the claim of consensus has been the first refuge of scoundrels; it is a way to avoid debate by claiming that the matter is already settled. Whenever you hear the consensus of scientists agrees on something or other, reach for your wallet, because you’re being had.
Let’s be clear: the work of science has nothing whatever to do with consensus. Consensus is the business of politics. Science, on the contrary, requires only one investigator who happens to be right, which means that he or she has results that are verifiable by reference to the real world. In science consensus is irrelevant. What is relevant is reproducible results. The greatest scientists in history are great precisely because they broke with the consensus. There is no such thing as consensus science. If it’s consensus, it isn’t science. If it’s science, it isn’t consensus. Period."
The most notorious use of 'Consensus' was the Nazi book, 100 Authors Against Einstein. When Einstein learned of it, her remarked, ""Why 100? It would just take one to prove me wrong!" The moral and rational basis for consensus arguments has not improved since.
..... he remarked...
"It would just take one to prove me wrong!"
Although accurate, Einstein left out the more foundational assumptions (to any "proof") that were (maybe) once easily and unconsciously assumed, but are today frequently challenged: The other scientists must already accept, in common, a prior load of science (including: language and meanings of the terms they use, the meaning and even the existence of evidences presented, the logic connecting them, etc.), that came before Einstein's claim, no matter how novel his is.
When not all (or nearly all) professional scientists accept all necessary prior claims, concepts, and language, chaos can ensue. It's not just a matter of "looking at the evidence". In many scientific realms affecting public policy, we are unfortunately in that condition now. This why IMO western society currently has more fundamentally an epistemological crisis (over and above political and scientific ones).
“ 97% of scientists agree with whoever is funding them!”
Just as easy to buy a scientist as it is a politician. Maybe even easier if the last few years are anything to go by.
The story of how Oxycontin received FDA approval is most instructive.
Give this a quick look:
https://tritorch.com/sacklers
Here are excerpts from the Sackler trial – the family who owns Oxycontin. If you’re not already aware – the things that family did in order to get those extraordinarily dangerous and addictive drugs into the bloodstreams of every single person they could – young and old – will chill your blood cold:
Taken us out one way or another meoooow
Exactly right. Thank you. Scientists do not form consensus. They report results and explain what they mean, and invite other scientists to test these results and report mistakes. Consensus is questionable.
"Science, on the contrary, requires only one investigator who happens to be right, which means that he or she has results that are verifiable by reference to the real world."
Well, unfortunately, that's actually the problem, the one that effectively negates the rest of what he says... Because there is *no such thing* as science that "happens to be [unimpeachably] right". It is ALWAYS open to question because it is ALWAYS just perception and beliefs by imperfect humans. Even if viable questions may not come until decades or centuries later, or never. Ongoing replicability is beside the point, if it is illusions, along with their entire context, that are being replicated.
Thomas Kuhn, I understand, pointed this out in the early 60s in his work on the surprising -- and to many depressing -- de facto history of science over long periods of time. Consensus, or as Kuhn says (or implies), funerals, drive it. Not Crichton's idealized and popular version of the scientific method.
And now, it appears we may be discovering this again in the current replication crises, for different reasons than orderly and infrequent funerals.
For example, read up on the way Freud and allies browbeat people and thus how psychiatry evolved in the early 20th century. Powerful personalities influence science, because perceptions -- yes, even of data, and data constructs -- can always be manipulated on some level.
And don't get me started on economics. 'Nuff said, eh?
Which is why we take scientific discoveries with a grain of salt, and ask for replication and practical applicability. Like the recent room-temperature super conductor. Someone made a claim, it was tested and didn't work out. That's how science should work. Either assuming it was real or assuming it was false was not. Could there be a room-temperature super conductor? Who knows! That's the point, not assuming ahead of time. Maybe they can find a way to make this one work, given time and effort. No reason to take a solid stance on it and act like it's somehow settled.
The problem arises with how to deal with a planetary threat, for example, the opening of an ozone hole. Loss of the ozone layer is a true civilization ending planetary threat. But who gets to decide the threat actually exists? Who do policymakers listen to? I would say they listen to a consensus. Thirty years ago, policymakers listened to a scientific consensus saying the threat of ozone depletion exists. Then scientists worked on a solution. A scientific consensus decided the problem was mostly CFC's used in air conditioners, refrigerators, aerosol cans. Policymakers internationally met in Montreal and based on the scientific consensus about the cause of ozone depletion, banned CFC's. Manufacturers complained, but eventually complied, and the ozone layer was saved.
That process has been destroyed, I believe, by social media. I understand Mr. Taibbi's concern about government suppression on social media, but I believe the spread of misinformation there has completely destroyed our society's ability to confront threats. Experts are just part of determining a problem and its solution, and now everyone with a thought about it are involved whether or not they have any expertise on the subject. Serious threats like Covid and Climate Change become politicized, and policymakers are unable to develop a policy everyone will accept. We have to solve this problem or we face a grim future with worse pandemics and rising seas.
I believe we do need to establish what a scientific consensus is so threats can be identified, solutions arrived at, and policies to solve the problem are implemented.
Exactly.
When a highly transmissible flesh-eating bacteria that kills within a few days emerges and a vaccine is developed that mitigates it, the Taibbi “free speech/guvmint is bad” bunch will refuse it because it’s endorsed by guvmint and everyone on YouTube knows more than scientists and medical professionals, so they will pass it on to everyone they come in contact with before they die horribly.
Freedom!! Fuck common sense, live free or die, do not trust The Man. No middle ground for ideologues. The sooner this stupid species perishes, the better.
Maroons. (shaking head.)
TriTorch the Crichton post is the best of hundred of comments Thank you.
Secure funding, publish papers, get promoted = the scientific method
🤣😭
Or even more simply, science now equals dogma. And woe unto thee who question the wisdom of the high priests of scientism.
"I fucking love science!(R)*"
*except when science is not politically convenient at the moment. Then science is a white male tool intended to oppress minorities and women.
Yes! "Science" should for sure be a future entry in Matt's project.
This is a good one. The bastardization of the term and the fact that the "vaccine" isn't really a vaccine, but a therapeutic that prevents neither infection nor transmission will contribute to vaccine hesitancy for years to come now.
Exactly. "COVID vaccination" now means, at least to tens of millions of people, "invasive bodily access, with whatever the authorities want, whenever the authorities want it".
The yearly flu shot wasn't yet getting the compliance they needed, so they impatiently killed their golden-egg-laying goose for immediate payoff. But now, they've also f*cked up compliance for traditional (i.e. actual) vaccines. Way to go, tyrants!
I seriously won't get any future dog vaxxed, their vaccines are causing allergies to everything. Never again!
Polio? You won't get vaccinated?
Jennifer, where would one get polio?
NYC/England/Wales the whole world.
I didn't know that dogs can get polio. Very interesting.
«COVID vaccination" now means, at least to tens of millions of people, "invasive bodily access, with whatever the authorities want, whenever the authorities want it".»
How many Real Americans have been grabbed from their homes or on the street by the faucist squads, tied to a chair and then needle-raped?
Only hundreds of thousands? Millions? Tens of millions? The cover-up as to this horror has been so pervasive that only brave people like you dare to mention it.
:-)
No, silly. That's not how the West's 21st century totalitarianism 2.x works. Violence is unnecessary when mind control does sufficient prep work on the vast majority. Keeps things clean and orderly, and gets the job done. I don't think I need to elaborate on the COVID fearmongering, and legal and financial arm-twisting campaigns, etc. etc., do I?
Otherwise, you'd end up looking like Bull Connor or Mayor Daley. Assuming (just for argument's sake, that is) that you were a totalitarian or one of their dupes, you don't want that, do you?
Yes, they made the term ‘vaccinated’ meaningless. They chouldn't have killed their credibly any quicker if they doused it in jet-fuel and set it on fire. From the Washington Post 10/2021:
"You're not fully vaccinated. You never will be.
https://tritorch.com/degradation/!YoureNotFullyVaccinatedYouNeverWillBeWaPo.png
And you’re either “fully vaccinated” or “unvaccinated” when it comes to the Serious Adverse Events tally.
Like in hundreds of millions of people. But, hey, they still billions to harm.
Further fuel from Dr John. (Campbell) "Natural Immunity Wins"
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IiA1S6NvCo4&list=TLPQMjcwODIwMjMDorPQs_SQ3A&index=19
It usually does. Probably why so many of Big Pharma's medications coincidentally operate by suppressing it.
This is a, it is THE must-see-hear synopsis of this travesty we've been enduring for the past several years. I am amazed it has not been taken down by EwwToob, and I swear that is no exaggeration.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rG38_53SEbU&t=1900s
And when they changed the definition I KNEW it was all bullshit.
The root cause of failure in a supposedly Free Society is a lack of 1st rate citizens.
And the reason we have few 1st rate citizens is the lack of 1st rate Public Schools.
And the reason we don't have 1st rate Public School Education is because the wealthy & powerful don't want a highly educated general public.What they want is a less educated public.
A less educated general public is easier to control & abuse!
I am boggled by how intentionally bad my niece’s school system is, in the affluent town of Camden, ME.
That's because it's not really about (the ethical value of) wealth vs non-wealth.
At the core, this relatively new ethic is about the (supposed) moral value of (supposed) intelligence vs stupidity, and wealth (or class) is only a rough proxy for that. Let me emphasize: Not the functional value of being smart (which is obvious), but a supposed *moral* value to intelligence, over and above its functional value in life.
So, if you're smart, then you see around it, and you stealthily wiggle your way out of any danger. All through your life. But if you're stupid, well... too bad, you dumbass -- you had it coming!
Self-professed "intellectuals" and actual intellect often stand apart.
True. But whether real or not, intellectual ability is not a characteristic worthy of praise. It just "is", like any other physical characteristic. One has precious little influence in authoring the abilities of one's own mind.
Exactly. A fancy degree from a fancy (expensive) college may represent some retained knowledge -- most of which is forgotten in 5 years -- but it doesn't denote wisdom. And certainly not any moral or ethical superiority over others.
Yet it doesn't keep the poseurs from trying to fake it.
the great George Orwell
was quoted as saying, "there are some ideas that are so absurd that only an intellectual could believe them''
a great thinker,George Orwell commented that
"There are ideas so absurd that only an Intellectual can believe them"
Good point, but I don’t think it’s anything new. Western Education has always been about nurturing the obedient and culling the inquisitive. Story of my life! The same system that gives you brownie points for raising your hand before you speak as the system that pats you on the head for wearing a mask without question.
"Western Education has always been about nurturing the obedient and culling the inquisitive."
Well, this is a different issue. In schools, it's only the mid-wit admins/teachers who want obedience uber alles and crush any who show intelligence. The most powerful (in society at large) of course want the intelligent under their wings, but the best of these have traditionally come in the side door by invitation in college and work.
What I'm getting at above is the contemporary (past few decades) hero-worship of the intelligent, to the point of doling out -- IMO unnecessary, undemocratic, and otherwise societally destructive -- resources for them, e.g. gifted child schools.
What do you mean by "Western Education?"
Does this just mean the US?
This sentence to me defines how Americans think..so you know how France/Spain etc education works?
The Prussian model.
It's not even a question of I.Q.
It's about deliberately fostering teaching methods that hold back a child's ability to think logically & objectively.This is done at a very early age 4/5 years old.
That's the age when children need their imagination & curiosity stimulated!
Instead the children are stuffed with raw data to believe & most of this data is false.
Much of it the nonsense of john Dewey.
Dewey who formed many of his ideas concerning education while visiting Soviet Schools in Stalinist Russia!
Agreed that this happens. As you note, "the wealthy & powerful don't want a highly educated general public." It's done to channel the classes, not help their individual lives.
If a student rebels in the lower class settings, at least the dimmer among teachers and admins will seek to stifle him/her as you note. But if the student is in an upper-middle to upper class environment, perceptive staff is far more likely to take notes and channel the energy in better ways.
Hello Anti Hip.
I am not even talking about early Public School,I am thinking of preschool & kindergarten!
These are the basic's for turning future savages into decent students & decent human beings afterwards! Kids need to learn basic discipline,basic social lessons & basic behavior.
Plus stimulation of their Imaginations & Curiosity! Old fashioned basic beginners Reading & Writing!
Public School just does indoctrination for the most part,not how to think objectively but raw data to believe! Without the very basics, humans would be wild beasts, there is nothing in basic human nature for living in a society peacefully with others.
This is why the Wealthy pay to send their children to private academies to learn how to think rather than what to believe!
This from John Taylor Gatto!
Relying on the government to make first rate citizens is doomed to failure.
Public schools was never the solution.
I agree. Public education has to grapple with the entire range of human intelligence, so there's only so much they can teach--the three Rs are about it--literacy, computational skills, and instruction in civics is about all that's useful and practical.
Highly intelligent kids from working class families ought to have the opportunity to opt out of the generic public schools and be awarded entry into rigorous private academies, the schools our rich people have had exclusive access to forever.
All that social engineering bullshit from the founders of US public schools is unfortunate. It set the tone and now public ed is being ruined by dumbass graduates of schools of education, which have become ideological indoctrination centers dominated by that asshat Paolo Friere. I suppose neo-Marxist ideological capture of education is a sort of natural reaction to the schemes of elitist social engineers like Conant and Dewey, but it's an extreme lurch in the opposite and evil direction.
And the powers that be,in order to dumb down the average student used the methods of John Dewey.Dewey who formed his ideas visiting schools in Stalinist Russia!
Perfect if indoctrination is what is desired!
As George Washington said.
The Government,any government,is basically the enemy of the people.
But a necessary enemy that must be controlled,like fire!
Not doing too badly here in France.
At least we learn Geography and world History.
What's claimed to be world history for the masses
Not just the History of ones Country.
DEAD ON, Sidney Wider! First rate schools demand academic rigor.
From What I have read,
It's the methods of teaching count & at an early age!
The Problem with the Public Schools is that they don't teach children how to think,.
They indoctrinate them as to what to believe!
Real education starts at a very early age,4/5 years old when a child has his/her imagination & curiosity stimulated & the begin to read written words!
This leads to an ability,later on,to form concepts & reach logical assumptions.
Instead they deal in symbols & predigested truths!
Instead of graduating as adults who can reason & think,they create drones who memorize what to believe! And what to believe is whatever they were told!
One example is the comment section of some blog sites.Most draw their ideas from Sound Bites
State that you don't Approve of Central Bankers & a reply will answer that
"Yes,I don't like those Commie Bums either.
The answer comes from an individual who doesn't know the difference between Globalist bankers & Communist!
He reached his conclusion by thinking that Globalist Bankers are bad & Communists are also bad.If both are bad,than Bankers & Communists are the same!
He doesn't know the difference
Perhaps an educated and enterprising public with stakes in the broader world is no longer required for the next chapter of human existence.
let me amend my previous statement.
it is not a question of I.Q. are mental abilities.The real issue is that there are different methods of instruction for real learning & other methods for indoctrination!
This goes back to preschool & methods as used by the Montessori System to encourage & cultivate the minds of 4/5 year olds in Reading,writing & arithmetic,the old fashioned way!
This begins the development of the child's ability to think in an logical & objective manner.to encourage the growth of a child's imagination & sense of curiosity!
Public School are just Indoctrination centers to program students with arbitrary data that may or may not be true! The system produces graduates who have been programmed like a computer hard drive.Turns the brain into a search engine that searches out words rather than ideas!
Turns out adults that can't form concepts,only predigested Ideas!
When I said ''The Wealthy & Powerful'' I left out a bit of context!
Most of the ideas about Education are carry overs from Europe.
And these ideas go back many centuries.!
Europe over the Centuries has been ruled by Kings & Nobility because of the Doctrine of the Divine Right to Rule.
in my opinion the idea was about the few who were born higher & the rest of humanity born lower to serve those that are higher.
And all of this sanctioned & authorized by Heaven.
This has morphed & changed over the years into the aristocracy,what's left of it in Europe,
and the old established wealth going back many generations(mostly Anglo Saxon).
To the point, they are against higher education levels for those they considered to be born lower!
Higher levels of education for those they see as born lower is seen as a threat to these exalted ones' as a threat to their status as high born!
That's what all this NWO & WEF business is mostly about,
🏆
If you're looking for more altered meanings for your Devil's Dictionary - how about the word Freedom itself? I couldn't believe it the first time I heard the term FreeDUMB. Say what?? Seriously? The Conformists are now equating people who value Freedom with Dumbasses?? What the h...?? And, of course, the ole Freedom = Selfishness became huge. What a turn around! The social engineering has been exceptionally professional - I mean who could have believed that, within the matter of a year or two the always-held-in-high-esteem value Freedom would degenerate into something so measly and so easily trod upon? It's too much...
This is the really scary one. The governator saying "Screw your freedoms"?
The last Republican governor CA will likely ever have. How's that for a legacy?
Not sure having someone with an Austrian accent say “screw your freedom”
If you didn’t love Ah-nold before...
One of the nutrition podcasters that I have followed for several years became alarmed at the very beginning of Covid madness, and decided to start a Facebook group to organize opposition to vaccine passports/mandates (which she correctly predicted would be eventually coming). Her group originally had the word “freedom” in the name, but she had to change it because she soon discovered that Facebook doesn’t like the word “freedom”.
Wow, that's crazy...and awful :(
Freedom for oneself is fine. Freedom for others is downright frightening.
“White supremacy” seems to have shifted from actual racism to anyone on the right
It is a collectivist idea. White supremacy can apparently exist and be an existential threat without a single actual white supremacist.
As intended.
Democracy: The plebs vote the way we want.
Fascism: The plebs vote in a way we don't like
Communism: Whatever Russia still is but China certainly is not
Authoritarianism: When people believe their rights supersede our authority
Hitler: Literally Hitler
Trump: Also literally Hitler
White Supremacist: Anyone who disagrees with us and has a low melanin count
Nazis: Civil Libertarians
Actually a low melanin count isn't required anymore...people of color who don't tow the line are told they have "internalized white sypremacy."
They called Larry Elder "the black face of white supremacy."
Progressive attacks on Clarence Thomas are much worse.
Well, he's quite a bit more important, especially now.
In this devil's dictionary project, one could say Larry Elder and Clarence Thomas are victims of virulent anti-racism.
Any of the judges on the Supreme Court are as corrupt as the day is long. You should spent some time in any Superior Court, then you would realize why judges wear black. They are definitely from the dark side.
A gross, and untrue, generalization WA. There are (a few) corrupt judges, a fairly good number of less than astute judges, but the vast majority of judges put their hearts and souls into trying to be fair and hold society together.
Hahahahahahaha!!!!!
I spent 10 years fighting the banks in Superior Court. You are either naive or just plain stupid.
“White adjacent” is being used to describe people of Pacific Rim descent
Or how Asians are "white adjacent" when it comes time to play Admissions Office Wokemon but the victims of a terrifying wave of racist violence when it comes time to line up voters for Team D,
White Supremacist: Anyone who disagrees with us and has a low melanin count
lolol
good one!
And of course anything that conflicts with the prevailing ideology on the Left is considered Extremely Dangerous to Our Democracy™.
We live in a ridiculous time.
🤡🌎
Let's take a crack at defining the most mysterious and perplexing word of our time:
WOMAN.
This one really seems to stump our enlightened betters.
Careful, you might be violating the intellectual property rights of the Real Woman (tm) brand, which is a line of elective cosmetic surgeries. I'd just avoid the "w" word from now on. It only attracts harassment from the stans.
Adult Human Female
One of the most prescient observations by de Tocqueville in 1833: “There are at the present time two great nations in the world, which started from different points, but seem to tend towards the same end. I allude to the Russians and the Americans. Both of them have grown up unnoticed; and whilst the attention of mankind was directed elsewhere, they have suddenly placed themselves in the front rank among the nations, and the world learned their existence and their greatness at almost the same time.
All other nations seem to have nearly reached their natural limits, and they have only to maintain their power; but these are still in the act of growth. All the others have stopped, or continue to advance with extreme difficulty; these alone are proceeding with ease and celerity along a path to which no limit can be perceived. The American struggles against the obstacles which nature opposes to him; the adversaries of the Russian are men. The former combats the wilderness and savage life; the latter, civilization with all its arms. The conquests of the American are therefore gained with the ploughshare; those of the Russian by the sword. The Anglo-American relies upon personal interest to accomplish his ends, and gives free scope to the unguided strength and common sense of the people; the Russian centres all the authority of society in a single arm. The principal instrument of the former is freedom; of the latter, servitude. Their starting-point is different, and their courses are not the same; yet each of them seems marked out by the will of Heaven to sway the destinies of half the globe.”
Seems we were never destined to get along.
Not long after de Tocqueville wrote those words, tsarist Russia made it clear that if Britain tried to intervene in the American Civil War on behalf of the Confederacy (as many British politicians wanted), Russia would intervene on the side of the Union.
The Russian Navy also patrolled the California coast, thus freeing up Union ships for blockade duty.
That is a legitimate way to look at it. Did you know Russia established a fort in (what is now) California in 1812? Weird to ponder.
The Russian River
It's in the 6th grade curriculum in California. Also Alaska.
“Democracy” as used by Democrats and Liberals in Canada, does not mean to allow the free flow of information such that each citizen can make up their own mind and vote to their convictions: a cornerstone of Liberalism and The enlightenment. Rather, it means for The State to curate and censor information such that each individual votes according to what’s best for The State: a fascist tenet.
"Rather, it means for The State to curate and censor information such that each individual votes according to what’s best for The State: a fascist tenet."
Which is why they use the phrase "our democracy" which has its own meaning in the technocratic leftist lexicon.
Where do you find that conversion to fascism in our founding document? Not the words, but the principle stated.
To speak of the United States, the Constitution has long been a dead letter.
I don’t. And I don’t need to. Mussolini juxtaposes fascism to liberalism, ie western democracy far more eloquently then I :”The Fascist conception of life accepts the individual only in so far as his interests coincide with the State. . . . Fascism reasserts the rights of the state. If classical liberalism spells individualism, Fascism spells government.”
I thought so.
I actually think that the problem is self management of image. Particularly in the age of social media.
Solzhenitsyn said:
“A society which lives in constant dread of publicity loves to deceive itself.”
That’s what’s going on with the word democracy. It’s a publicity stunt.
Repeating the observation of a dear friend: "We can't vote our way out of this." Sadly, I suspect that is true, and now the case. Have we have fallen too far down the rabbit memory hole, or is it true "The future is not written."
I'll be in the bar.
Order me a martini cuz I'm following ya in!
The way the "Deep State" works is that it is immune to adverse election results.
I was waiting for "democracy."
I suppose it now makes sense why freedom would be a threat to "democracy."
You might choose incorrectly, Lillia!
It makes me so mad, how people don't appreciate the tireless efforts our betters make to protect us from harmful ideas!
Show some appreciation!
Their work is never done.
They labor ceaselessly on our behalf.
All hail hero censors!
Down with the wreckers!
The term "the people" . . .
It's gotten twisted from the "We the People" to something more resembling a Soviet or a Maoist use, as a synonym for the party or the ruling class.
Thanks for pointing that out.