575 Matching Annotations
  1. Nov 2024
    1. Poverty, by America

      the title of the book implies an ownership of poverty (by America)... there's also an implication of authorial voice as if America is a "creator", but specifically a creator of poverty as much as it is a creator of wealth

      In the framing of toxic capitalism, it's almost as if one of the things America is good at manufacturing is poverty.

      If we've outsourced most of our manufacturing sector, why not also include poverty?!?

    2. America’spoverty is not for lack of resources. We lack something else.
  2. Oct 2024
    1. Viele New Yorker Juristen, darunter namhafte Staatsanwälte, unterstützen eine Resolution zur strafrechtlichen Verfolgung der großen Ölgesellschaften. Vorgeworfen wird den Firmen, fossile Brennstoffe über Jahrzehnte verkauft zu haben, ohne über die ihnen bekannten Gefahren zu informieren oder diese zu berücksichtigen. Gefordert wird eine Klage wegen fahrlässiger Gefährdung von Menschenleben. Dazu muss nicht nachgewiesen werden, dass der Tod bestimmter Menschen durch die Konzerne verursacht wurde https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2024/oct/17/new-york-big-oil-fueling-climate-disasters

    1. At the same time, colonial settlements grew and matured, developing into powerful societies capable of warring against Native Americans and subduing internal upheava

      This sentence that I highlighted the growth of colonial settlements into powerful self sustaining places. The statement "warring against Native Americans" refers to the constant conflict between European settlers and the indigenous people which were often fought over land and resources.This reflect the mindset of the colonist who viewed the land as theirs regardless of native being there prior

    1. Sam Harris speaks with Barton Gellman about election integrity and the safeguarding of American democracy. They discuss the war games he's run to test our response to an authoritarian president, using federal troops against American citizens, the difference between laws and norms, state powers to resist the federal government, voter identification and election integrity, political control over election certifications, the Bush-Gore election, the Electoral Count Reform Act, the prospect of public unrest after the November election, January 6th, George Soros, the "good people on both sides" calumny against Trump, what happens to Trump and Trumpism if Harris wins in November, the presidential debate with Harris, the authoritarian potential of a second Trump term, Project 2025, and other topics.

      Stress Testing Our Democracy: A Conversation with Barton Gellman<br /> Episode 384 of Sam Harris podcast<br /> https://www.samharris.org/podcasts/making-sense-episodes/384-stress-testing-our-democracy

      Suggested by Flancian at FoTL

  3. Sep 2024
    1. Die Fossilindustrie finanziert seit Jahrzehten Universitäten und fördert damit Publikationen in ihrem Interesse, z.B. zu false solutions wie #CCS. Hintergrundbericht anlässlich einer neuen Studie: https://www.theguardian.com/business/article/2024/sep/05/universities-fossil-fuel-funding-green-energy

      Studie: https://doi.org/10.1002/wcc.904

  4. Aug 2024
    1. Salesman documents the work of a group of door-to-door Bible salesmen in New England and Florida. Deeper down, the film is a dissection of the degenerative and devastating effects of capitalism on small towns and individuals, but more than any political statement the film is about normal people in all their ugliness and truthfulness.

      see also: Barnouw, Erik (1993), Documentary a History of the Non-fiction Film (PDF), New York and Oxford: Oxford University Press, pp. 241–242, retrieved March 30, 2020

    1. CHINESE AMBASSADOR Exactly. But you have always taught us that liberty is the same thing as capitalism, as if life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness cannot be crushed by greed. Your American dream is financial, not ethical.

      West Wing S7 E 11 "Internal Displacement"<br /> http://www.westwingtranscripts.com/search.php?flag=getTranscript&id=145<br /> written by Aaron Sorkin & Bradley Whitford

      A powerful quote about what really matters in America

    1. 101st CONGRESS 1st Session H. CON. RES. 180 Commending the outstanding efforts of aviators and the Flying Tigers for valued and competent service to the United States. IN THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES July 31, 1989

      resolution; which was referred to the Committee on Post Office and Civil Service.

      • Whereas aviators have had a distinguished record as volunteers in emergency and rescue missions;

      • Whereas the Flying Tigers originated in the jungles of Burma nearly 50 years ago with the United States volunteer group of General Clair Chennault;

      • Whereas the tradition of proud and distinguished service of the Flying Tigers to the United States began under the direction of Robert W. Prescott;

      • Whereas this proud and distinguished group of aviators has steadfastly served the specialized air transportation needs of the United States for more than 4 decades;

      • Whereas the Flying Tigers has provided assistance with rescue efforts in Korea, Hungary, Vietnam, Cambodia, and Ethiopia, as well as many other humanitarian missions; and

      • Whereas the Flying Tigers are representative of countless aviators that deserve recognition for service to the Nation and to thousands of individuals throughout the world:

      Now, therefore, be it Resolved by the House of Representatives (the Senate concurring), That the Congress commends the outstanding efforts of aviators and the Flying Tigers for valued and competent service to the United States.

  5. Jul 2024
    1. Economic Policy Institute,by the year 2032 the majority of the working class willbe composed of people of colo

      for - stats - whites become minority percentage of US working class by 2032

      stats - whites become minority percentage of US working class by 2032 - From Economic Policy Institute

      to - People of color will be a majority of the American working class in 2032 -

  6. Jun 2024
    1. Oral tradition, too, entangled national identity and religion.

      I can't help but wonder how this is currently working in the deep South with respect to political identity (far right, Trump, MAGA) and religious identity (born again, ultra-nationalist Christians, etc.)

  7. May 2024
    1. The Guardian: Donald Trump hat Big-Oil Managern angeboten, klimapolitische Maßnahmen der Biden-Administration rückgängig zu machen, wenn sie seinen Wahlkampf mit einer Milliarde Dollar unterstützen. Einer Studie des Guardian zufolge können die Ölkonzerne von Trump vor allem 110 Milliaren Dollar Subventionen (u.a. Steuererleichterungen für neue fossile Projekte) erwarten, die die Biden-Regierung abschaffen will. Hintergrundartikel zu Lobbyisten im US-Ölgeschäft und aktuellen Konflikten<br /> https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/article/2024/may/16/donald-trump-big-oil-executives-alleged-deal-explainedlog

    1. Die amerikanische Behörde zur energieregulation Regulierung hat die Bestimmung für Stromnetze radikal reformiert um die Produktion erneuerbarer Energien zu fördern. Unter anderem müssen Netzbetreiber für den voraussichtlichen Bedarf in 20 Jahren planen. Einer neu einen neuen Bericht zufolge werden 50% der positiven Effekte des Inflation reduction Act für die Senkung der Emissionen verloren gehen wenn die amerikanischen Stromnetze nicht grundsätzlich gründlich überholt werden. https://www.nytimes.com/2024/05/13/climate/electric-grid-overhaul-ferc.html?region=BELOW_MAIN_CONTENT&block=storyline_flex_guide_recirc&name=styln-climate&variant=show&pgtype=Article

    1. Verantwortliche der großen amerikanischen Ölfirmen haben auch nach 2015 privat zugegeben, dass sie die Gefahren fossiler Brennstoffe heruntergespielt haben. Sie haben internationale Pläne gegen die globale Erhitzung nach außen hin unterstützt und nach innen kommuniziert, dass ihre Firmenpolitik diesen Plänen widerspricht. Und sie haben gegen politische Maßnahmen lobbyiert, hinter die sie sich offiziell gestellt haben. Das alles ergibt sich aus dem neuen Bericht des amerikanischen Kongresses über die Desinformations-Politik von Big Oil. Ausführlicher Bericht mit Informationen über mögliche juristische Konsequenzen. https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2024/apr/30/big-oil-climate-crisis-us-senate-report

  8. Apr 2024
    1. Will the escalation of protests and reaction by Columbia University’s President, Minouche Shafik cause an ultimate shift in American sentiment because she reacted in the wrong way to quell protests in Spring 2024? Will things escalate as they did in 1968 and spill over into actual change in society and culture?

    1. During a visit to Moscow in 2015, Franklin Graham—the son of the late Southern Baptist leader Billy Graham—told Kirill that many Americans wished that someone like Putin could be their president.
    2. According to Sarah Riccardi-Swartz, a scholar of Orthodoxy who teaches at Northeastern University, in Boston, the new converts tend to be right-wing and Russophile, and some speak freely of their admiration for Putin’s “kingly” role. In the U.S., converts are concentrated in the South and Midwest, and some have become ardent online evangelists for the idea that “Dixie,” with its beleaguered patriarchal traditions, is a natural home for Russian Orthodoxy. Some of them adorn their websites with a mash-up of Confederate nostalgia and icons of Russian saints.

      Many in the southern United States are converting to Orthodox Christianity, a conversion which is tied into patriarchal ideas on the far right.

    1. There is a reason that the abolitionist Frederick Douglass said that between the Christianity of this land (America) and the Christianity of Christ, he recognized the “widest possible difference.”

      specific quote? direct source?

    2. Whether this Bible is an example of Christian nationalism I will leave to others. It is at least an example of Christian syncretism, a linking of certain myths about American exceptionalism and the Christian faith. This is the American church’s consistent folly: thinking that we are the protagonists in a story that began long before us and whose main character is in fact the Almighty.
  9. Mar 2024
    1. His rescue story perfectly mimicked a popular Scottish ballad ofthe day in which the beautiful daughter of a Turkish prince rescues anEnglish adventurer who is about to lose his head.
    2. a farsexier fable in the dramatic rescue of John Smith by the “Indian princess”Pocahontas.

      extended look at the mythology of Pocahontas here

    3. The master of ceremonies was their Indian interpreter, Squanto, who hadhelped the English survive a difficult winter. Left out of this story is thedetail (not so minor) that Squanto only knew English because he had beenkidnapped and sold as a slave to an English ship’s captain.

      The fact that early Americans needed to be bailed out by others also doesn't seem to do anything to dampen either the mythology of American exceptionalism nor their "can-do attitude".

    4. Exceptionalism emerges from a host of earlier myths of redemption andgood intentions. Pilgrims, persecuted in the Old World, brave the Atlanticdreaming of finding religious freedom on America’s shores; wagon trains ofhopeful pioneer families head west to start a new life. Nowhere else, we aremeant to understand, was personal freedom so treasured as it was in theAmerican experience. The very act of migration claims to equalize thepeople involved, molding them into a homogeneous, effectively classlesssociety.

      Do some of these same types of stories and mythologies also erase the harm of an over-armed populace with respect to the lack of appropriate gun control and mass shootings versus gun rights in America?

      As a country our gun mythology is stronger than our desire to act to improve our (collective) lives....

    5. And so the great American saga,as taught, excludes the very pertinent fact that after the 1630s, less than halfcame to Massachusetts for religious reasons.
    6. These efforts were magnified as a result of promotional skillsdemonstrated by such organizations as the Colonial Dames, who worked toelevate the Mayflower Pilgrims and Winthrop’s Puritans into some of theforemost figures in our national memory.

      What parallelisms were there between the Colonial Dames, Daughters of the American Revolution, or Lost Cause societies that fundraised for Civil War statues in the post-Civil War and 19-teens to promote white power in the American south?

      Did the structures and existence inform later efforts?

    7. the first volume of GeorgeBancroft’s widely praised History of the United States (1834) may be thebest example of how the Mayflower and Arbella washed ashore and seededthe ground where love of liberty bore its ripest fruit
    8. Beyond the web of stories the founding generation itself wove, ourmodern beliefs have most to do with the grand mythmakers of thenineteenth century. The inspired historians of that period were nearly allNew Englanders; they outpaced all others in shaping the historicalnarrative, so that the dominant story of origins worked in their favor. That ishow we got the primordial Puritan narrative of a sentimental communityand a commendable work ethic.

      A fascinating thesis about American historical perspective and our identity.

      Does this play out with respect to Max Weber's thesis?

    9. most colonizing schemesthat took root in seventeenth- and eighteenth-century British America werebuilt on privilege and subordination, not any kind of proto-democracy.
    10. John Adams,heralded the first governor of Massachusetts Bay Colony, John Winthrop, asan earlier and stronger model for an American patrician-patriarch.

      This adds additional weight to the concept of "city upon a hill" which was highlighted in a speech by John Winthrop.

    11. Because of how history is taught, Americans tend toassociate Plymouth and Jamestown with cooperation rather than classdivision.

      The largest swaths of taught American history have propagated the idea of American Exceptionalism rather than actual truth.

    12. promoters imagined America not as an Eden of opportunity but as a giantrubbish heap that could be transformed into productive terrain.

      Looking for evidence (to come) of this statement

    13. How does a culture that prizes equality of opportunity explain, or indeedaccommodate, its persistently marginalized people?

      Is some of the "backlash" against diversity, equity and inclusion efforts in 2020s America a manifestation of attempting to prevent a shift in the status quo of class structure in America?

      How is the history of the space potentially useful in easing the potential transition to something better?

    14. Lest the reader misconstrue the book’s purpose, I want to make the pointunambiguously: by reevaluating the American historical experience in classterms, I expose what is too often ignored about American identity. But I’mnot just pointing out what we’ve gotten wrong about the past; I also want tomake it possible to better appreciate the gnawing contradictions still presentin modern American society.

      The author lays out what she hopes to accomplish with the book.

    15. The hallowed American dream is thegold standard by which politicians and voters alike are meant to measurequality of life as each generation pursues its own definition of happinessunfettered by the restraints of birth (who your parents are) or station (theposition you start out from in the class system).

      Did it help that America was broadly formed during the start of the Industrial Revolution and at a time in which social mobility was dramatically different than the period of history which proceeded it?

      And how much of this difference is split with the idea of the rise of (toxic) capitalism and the switch to "keeping up with the Jonses" which also tends to drive class distinctions?

    16. American exceptionalism, 7, 69, 190, 310, 318
    1. Read [[Martha S. Jones]] in Sleuthing the Card Catalog

    2. I fingered my way through where I thought I’d find entries: African American, Afro-American, Black. Nothing there. I had to then brainstorm like it was 1999, or was it 1989, 1979, or even earlier, to discover the right term. As far back as 1984, the Library of Congress, whose subject headings most research libraries in the United States utilize, admitted that it was “frustrating” to search for Black people in its catalog because two terms were simultaneously in use: “Afro-Americans” and “Blacks.”1 Neither term made it into the old Peabody Library catalog, so perhaps it and the terminology it reflected dated from an even earlier time.

      Research on keywords and their shifting meanings over time can make things difficult for the novice researcher. This example from Martha S. Jones certainly highlights this perspective even in under a century of semantic shift.

  10. Feb 2024
    1. Fachleute rechnen damit, dass ein Sieg Trumps bei den Präsidentschaftswahlen zu einem Rollback bei den Projekten für saubere Energie führen würde, die die Biden-Administration eingeleitet hat. Der Inflation Reduction Act hat bereits zu Investitionen von etwa 200 Milliarden Dollar in solche Projekte geführt. Wie weit der Rollback gelingen würde, ist unklar, zumal besonders republikanisch dominierte Regionen von den Projekten der aktuellen Administration profitieren. https://www.nytimes.com/2024/02/19/us/politics/inflation-reduction-act-republican-attacks.html

  11. Jan 2024
  12. Nov 2023
    1. the Americanization of the culture of Alberta and the importance of American capital for the 00:24:23 energy industry but there was a lot of migration from the United States from Nebraska and Montana um up north yeah a third of the people who settled 00:24:35 the Prairies between 1880 and 1913 and a third of the three million who came were American my mother born in the U.S yes a lot of 00:24:48 the established you know people who've been here a while uh on the Canadian prairies we look South and we literally see cousins
      • for: interesting fact - many Albertans are from America

      • interesting fact

        • 3 million people settled the Canadian Praries between 1880 and 1913
        • 30% of them were fromNebrask and Montana
    1. Die englische Regierung hat in der letzten Oktoberwoche 27 Lizenzen zur Öl- und Gasförderung in der Nordsee vergeben. George Monbiot konfrontiert diese Entscheidung mit aktuellen Erkenntnissen zum sechsten Massenaussterben und dem drohenden Zusammenbruch lebensunterstützender Systeme des Planeten https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2023/oct/31/flickering-earth-systems-warning-act-now-rishi-sunak-north-sea

    1. sumption of decreasing virulence with time is a double-edged sword in NativeAmerican disease history. Recent Native Americans have extreme susceptibility to oftenacute infections such as influenza and tuberculosis (Indian Health Service 1999; Koenig1921; Matthews 1886). Although, as detailed later in this paper, many factors, includingsocio-economic conditions, diet, and other concurrent infections, could be contributing tothis incidence, these factors seem to pale by comparison with disease history. Essentially,current incidence rates account for the absence of crowd infections prior to Columbus andabsence explains the present incidence rate

      .

    2. se diseases, once introduced, severelywinnowed Native American populations.

      .

    3. Since the mid-twentieth century it has been widely accepted that Old World populationsintroduced infectious diseases to Native Americans beginning with the Columbianvoyages of AD 149

      .

    1. People of all cultures utilize symbolism found in their various religions and spiritual practices to cope with health problems. NA healing ceremonies rely heavily on a combination of traditional and Christian religious symbols, icons, and ritualistic objects. These symbols cue bio-psycho-social-spiritual healing responses by restoring the harmony necessary for health. Symbolism, whether associated with ceremonies or church services, can be incorporated into their treatment plan to create a powerful healing synergy.

      .

    2. NA ceremonies involve the patient, the family, and the community in the healing process. Ceremonial gatherings may last for days or weeks; the more people that are present, the greater the healing energy. Through their participation in songs, prayer, music, and dance, the family and community contribute healing energy to the patient.

      .

    3. Native diets, ceremonies that greet the seasons and the harvests, and the use of native plants for healing purposes have been used to live to promote health by living in harmony with the earth

      .

    4. Native Americans in Arizona run each day to greet the dawn, a practice that not only conditions their bodies but also nourishes their spiritual wellbeing. Stories and legends are used to teach positive behaviors as well as the consequences of failing to observe the laws of nature. Herbs, manipulative therapies, ceremonies, and prayer are used in various combinations to prevent and treat illness.1

      .

  13. Oct 2023
    1. But sometimes Alter’s comments seem exactly wrong. Alter calls Proverbs 29:2 “no more than a formulation in verse of a platitude,” but Daniel L. Dreisbach’s Reading the Bible with the Founding Fathers devotes an entire chapter to that single verse, much loved at the time of the American Founding: “When the righteous are many, a people rejoices, / but when the wicked man rules, a people groans.” Early Americans “widely, if not universally,” embraced the notion that—as one political sermon proclaimed—“The character of a nation is justly decided by the character of their rulers, especially in a free and elective government.” Dreisbach writes, “They believed it was essential that the American people be reminded of this biblical maxim and select their civil magistrates accordingly.” Annual election sermons and other political sermons often had Proverbs 29:2 as “the primary text.” Far from being a platitude, this single verse may contain a cure to the contagion that is contemporary American political life.

      Ungenerous to take Alter to task for context which he might not have the background to comment upon.

      Does Alter call it a "platitude" from it's historical context, or with respect to the modern context of Donald J. Trump and a wide variety of Republican Party members who are anything but Christian?

    1. France is quite different. It is a culture of quality and differentiation. Take French cuisine as an example. Unlike other world cuisines, which are characterized by dishes (e.g., Italian pizza or Spanish paella), the French restaurant experience is one where chefs are always adding their own twist. Almost any dish can be served in a French restaurant because what makes it French is the attention to detail in the preparation. French restaurants also tend to focus on few dishes, and I am not talking about Michelin star restaurants, but regular lunch places that serve a fixed menu at noon. Many of them are great, and provide a very contrasting experience to that of the American dinner. No 20-page plasticized menu with 100s of options (none prepared very well), but a few carefully crafted dishes each day. It is not about more, bigger, or faster, but about fewer, different, and better. No architectural scale sponge-filled wedding cakes, but delicious and beautifully crafted petite gâteaus that satisfy you with taste, not size.
    1. frank danielle at the 1:29 american film institute 1:30 who was dean of the school uh center for 1:33 advanced film studies 1:34 and he taught a way to do it 1:39 um you get yourself a pack of three by 1:42 five cards 1:44 and you write a scene 1:47 on each card and when you have 70 scenes 1:52 you have uh a feature film 1:56 so on each card you write the heading of 1:58 the scene 1:59 and then the next card the second scene 2:00 the third scene four scenes so you have 2:03 70 cards 2:04 each with the name of the scene then you 2:07 flesh out each of the cards 2:09 and walk away you got a script

      David Lynch described the method from Frank Daniel (1926-1996) of the American Film Institute and Dean of advanced film studies who taught students to plot out their screenplays using 3 x 5" index cards. One would write out a total of 70 cards each with scene headings. Once fleshed out, one would have a complete screenplay.

      via https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yngWNmouhP0

  14. Sep 2023
    1. civil peace the kind of peace that 00:29:37 exists in the United States in California in Illinois in Chicago and New York where people are living under government where they can settle their differences by recourse to law by request to government rather than to 00:29:49 fighting

      Based on Hobbes' definition of war, the left and the right in America are currently either at war or on the brink, because we are slowly coming to the point at which our differences can't or won't be decided by our recourse to law, which is actively moving against the will of the larger majority of Americans.

    1. "Surrendering" by Ocean Vuong

      1. He moved into United State when he was age of five. He first came to United State when he started kindergarten. Seven of them live in the apartment one bedroom and bathroom to share the whole. He learned ABC song and alphabet. He knows the ABC that he forgot the letter is M comes before N.

      2. He went to the library since he was on the recess. He was in the library hiding from the bully. The bully just came in the library doing the slight frame and soft voice in front of the kid where he sit. He left the library, he walked to the middle of the schoolyard started calling him the pansy and fairy. He knows the American flag that he recognize on the microphone against the backdrop.

    1. A number of publishers were left high and dry with that announcement and several of us worked together through a broker *during the pandemic* to find a mill in Finland (!) to produce our paper.
    2. the number of *American* printers that can print large books has decreased by two—bankruptcies, both of them. In fact, there are only two firms remaining in the U.S. that both have the presses to print on thin (30# to 40#) paper *and* that can do sewn bindings of books of 1,200 pages or more.
  15. Aug 2023
    1. on Aug. 12, the National Museum of American History is giving the artifact pristine treatment.WpGet the full experience.Choose your planArrowRight"Have You Heard the One . . . ? The Phyllis Diller Gag File" is an exhibition of the beige cabinet in the quiet Albert H. Small Documents Gallery.

      The National Museum of American History debuted Phyllis Diller's gag file on August 12, 2011 in the Albert H. Small Documents Gallery in an exhibition entitled "Have you Hard the One...? The Phyllis Diller Gag File."

      see also: press release https://www.si.edu/newsdesk/releases/national-museum-american-history-showcases-life-and-laughs-phyllis-diller

    1. beautiful cities have six qualities
      • for: beautiful cities - qualities, comparison - American vs European cities
      • paraphrase
        • qualities of a beautiful city
          • orderly, but not homogenous
          • they have visible life
          • they are compact, not sprawling
          • have both orientation and mystery
          • appealing scale with ideal height of 5 stories
    1. Oreskes, Naomi, and Erik M. Conway. The Big Myth: How American Business Taught Us to Loathe Government and Love the Free Market. Bloomsbury Publishing, 2023.

    2. Most Americans know that before becoming a politician Reaganwas an actor, but fewer are aware that Reagan’s flagging screencareer was revived by a job with the General Electric Corporation(GE). Reagan hosted the popular television show General ElectricTheater, where each week his voice and face reached into tens ofmillions of homes, promoting didactic stories of individualism andfree enterprise. At the same time, he traveled across the country onbehalf of GE—visiting factories, making speeches at schools, anddoing the dinner circuit in communities where GE had a presence—promoting the corporation’s stridently individualist antiunion andantigovernment vision.

      From a philosophical viewpoint, Reagan grew up in Dixon, Illinois a small town (surrounded by farmland) in North West-ish Illinois roughly on the border of the political borders of what Colin Woodard calls The Midlands and Greater Appalachia. He seems to have been a Midlander for the first half of his life, but obviously had an easy time moving to a more Greater Appalachia viewpoint when working for GE.

  16. Jun 2023
    1. Quarter Sawn Tiger Oak 6 Drawer Card Catalog Vintage American Business Systems

      https://www.ebay.com/itm/256099662210

      American Business Systems Co. at 212 Summer Street, Boston, MA manufactured six drawer wooden card indexes some time circa early 1900s.

  17. May 2023
  18. Apr 2023
    1. A political system, he said, needs people who are fair,open-minded, and think for themselves; it doesn’t want people who aresubservient to authority.

      Is there a better direct quote from Locke for this indirect one?


      Oddly, large portions of the religious right and Republican right are highly subservient to authority while simultaneously espousing the idea of "freedom".

      Apparently the base definition of "freedom" on the right has shifted in large portions of American culture.

  19. Mar 2023
    1. “I Vitelloni,” Federico Fellini’s 1953 film about a group of young men on the brink of adulthood drifting about in a small Italian village, to George Lucas before he made “American Graffiti.”

      Tom Luddy introduced George Lucas to Federico Fellini's I Vitelloni before he made American Graffiti.

    2. As director of special projects for Francis Ford Coppola’s company American Zoetrope, he produced movies like Paul Schrader’s “Mishima: A Life in Four Chapters” (1985), a complicated film about Yukio Mishima, the eccentric Japanese author who killed himself publicly in 1970 — a passion project that Mr. Schrader has described as “the definition of an unfinanceable project.” Mr. Luddy was its tireless booster and supporter, funding it early on with his American Express card.
    1. Medicine shows became popular after the Civil War when patent medicine salesmen traveled the "kerosene circuit" in rural America. Flourishing until the passage of 1906 Fair Food and Drug Act made them obsolete, medicine shows provided entertainment to attract audiences and then used their intermissions to sell their products.

      This pattern would later be seen in later radio and television when product pitchmen sponsored entertainment in return for commercial time.

      (Bob Dylan, Theme Time Radio Hour, "Doctors," February 20, 2008 via http://www.oldhatrecords.com/)

      See also: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Medicine_show


      Also related to tent revival shows which featured music and religion as entertainment and socializing.

      Example in music: Neil Diamond's song: Brother Love's Travelling Salvation Show

    1. AMS Open Math Notes

      Resources and inspiration for math instruction and learning

      Welcome to AMS Open Math Notes, a repository of freely downloadable mathematical works hosted by the American Mathematical Society as a service to researchers, faculty and students. Open Math Notes includes: - Draft works including course notes, textbooks, and research expositions. These have not been published elsewhere and are subject to revision. - Items previously published in the Journal of Inquiry-Based Learning in Mathematics, a refereed journal - Refereed publications at the AMS

      Visitors are encouraged to download and use any of these materials as teaching and research aids, and to send constructive comments and suggestions to the authors.

    1. As ajournalist, historian, novelist, and autobiographer, Adams was con-stantly focused on the American experiment, testing a statementoffered by another figure in Democracy: ‘You Americans believe your-selves to be excepted from the operation of general laws. You care notfor experience’ (LA 37–8).

      In Chapter 1: American Exceptionalism of Myth America (Basic Books, 2023) historian David A. Bell indicates that Jay Lovestone and Joseph Stalin originated the idea of American Exceptionalism in 1920, but in Democracy (1880, p.72) Henry Adams seems to capture an early precursor of the sentiment:

      "Ah!" exclaimed the baron, with his wickedest leer, "what for is my conclusion good? You Americans believe yourselves to be excepted from the operation of general laws. You care not for experience. I have lived seventy-five years, and all that time in the midst of corruption. I am corrupt myself, only I do have courage to proclaim it, and you others have it not. Rome, Paris, Vienna, Petersburg, London, all are corrupt; only Washington is pure! Well, I declare to you that in all my experience I have found no society which has had elements of corruption like the United States. The children in the street are corrupt, and know how to cheat me. The cities are all corrupt, and also the towns and the counties and the States' legislatures and the judges. Every where men betray trusts both public and private, steal money, run away with public funds.

      Had a flavor of American Exceptionalism been brewing for decades before Stalin's comment?

    1. Europe invented the practice of turning words around on themselves. You need only look to the treaties between American Indian peoples and various European governments to know that this is true. Draw your strength from who you are.
      • Critique
      • I doubt that European culture invented institutional deception but through colonialism, they were certainly leading practitioners of it
    1. Rank, Mark Robert, Lawrence M. Eppard, and Heather E. Bullock. Poorly Understood: What America Gets Wrong About Poverty. Oxford University Press, 2021.

      Reading as part of Dan Allosso's Book Club

      Mostly finished last week, though I managed to miss the last book club meeting for family reasons, but finished out the last few pages tonight.

      annotation target: url: urn:x-pdf:c3701d1c083b974a888f7eaa4009f11f

  20. Feb 2023
    1. Moststriking, though, was Marcus’ appropriation of Deutsch’s cards when he extracted thoserelating to America, installing them in the reading room of the American JewishArchives where they remain to this day.
    1. It may be necessary to kill half of the Filipinos in order that the remaining half of the population may be advanced to a higher plane of life than their present semi-barbarous state affords.

      Filipinos and their way of life were perceived as less people. I think this is why today, Asian-American are more likely to experience discrimination than their European counterpart.

      What is your opinion about this?

  21. Jan 2023
    1. you're a Native American and also president of the National Congress of American Indians

      !- Fawn Sharp : ingienous leader - President off National Congress of American Indians

  22. Nov 2022
    1. primary source uh press books thing

      US History and Primary Source Anthology, volume 1<br /> https://minnstate.pressbooks.pub/ushistory1/

  23. Oct 2022
    1. Turner's sectionalism essays are collected in The Significance of Sections in American History, which won the Pulitzer Prize in History in 1933. Turner's sectionalism thesis had almost as much influence among historians as his frontier thesis, but never became widely known to the general public as did the frontier thesis. He argued that different ethnocultural groups had distinct settlement patterns, and this revealed itself in politics, economics and society.

      Was sectionalism discussed or mentioned in Colin Woodard's American Nations (2011) as part of an underlying piece of his thesis about American history? It seems applicable.

    2. His best known publication is his essay "The Significance of the Frontier in American History," the ideas of which formed the frontier thesis. He argued that the moving western frontier exerted a strong influence on American democracy and the American character from the colonial era until 1890.
    1. The danger is in conflating our Christian identity and our national identity. We can be Christian, we can also be American. But to assume that being American means being Christian and that being Christian means holding to a narrow view of what it means to be American is limiting to all of the above.

      Being Christian means performing our commitment to follow Jesus along the Way of Love as our response to God's abundant grace. Being American means performing our commitment to a common life within our nation-state according to our founding and constitutional principles. To excel in our American identity, one need not be Christian. To excel in our Christian identity, one need not be American. Conflating these two identities causes us to miss the mark in performing both.

  24. Sep 2022
    1. Consider another example—education. It is true that in most countries, asin the United States, a higher level of educational attainment is typically as-sociated with a lower risk of economic insecurity. But the penalties associatedwith low levels of educational attainment, and the rewards associated with highlevels of attainment, vary significantly by country. Full-time workers without ahigh school degree in Finland, for instance, report the same earnings as thosewith a high school degree. In the United States, however, these workers ex-perience a 24 percent earnings penalty for not completing high school.23 InNorway, a college degree yields only a 20 percent earnings increase over a highschool degree for full-time workers, versus a much higher 68 percent increase inthe United States.24 The percentage of those with a high school degree earningat or below the poverty threshold is more than 4 times higher in the UnitedStates than in Belgium.25

      The US penalizes those who don't complete high school to a higher degree than other countries and this can tend to lower our economic resiliency.

      American exceptionalism at play?

      Another factor at play with respect to https://hypothes.is/a/2uAmuEENEe2KentYKORSww

    2. Theidealized image of American society is one of abundant opportunities, withhard work being rewarded by economic prosperity. Consequently, those whofail to get ahead have only themselves to blame according to this argument. Itis within this context that America thinks of itself as a fair and meritocraticsociety in which people get what they deserve in life.

      There is a variety of confounding myths in America which tend to hold us down. These include economic mobility, meritocracy, poverty, and the land of opportunity.

      With respect to the "land of opportunity", does positive press of a small number of cases from an earlier generation outweigh the actual experience of the majority?


      There was a study on The Blitz in London and England in general in World War II which showed that despite high losses in general, enough people knew one or more who'd lost someone or something to the extreme but that the losses weren't debilitating from a loss perspective and generally served to boost overall morale. Higher losses may have been more demoralizing and harmful, but didn't happen. (Find this source: possibly Malcolm Gladwell??)

      Is this sort of psychological effect at play socially and politically in America and thereby confounding our progress?

  25. Aug 2022
    1. A month before the ceremony, the activist organization American Indian Movement had occupied the South Dakota town of Wounded Knee to protest the sustained mistreatment of Native Americans, a standoff that at the time of Littlefeather’s televised appearance at the Oscars was under a U.S. Department of Justice-imposed media blackout.)
  26. Jul 2022
    1. Yet not all of the sciences use (or require) mathematics to the same extent, for example, the lifesciences. There, the descriptive, analytical methods of Aristotle remain important, as does the(somewhat casual) recourse to final causes.

      Is the disappearance of the Aristotelian final cause in modern science part of the reason for the rise of an anti-science perspective for the religious right in 21st century America?

      People would seem to want or need a purpose to underlie their lives or they otherwise seem to be left adrift.

      Why are things the way they are? What are they for?

      Is the question: "why?" really so strong?

    1. 08:58 - Migrant gene DRD4-7R* Allele and correlation with the pursuit of novelty

      DRD4-7R is the specific gene that Peter implicates in migrants who are adventurous enough to come to America. This is associated with the "can do" perspective that has propelled America into a world leader but also drives America reflexively into the future...on autopilot.

    2. 04:04 - American Mania: When More is Not Enough

      Peter's book explores the biological and evolutionary roots of America's culture of exceptionalism.

    1. he distinguishes three dimensions of dependent origination and this is in his commentary on the guardian of malama jamaica carica called clear words he talks about causal dependence that is every phenomenon depends upon causes and 00:16:19 conditions and gives rise to further causes and conditions um myriological dependence that is every phenomenon every composite phenomenon depends upon the parts that uh that it 00:16:31 comprises and every phenomenon is also dependent upon the holes or the systems in which it figures parts depend on holes holes depend on parts and that reciprocal meteorological dependence 00:16:44 characterizes all of reality and third often overlooked but most important is dependence on conceptual imputation that is things depend in order to be represented as the kinds of 00:16:57 things they are on our conceptual resources our affective resources and as john dunn emphasized our purposes in life this third one really means this um 00:17:09 everything that shows up for us in the world the way we carve the world up the way we um the way we experience the world is dependent not just on how the world is but on the conceptual resources 00:17:22 as well as the perceptual resources through which we understand the world and it's worth recognizing that um when we think about this there are a bunch of um contemporary majamakers majamikas we 00:17:34 might point to as well and so paul fireauben who's up there on on the left well really an austrian but he spent much of his life in america um willard van norman kwine um up on the right wilford sellers and paul churchland

      This is a key statement: how we experience the world depends on the perceptual and cognitive lens used to filter the world through.

      Francis Heylighen proposes a nondual system based on causal dependency relationships to serve as the foundation for distributed cognition.(collective intelligence).

      https://hyp.is/go?url=https%3A%2F%2Fbafybeicho2xrqouoq4cvqev3l2p44rapi6vtmngfdt42emek5lyygbp3sy.ipfs.dweb.link%2FNon-dualism%2520-%2520Mind%2520outside%2520Brain%2520%2520a%2520radically%2520non-dualist%2520foundation%2520for%2520distributed%2520cognition.pdf&group=world

  27. Jun 2022
  28. www.bunkhistory.org www.bunkhistory.org
    1. Bunk is a shared home for the web’s most interesting writing and thinking about the American past. Join us to explore the multi-dimensional connections between past and present.
    1. The phrase "now you're coking with gas" was coined by American Gas Association publicist Carroll Everard "Deke" Houlgate. Deke's son indicated that his father "planted it with Bob Hope's writers" and it was ultimately used in one of his radio shows. From there it turned into one of his catchphrases and it was adopted by others including The Jack Benny Program and Maxwell House Coffee Time.

      Incidentally, Houlgate was also a football journalist who devised the first college football rankings methodology that determined the national champions from 1929 to 1958.

      Is this the same Houlgate, or perhaps his son who played for USC Trojans in the 1931 and 1932 Rose Bowl games?

      References: (see also and check...) - A Way With Words co-host Martha Barnette https://soundcloud.com/waywordradio/now-youre-cooking-with-gas

    1. Some minds are agitated by foreign alarms. Happily for us, there is no real danger from Europe; that country is engaged in more arduous business: from that quarter there is no cause of fear: you may sleep in safety forever for them.

      When talking about "disciplined armies", "defense", and "militias" at the Virginia Ratifying Convention in 1788, Patrick Henry explicitly says that the United States is not in danger from European powers:

      Some minds are agitated by foreign alarms. Happily for us, there is no real danger from Europe; that country is engaged in more arduous business: from that quarter there is no cause of fear: you may sleep in safety forever for them.

    1. Professor Carl Bogus: Carl T. Bogus, “Was Slavery a Factor in the SecondAmendment?” e New York Times, May 24, 2018.

      Professor Carl Bogus: Carl T. Bogus, “Was Slavery a Factor in the Second Amendment?” The New York Times, May 24, 2018. https://www.nytimes.com/2018/05/24/opinion/second-amendment-slavery-james-madison.html

    2. Patrick Henry and George Mason: Dave Davies, “Historian Uncovers eRacist Roots of the 2nd Amendment,” NPR, June 2, 2021.

      https://www.npr.org/2021/06/02/1002107670/historian-uncovers-the-racist-roots-of-the-2nd-amendment

      Transcript: https://www.npr.org/transcripts/1002107670 Audio: <audio src="">

      <audio controls> <source src="https://ondemand.npr.org/anon.npr-mp3/npr/fa/2021/06/20210602_fa_01.mp3" type="audio/mpeg"> <br />

      Your browser doesn't support HTML5 audio. Here is a link to the audio instead.

      </audio>

    1. When Congress was considering the first significant federal gun law of the 20th century—the National Firearms Act of 1934, which imposed a steep tax and registration requirements on “gangster guns” like machine guns and sawed-off shotguns—the NRA endorsed the law. Karl Frederick and the NRA did not blindly support gun control; indeed, they successfully pushed to have similar prohibitive taxes on handguns stripped from the final bill, arguing that people needed such weapons to protect their homes. Yet the organization stood firmly behind what Frederick called “reasonable, sensible, and fair legislation.”
    2. The very next day, Congress passed the Omnibus Crime Control and Safe Streets Act of 1968, the first federal gun-control law in 30 years. Months later, the Gun Control Act of 1968 amended and enlarged it.
    3. A 1792 federal law mandated every eligible man to purchase a military-style gun and ammunition for his service in the citizen militia. Such men had to report for frequent musters—where their guns would be inspected and, yes, registered on public rolls.
    1. https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/the-complicated-legacy-of-e-o-wilson/

      I can see why there's so much backlash on this piece.

      It could and should easily have been written without any reference at all to E. O. Wilson and been broadly interesting and true. However given the editorial headline "The Complicated Legacy of E. O. Wilson", the recency of his death, and the photo at the top, it becomes clickbait for something wholly other.

      There is only passing reference to Wilson and any of his work and no citations whatsoever about who he was or why his work was supposedly controversial. Instead the author leans in on the the idea of the biology being the problem instead of the application of biology to early anthropology which dramatically mis-read the biology and misapplied it for the past century and a half to bolster racist ideas and policies.

      The author indicates that we should be better with "citational practices when using or reporting on problematic work", but wholly forgets to apply it to her own writing in this very piece.

      I'm aware that the magazine editors are most likely the ones that chose the headline and the accompanying photo, but there's a failure here in both editorial and writing for this piece to have appeared in Scientific American in a way as to make it more of a hit piece on Wilson just days after his death. Worse, the backlash of the broadly unsupported criticism of Wilson totally washed out the attention that should have been placed on the meat of the actual argument in the final paragraphs.

      Editorial failed massively on all fronts here.


      This article seems to be a clear example of the following:

      Any time one uses the word "problematic" to describe cultural issues, it can't stand alone without some significant context building and clear arguments about exactly what was problematic and precisely why. Otherwise the exercise is a lot of handwaving and puffery that does neither side of an argument or its intended audiences any good.

    1. https://scottaaronson.blog/?p=6202

      Scientific American apparently published an unsupported hit piece on E. O. Wilson just following his death.


      Desperately sad to hear as I've read many of his works and don't recall anything highly questionable either there or in his personal life, even by current political standards.

      SA does seem to have slipped from my perspective and I'm more often reading Quanta instead.

  29. May 2022
    1. By 1860, the American Medical Association sought to end legal abortion. The Comstock Law of 1873 criminalized attaining, producing or publishing information about contraception, sexually transmitted infections and diseases, and how to procure an abortion.
  30. Apr 2022
    1. Hubbard hadn’t even always been opposed to the psychiatric profession. Soon after Dianetics was published he had attempted to secure APA approval for it. In its early years, Scientology had relied on appearing associated with medical psychiatry to bolster its legitimacy.

      L. Ron Hubbard attempted to get the American Psychological Association (APA) to approve his book Dianetics shortly after it was published. Early on Scientology had relied on appearing associated with the medical psychiatry complex to burnish its image.

  31. Mar 2022
    1. This is a moment that we should seize, in all seriousness, in order to take on the two huge existential plagues that face us this morning: the climate crisis, outlined in this new IPCC report, and the fact that we have a madman with nuclear weapons who’s used the revenues from oil and gas to intimidate and terrify the entire world.

      This is the critical observation - everything is interconnected. It is a nexus of problems that requires that we deal with all dimensions of the problem simultaneously.

      Putin is the nexus of so much that is wrong with the world. He is like an octopus that has its arms in multiple crisis of the planet.

      The political polarization of the US, the ascendancy of the puppet government of Trump and the blatant cognitive dissonance of the extreme right who are impervious to facts is reminiscent of the propaganda imposed upon the Russian people themselves for one reason - it was part of Putin's master plan: https://youtu.be/FxgBuhMBXSA The US population has been split by Putin's information warfare system, the same one he uses on the Russian population.

      The fake news programmed by Russian propaganda about the Ukraine war has worked effectively to mislead the Russian populus: https://youtu.be/kELta9MLOzg The same pattern of psychological manipulation has also had the same impact in the belief system of the typical hardcore Trumpist.

  32. Jan 2022
    1. It was largely the speakers of Iroquoian languages such as theWendat, or the five Haudenosaunee nations to their south, whoappear to have placed such weight on reasoned debate – evenfinding it a form of pleasurable entertainment in own right. This factalone had major historical repercussions. Because it appears tohave been exactly this form of debate – rational, sceptical, empirical,conversational in tone – which before long came to be identified withthe European Enlightenment as well. And, just like the Jesuits,Enlightenment thinkers and democratic revolutionaries saw it asintrinsically connected with the rejection of arbitrary authority,particularly that which had long been assumed by the clergy.

      The forms of rational, skeptical, empirical and conversational forms of debate popularized by the Enlightenment which saw the rejection of arbitrary authority were influenced by the Haudenosaunee nations of Americans.


      Interesting to see the reflexive political fallout of this reoccurring with the political right in America beginning in the early 2000s through the 2020s. It's almost as if the Republican party and religious right never experienced the Enlightenment and are still living in the 1700s.


      Curious that in modern culture I think of the Jesuits as the embodiment of rationalist, skeptical argumentation and thought now. Apparently they were dramatically transformed since that time.

  33. Dec 2021
    1. What we’re going to suggest is that American intellectuals – we areusing the term ‘American’ as it was used at the time, to refer toindigenous inhabitants of the Western Hemisphere; and ‘intellectual’to refer to anyone in the habit of arguing about abstract ideas –actually played a role in this conceptual revolution.

      I appreciate the way that they're normalizing the idea of "American intellectuals" and what that really means.

    1. most people trained in our subjects are aware of is the 00:28:22 phenomenon of slavery among non farming populations and actually the classic example is precisely that of the the indigenous societies of the Northwest Coast who are known to have kept slaves 00:28:36 who were actually hereditary slaves in their households which were organized on these highly stratified aristocratic sort of lines what nobody seems to have 00:28:48 been interested up to now is why this practice of keeping slaves seems to sort of fizzle out and stop as you head south into what is now broadly speaking the 00:29:00 area of coastal California

      How many non-agricultural societies practiced slavery?

      Apparently some indigenous societies on the American Northwest Coast did down into coastal California.

  34. Nov 2021
    1. Du Mez told me it’s important to recognize that this “rugged warrior Jesus” is not the only Jesus many evangelicals encounter in their faith community. There is also the “Jesus is my friend” popular in many devotionals, for example. These representations might appear to be contradictory, she told me, but in practice they can be mutually reinforcing. Jesus is a friend, protector, savior—but according to one’s own understanding of what needs to be protected and saved, and not necessarily according to core biblical teachings.

      This seems to be getting at the "personal Jesus" and personal faith that Colin Woodard mentions as well.

    1. https://danallosso.substack.com/p/help-me-find-world-history-textbooks

      Dan Allosso is curious to look at the history of how history is taught.

      The history of teaching history is a fascinating topic and is an interesting way for cultural anthropologists to look at how we look at ourselves as well as to reveal subtle ideas about who we want to become.

      This is particularly interesting with respect to teaching cultural identity and its relationship to nationalism.

      One could look at the history of Reconstruction after the U.S. Civil War to see how the South continued its cultural split from the North (or in more subtle subsections from Colin Woodard's American Nations thesis) to see how this has played out. This could also be compared to the current culture wars taking place with the rise of nationalism within the American political right and the Southern evangelicals which has come to a fervor with the rise of Donald J. Trump.

      Other examples are the major shifts in nationalism after the "long 19th century" which resulted in World War I and World War II and Germany's national identity post WWII.

    1. On two highly divisive cultural issues — public safety and public education — even voters in this exceedingly progressive city have bluntly told their elected leaders that high-minded rhetoric is not enough.
  35. Oct 2021
  36. Sep 2021
    1. I told them it was the Sabbath day, and desired them to let me rest

      She hadn't practiced a sabbath before, why is she upset about this one?

    2. She didn't even pass through the water like a baptism entails she skirted over it in a raft. It even dictates that "my food did not wet"

    3. stoutest men, and sent them back to hold the English army in play whilst the rest escaped.

      Men who would die for the benefit of the tribe. A war with the English army

    1. “Wait on the Lord, Be of good courage, and he shall strengthen thine Heart, wait I say on the Lord.”

      it seems like she isn't exactly bothered by captivity. Although I understand her urging her not because she's pregnant and due soon. But shouldn't she at least think about running away too if she's captive and unhappy.

    2. chapter of Deuteronomy

      What is the significance to this chapter?

    3. One of the Indians that came from Medfield fight, had brought some plunder, came to me, and asked me, if I would have a Bible, he had got one in his basket. I was glad of it, and asked him, whether he thought the Indians would let me read? He answered, yes. So I took the Bible,

      They treat captives with more kindness than the Englishmen do. They still let her have access to religious texts.

    4. Then they went and showed me where it was, where I saw the ground was newly digged, and there they told me they had buried it.

      They took the time to bury it upon a hill and to tell her where her baby was buried

    5. my sweet babe like a lamb departed this life on Feb. 18, 1675. It being about six years, and five months old.

      No one should go through the death of a baby. Why is there no distinguishing language about the baby? no possessive descriptions or even a name

    6. Then I took oaken leaves

      Seems like herbal remedies which are common from pagans and Native Americans

    7. and my child’s being so exceeding sick,

      I thought her children died??

    8. One of the Indians got up upon a horse, and they set me up behind him, with my poor sick babe in my lap.

      It seems to be that the once off act of kindness might actually be a pattern

    1. still the Lord upheld me with His gracious and merciful spirit, and we were both alive to see the light of the next morning.

      God's mercy and love kept them alive through to the morning

    2. but God was with me in a wonderful manner, carrying me along, and bearing up my spirit, that it did not quite fail.

      Why is God with her all of a sudden? I'm sensing a theme of Christianity and praising the Lord.

    3. One of the Indians carried my poor wounded babe upon a horse

      Quite interesting since they are 'barbaric' creatures. Why would they carry her wounded baby on a horse showing kindness to her?

    1. All was gone, my husband gone (at least separated from me, he being in the Bay; and to add to my grief, the Indians told me they would kill him as he came homeward), my children gone, my relations and friends gone, our house and home and all our comforts—within door and without—all was gone (except my life), and I knew not but the next moment that might go too.

      Alluding to how the Englishmen killed the Natives and took them slaves as a way of profit.

    2. one-eyed John, and Marlborough’s Praying Indians

      Are these characters to be followed up on?

    3. Oh the roaring, and singing and dancing, and yelling of those black creatures in the night, which made the place a lively resemblance of hell.

      Shows the disconnect that English people felt at the time and the animistic view of Native Americans that was portrayed.

    4. “What, will you love English men still?”

      Her being in Native American territory somehow denotes her English nature?

    1. “From the culture’s point of view, Adler was a dead white male who had the bad luck to still be alive.”

      This is a painful burn by the writer Alex Beam.

      Perhaps worth modifying for Donald J. Trump?

      From the perspective of the American experiment and the evolution of democracy, Donald J. Trump was a dead white male who had the bad luck to still be alive."

    1. Billionaire business owners deployed lobbyists to make sure Trump’s 2017 tax bill was tailored to their benefit. Confidential IRS records show the windfall that followed.

      @choppa1890 says "will read and get mad about one of these days"

      With respect.....this learned attitude is the leading contributor to the problem with modern America. The quote reflects cognitive dissonance that is dealt with through a weak form of denial. @choppa1890 uses a mentally acceptable task (posting in Hypothesis) and 'avoidance', to resolve the dissonance. @choppa1890 can not allow him/herself to read the article, create knowledge and emotion. It's too much to think about so I will make a note in Hypothesis and move on!

    1. The Uncomfortable Truth is the Difficult and Unpopular Decisions are Now Unavoidable.

      Topic is relevant across a span of global issues. Natural resources are Finite.....period! Timely decisions are critical to insure intelligent use of resources. DENIAL is the enemy and 800lb gorilla in the room. Neoliberisim and social dysfunction feed on any cognitive dissonance and poop it out as "crap". True believers of American Capitalism (yes there is a difference) have become "cult-like" and drink the fluid of the cult to the very end, human consequence is of no concern.

      Point being: Reality is always elusive within a cult controlled (authoritative) mindset. Cult members are weak sheep, incapable of individual logic/reason. Authority can not be challenged. -- Denial, a human defense mechanism has been and is the common denominator in all personal and global conflict. Denial can be traced throughout modern history and rears its ugly head whenever the stakes are high.

  37. Aug 2021