444 Matching Annotations
  1. Sep 2024
  2. Jul 2024
    1. "We made dissent illegal and banned controversial discourse from public spaces, why hasn't bigotry and hate stopped existing?"

      this is just a precursor to genocide.<br /> first they ban your religion, then they wipe out your families.

      go ask the armenians how their genocide went...<br /> go ask some turcs why they killed so many armenians...<br /> (spoiler: turcs absolutely hate that question, they will freak out.)

    1. Improving the living standards of all working-class Americans while closing racial disparities in employment and wages will depend on how well we seize opportunities to build multiracial, multigendered, and multigenerational coalitions to advance policies that achieve both of these goals

      for - political polarization - challenge to building multi-racial coalition - to - Wired story - No one actually knows how AI will affect jobs

      political polarization - building multi-racial coalitions - This is challenging to do when there is so much political polarization with far-right pouring gasoline on the polarization fire and obscuring the issue - There is a complex combination of factors leading to the erosion of working class power

      automation - erosion of the working class - Ai is only the latest form of the automation trend, further eroding the working class - But Ai is also beginning to erode white collar jobs

      to - Wired story - No one actually knows how AI will affect jobs - https://hyp.is/KsIWPDzoEe-3rR-gufTfiQ/www.wired.com/story/ai-impact-on-work-mary-daly-interview/

  3. May 2024
    1. there 00:40:08 are many hundreds of thousands now and their uh their rights are being threatened of course not that any of them are inviting the Kremlin to come in and save them but we kind of know how this 00:40:19 works

      for - geopolitics - Russian play book for political takeover

      geopolitics - Russian playbook for political takeover of ex- Soviet satellite countries - claim that Russian citizens are being threatened - send Putin loyalists into the local government - have fake referendum and rigged elections - install Putin loyalists to take over the country

    1. This led him to createhis distinctive compositional style referred to as clazz.The name originated froman amalgamation of the words ‘classical’ and ‘jazz’. In reality, clazzcomprisesseveral musical genresincludingjazz, pop, Indian, world music, rock, Javanese gamelan music, South African mbaqanga,isicathamiya, and Western art music. Reddy’s political and philosophical beliefs are evident in clazz. By fusing different musical styles, he exhibitedhis humanitarianism, deeming all should be treated equally(Reddy 2007:11; Lucia 2010b:53; Van der Merwe 2016:71).
  4. Apr 2024
    1. The way that administrators normally respond to a tactic like this is to just wait it out. Have campus security keep an eye on them to make sure things don’t get out of hand. Make vague statements to the campus paper. Schedule some meetings. Maybe declare that you’ll form a committee to look into things further.Traditionally, the weakness of this tactic is that it does little to expand the conflict.
    2. Schattschneider tells us that contentious politics can be best understand through a lens of conflict expansion. Those in power will (and, strategically, should) try to maintain and contain the scope of a conflict. Those arrayed against them will (and should) attempt to expand the scope of the conflict. If you want to understand an episode of contentious politics, don’t evaluate the substance of the arguments as though you are judging an intercollegiate debate. Instead, watch the crowd.
    3. One book that I have my students read every semester is E.E. Schattschneider’s 1960 classic, The Semi-Sovereign People. The book is a tight 180 pages.
  5. Mar 2024
    1. To LODOVICO) Concerning this, sir—(To DESDEMONA) Oh,well-painted passion!(To LODOVICO) I am commanded home.(To DESDEMONA) Getyou away,I’ll send for you anon.(To LODOVICO) Sir, I obey themandateAnd will return to Venice.(To DESDEMONA) Hence,avaunt!

      Maybe this passage signifies the intertwining of politics and personal, and how they are inseperable, because human is inseperable to their emotions -- lest they be Iago?

    2. Either from Venice, or some unhatched practiceMade demonstrable here in Cyprus to him,Hath puddled his clear spirit, and in such casesMen’s natures wrangle with inferior things,Though great ones are their object.

      She thinks it must be something political that is upsetting him -- perhaps it shows that relationship between personal and political conflict, the transferrable nature? Or proving Iago's point that emotion sways the most?

    3. and for one to say a soldier lies,’tis stabbing

      Correlates occupation to personal life. He is speaking truth. But what is the Clown's relevance? Foreshadows that Cassio is truly honest

    4. And O you mortal engines, whose rude throatsThe immortal Jove’s dead clamors counterfeit,Farewell! Othello’s occupation’s gone

      Connects personal to political. How is his military role related to his personal love life?

    5. You have known him long, and be you well assuredHe shall in strangeness stand no farther offThan in a polite distance.

      Politics vs Feeling

    6. To manage private and domestic quarrel?In night, and on the court and guard of safety?'Tis monstrous. Iago, who began ’t?

      Personal and professional mix up looked down upon

    7. ake all the money thou canst. If sanctimonyand a frail vow betwixt an erring barbarian andsupersubtle Venetian be not too hard for my wits and allthe tribe of hell, thou shalt enjoy her.

      Showing that he believes his wills make him the God of the world, that he has ultimate power over the chessboard just through intention alone -- and that is the work of the devil, the rejection of emotion's sway on decision making, and pure reason

    8. Virtue? A fig! 'Tis in ourselves that we are thus orthus. Our bodies are our gardens, to the which our willsare gardeners

      Iago's main core lies in self-control and motivation -- he believes himself to be a man of simple free will, and unlimited freedom. Unrestrained and in control of the chessboard -- he assumes both the external world and (mistakenly) his internal world are under his control, but they may not be.

    9. Is of so flood-gate and o'erbearing natureThat it engluts and swallows other sorrowsAnd it is still itself.

      Exaggerated emotions in the form of water and nature -- what could this mean? ALSO, Shows the role of emotion in this political setting, which is a recurring motif of overlap in personal and political decisions that runs throughout. How do you make a good ruler, leader who does not impulsively use personal emotion to decide in political circumstances? Reminds me of Hitler

    10. We lacked your counsel and your help tonight.

      Humorous, as it shows the lack of Brabantio's care in the political field, he is incompetent -- only woke up from bed to address his daughter's married life.

      If he can't do political, can he do personal? And vice versa -- alienates him from the reader -> Alienates from his racist ideas.

    11. Valiant Othello

      Important because it contrasts all the other views of Othello -- but when he is a general, he is valiant. What does this signify about roles? About our split between personal and professional/political life?

    1. for - liberal blind spot - Chris Yates - book - liberalism and the challenge of climate change - adjacency - liberalism - individual liberty - progress - bond spot - political polarization - fuel for the right -hyperobjects

      Summary - This short article contains some key insights that point to the right climate communication strategy to target and win over the working class - Currently, climate communications speak to elitist values and is having the opposite effect - The working class farmer protests spreading across the EU is a symptom of this miscommunication strategy - as is the increasing support and ascendency of right wing political parties - Researcher and author Chris Yates is in a unique position with one foot in each world - He articulates his insightful ideas and points is in the right direction to communicate in a way that reaches the working class

      comment - the figure 4 graph is an example of carbon inequality

      Example - carbon inequality - see figure 4

  6. Feb 2024
    1. How to stop profligate states before they can sap the Fed

      Perhaps we should start with those states whose population pays less in Federal taxes than they receive in Federal dollars?

    1. Noël Mamère, der bisher erfolgreichste grüne Präsidentschaftskandidat Frankreichs, und der junge Aktivist Achraf Manar stellen im Interview fest, dass die politische Ökologie im Gegensatz zu den angepassten Teilen der grünen Parteien keinen sanften Übergang" verspricht. Die globale Erhitzung trifft vor allem die Verwundbarsten der Gesellschaft, für die sich die ökologische Bewegung deshalb vor allem engagieren muss. Beide verteidigen den zivilen Ungehorsam und stellen fest, dass die ökologische Bewegung zunehmend zum Sündenbock für die Folgen der Klimakrise gemacht wird. https://www.liberation.fr/environnement/noel-mamere-et-achraf-manar-il-faut-que-celles-et-ceux-qui-subissent-les-crises-soient-au-coeur-des-prises-de-decision-20240209_QYUABTHUTBB3DCL2LXBBKLK4ZI/

  7. Jan 2024
    1. “A second Trump term is game over for the climate — really!”

      for - quote - Michael Mann - quote - a Second Trump presidency - polycrisis - politics and climate crisis - climate mitigation strategy - voting in 2024 U.S. election - adjacency - Michael Mann - 2nd Trump presidency - exceeding planetary boundaries - exceeding 1.5 Deg C - Gen Z voting

      adjacency - between - Michael Mann - 2nd Trump presidency - exceeding planetary boundaries - exceeding 1.5 Deg C - Trump's presidency is existential threat to humanity - Gen Z voting - 2024 election - adjacency statement - Michael Mann's quote " A second Trump term is game over for the climate - really" applies to the 2024 election if Trump becomes the Republican nominee. - Trumps dismal environmental record in his 2016 to 2020 term speaks for itself. He would do something similiar in 2025 if he were the president. G - Given there are only 5 years and 172 days before we hit the dangerous threshold of burning through all the carbon budget for humanity, - https://climateclock.world/ - It is questionable whether Biden's government alone can do enough, but certainly if Trump won the 2024 election, his term in office would create a regression severe enough to put the Paris Climate goal of staying within 1.5 Deg C out of reach, and risk triggering major planetary tipping points - A Biden government is evidence-based and believes in anthropogenic climate change and is already taking measures to mitigate it. A Trump government is not evidence-based and is supported by incumbent fossil fuel industry so does not have the interest of the U.S. population nor all of humanity at heart. - Hence, the 2024 U.S. election can really determine the fate of humanity. - Gen Z can play a critical role for humanity by voting against a government that would, in leading climate scientists Michael Mann's words, be game over for a stable climate, and therefore put humanity and unimaginable risk. - Gen Z can swing the vote to a government willing to deal with the climate crisis over one in climate denial so voting activists need to be alerted to this and create the right messaging to reach Gen Z - https://hyp.is/LOud7sBBEe6S0D8itLHw1A/circle.tufts.edu/latest-research/41-million-members-gen-z-will-be-eligible-vote-2024

    1. In dem neuen sogenannten Österreic-Plan der ÖVP spielt Klimaneutralität keine Rolle. 20 Milliarden sollen bis 2030 in den Straßenbau investiert werden, zusätzlich eine Milliarde in sogenannte grüne Verbrenner. Außerdem setzt man auf CO2 Abscheidung und Speicherung. Fragen nach dem Klimaschutz gesetzt lassen die Verantwortlichen der ÖVP unbeantwortet. https://www.derstandard.de/story/3000000205164/von-oesterreich-plan-bis-klimagesetz-die-oevp-meidet-das-klima-thema

    1. Greek plays are not just about entertainment; they are invitations to the audience to discuss political events.

      Greek plays are either tragedies or comedies. There is a much deeper meaning to them than just entertaining the public. Keeping this in mind when reading the stories gives them a much deeper meaning.(https://www.worldhistory.org/Greek_Theatre/) To know the full extent of what they were really meant for is important to the readers. For this specific play, the meaning behind the story is that the men in charge are operating from an excessively limited perspective as they ignore their partners' informed advice. This is a huge political controversy to this day. Women are very overlooked in society especially considering how far back this is dated. Back when this play was written women were given tasks like cooking and cleaning and had little to no rights so this was a good political example of how they were treated and overlooked.

  8. Dec 2023
      • for: James Hansen - 2023 paper, key insight - James Hansen, leverage point - emergence of new 3rd political party, leverage point - youth in politics, climate change - politics, climate crisis - politics

      • Key insight: James Hansen

        • The key insight James Hansen conveys is that
          • the key to rapid system change is
            • WHAT? the rapid emergence of a new, third political party that does not take money from special interest lobbys.
            • WHY? Hit the Achilles heel of the Fossil Fuel industry
            • HOW? widespread citizen / youth campaign to elect new youth leaders across the US and around the globe
            • WHEN? Timing is critical. In the US,
              • Don't spoil the vote for the two party system in 2024 elections. Better to have a democracy than a dictatorship.
              • Realistically, likely have to wait to be a contender in the 2028 election.
      • reference

    1. Washington is a swamp it we throw out one party the other one comes in they take money from special interests and we don't have a government that's serving the interests 01:25:09 of the public that's what I think we have to fix and I don't see how we do that unless we have a party that takes no money from special interests
      • for: key insight- polycrisis - climate crisis - political crisis, climate crisis - requires a new political party, money in politics, climate crisis - fossil fuel lobbyists, climate change - politics, climate crisis - politics, James Hansen - key insight - political action - 3rd party

      • key insight

        • Both democrats and conservatives are captured by fossil fuel lobbyist interests
        • A new third political party that does not take money from special interests is required
        • The nature of the polycrisis is that crisis are entangled . This is a case in point. The climate crisis cannot be solved unless the political crisis of money influencing politics is resolved
        • The system needs to be rapidly reformed to kick money of special interest groups out of politics.
      • question

        • Given the short timescale, the earliest we can achieve this is 2028 in the US Election cycle
        • Meanwhile what can we do in between?
        • How much impact can alternative forms of local governance like https://sonec.org/ have?
        • In particular, could citizens form local alternative forms of governance and implement incentives to drive sustainable behavior?
    2. I think that what we have to 01:23:24 do is have the revolution that Benjamin Franklin said we need if because if we don't solve the problem in the United States I don't see us solving the global 01:23:39 problem
      • for: quote - James Hansen, quote Benjamin Franklin, climate crisis - leverage point - political revolution

      • quote

        • If we don't solve the problem in the United States, I don't see us solving the global problem
      • author: James Hansen
      • date: Dec 2023

      • comment

        • Tipping Point network
    1. She is hopeful when she approaches a house with solar panels on the roof and an electric car in the driveway.
      • for: example - political polarization, example - trumpism, example - anti- vaxxers, example - conspiracy theories, nonduality - political polarization

      • example: political polarization

        • classic dualistic categories will always fail to capture the complexity
        • indyweb mindplex's could reveal the nuances
    1. in some ways it may well be that this Century will be 00:16:19 a century characterized by the emotion of fear for many people and fear doesn't stay fear it often becomes anger and anger and fear are often exploited by 00:16:31 folks who uh use those emotions as a ways of as a as a way of building their political Authority to deepen divisions within their society to draw together their followers into sort of a fevered 00:16:45 pitch and uh and use and use the exploitation as political opportunists use the exploitation of fear and anger to build their Authority and Power
      • for: adjacency - polycrisis - fear - anger - political exploitation

      • adjacency between

        • polycrisis
        • fear
        • anger
        • political exploitation
        • polarization
        • authoritarianism
      • adjacency statement
        • In this polycrisis space, we witness fear leading to anger which is then exploited by political opportunists who then create polarization through authoritarian impulses that superficially quench the desires of the unheard angry citizens
  9. academic-oup-com.proxy.lib.miamioh.edu academic-oup-com.proxy.lib.miamioh.edu
    1. The most powerful groups in society, in any case, had elaborated persuasive rationales for exemption. The clergy, a vast corporation drawing revenues from a sixth of the kingdom’s land, and creaming off, in the form of tithes, a notional tenth of the yield of the rest, paid no direct taxes on the grounds that it performed its service to society by praying and interceding with God. The nobility, the social elite which owned over a quarter of the land, levied feudal dues over much of the rest, and steadily sucked most of the newly rich into its ranks via ennobling offices, resisted the payment of direct taxes as well. Nobles, the argument went, served the kingdom with their blood, by fighting to defend it.

      Tax evasion of 1st and 2nd estates

    2. The crisis was triggered by King Louis XVI’s attempts to avoid bankruptcy.

      Cause of instability

    3. It was not that France lacked the resources to survive as a great power. Over the next generation the French would dominate the European continent more completely than they had ever done. It was rather that many of these resources were locked up by the system of government, the organization of society, and the culture of what revolutionaries would soon be calling the ancien régime, the old or former order. It took the Revolution to release them.

      Discontent with status quo and diminishing legitimacy

      • for: climate crisis - voting for global political green candidates, podcast - Planet Critical, interview - Planet Critical - James Schneider - communications officer - Progressive International, green democratic revolution, climate crisis - elite control off mainstream media

      • podcast: Planet Critical

      • host: Rachel Donald
      • title: Overthrowing the Ruling Class: The Green Democratic Revolution

      • summary

        • This is a very insightful interview with James Schneider, communications officer of Progressive International on the scales of political change required to advert our existential Poly / meta / meaning crisis.
        • James sees 3 levels of crisis
          • ordinary crisis emerging from a broken system
          • larger wicked problems that cannot be solved in isolation
          • the biggest umbrella crisis that covers all others - the last remaining decades of the fossil fuel system,
            • due to peak oil but accelerated by
            • climate crisis
        • There has to be a paradigm shift on governance, as the ruling elites are driving humanity off the cliff edge
        • This is not incremental change but a paradigm shift in governance
        • To do that, we have to adopt an anti-regime perspective, that is not reinforcing the current infective administrative state, otherwise, as COVID taught us, we will end up driving the masses to adopt hard right politicians
        • In order to establish the policies that are aligned to the science, the people and politicians have to be aligned.
        • Voting in candidates who champion policies aligned to science is a leverage point.
        • That can only be done if the citizenry is educated enough to vote for such politicians
        • So there are two parallel tasks to be done:
          • mass education program to educate citizens
          • mass program to encourage candidates aligned to climate science to run for political office
    1. the French Revolution happened in Denmark
      • for: social tipping points - political, quote - french Revolution - Denmark

      • quote.

        • the French Revolution happened in Denmark
    2. well I'll start with two extremely optimistic points
      • for: answer to above question

      • answer : two answers

        • first, the elite have the majority of
          • wealth
          • control of setting policies
          • control of the media
          • and they work really hard at controlling policy and media
          • and the people
            • hate the system
            • generally hate them
        • second, social tipping points occur. Something happened in over place, then it spreads to other places
    3. the changes that we need to make to our political system go well well 00:41:10 well beyond like having a better P party in changing who some of the MPS are and so on and so forth because it is structurally set up to insulate the ruling class from popular pressure
      • for: quote - political system change is required

      • quote

        • the changes that we need to make our political system go well beyond having a better party or changing who some of the MPS are and so on
          • because it is structurally set up to insulate the ruling class from popular pressure
    4. I you know think this is important in the kind of what the left postur is to regime break to system breakdown which 00:35:27 experiencing has to be anti-regime let
      • for: Lessons from COVID

        • Left position to avoid driving masses to the hard right
      • quote

        • i think this is important in the kind of what the left posture is to regime and system breakdown which it is experiencing has to be anti-regime
      • paraphrase

        • otherwise the anti-regime forces go to the hard right and
          • if the left follows the left wing of the management state which is trying to technocratically limit the catastrophe of breakdown,
          • it will never get popular support that's basically what happened during COVID.
            • the hard right denied science, the left went begging the administrative state and as a consequence, there was a massive expansion of the right around the globe
    1. At the same time, more andmore people are demanding a different political culture, transparent decision-making and real partici-pation in political decision-making processes 18 . The crises challenge us to develop and implement newforms of solidarity, citizenship and political action in the sense of a vita activa
      • for: vita activa, new forms of political participation
    1. This dissatisfaction with the dominant role of the state, or similar dissatisfaction by what others consider the failing market-based neoliberal order, may now go into different directions
      • for: different possible socio-economic-political futures

      • comment

        • Michel outlines the possibilities then selects the last one as the one he situates himself in and will write on, namelyl:
          • A dream to integrate:
            • markets,
            • networks,
            • state functions, AND what we could call
            • ‘the Commons’
  10. Nov 2023
      • for: commented on - Trump and failings of political system, poem - Trump a symptom of failing political system

      • commented on

        • I wrote a poem in the comment section of this video:

          • Oh what a web we weave, when we practice to deceive
          • What a distance Trump will fall, when Jack Smith and the other upholders of truth disentangles it all!
          • What lesson have we learned, what has hindsight allowed us to see
          • about the fragility of this gift called democracy?
          • Whose ideal is that men and women are all equal another way of saying we are all sacred?
          • We pay a heavy price for not taking care of our disenfranchised sisters and brothers
          • for without job and pay they may seem powerless but the minions of poor left behind,
          • not lifted by the rising tide of unequal prosperity
          • at least have a vote to vent their anger and victimhood of being forgot
          • and comes along the next power-hungry, fork-tongued, snake-oil salesman
          • who recognizes the strength in the weakness of the minion
          • enough to exploit for personal gain the aggregate vote of the disenfranchised many
          • plunging democracy and its constitutions into crisis
          • Not only in the US, but all around the world
          • we witness the same phenomena
          • as the failings of liberal democracies that have left masses behind,
          • unintentional failings of democracy,
          • is exploited by the opportunist to seize power
          • and institute intentional forms of non-democracy

          • The bottom line (below):

          • Regardless of political ideology,
          • genuine empathy for all
          • not just in theory, but in practice
          • is the path to a just, stable and thriving society
      • for: epoche, epoche - interfaith applications, bracketing, applied epoche, Deep Humanity, DH, polycrisis, political polarization, religious polarization, epoche - research application

      • comment

        • I performed Google search for "Epoche and application to interfaith religion"
        • The reason is that I am exploring a hunch of the salience of applying epoche for deep interfaith understanding
        • political polarization constitutes an existential threat and is one important crisis in our current polycrisis
        • Unless we find ways to effectively and rapidly reduce polarization, the other crisis's such as climate crisis, biodiversity crisis and inequality crisis will likely not be resolved
        • religious polarization form ingroups / outgroups and is a major contributing factor to political polarization and violent conflict
        • hence it becomes important to understand how interfaith understanding can be enhanced
        • epoche appears to be one possible way to accelerate interfaith understanding
      • for: epoche, epoche - interfaith applications, Deep Humanity, DH, polycrisis, poltical polarization, religious polarization, hermenneutic, hermeneutical phenomenological method

      • summary

        • a very insightful paper
      • comment

        • I performed Google search for "Epoche and application to interfaith religion"
        • The reason is that I am exploring a hunch of the salience of applying epoche for deep interfaith understanding
        • political polarization constitutes an existential threat and is one important crisis in our current polycrisis
        • Unless we find ways to effectively and rapidly reduce polarization, the other crisis's such as climate crisis, biodiversity crisis and inequality crisis will likely not be resolved
        • religious polarization form ingroups / outgroups and is a major contributing factor to political polarization and violent conflict
        • hence it becomes important to understand how interfaith understanding can be enhanced
        • epoche appears to be one possible way to accelerate interfaith understanding
    1. On the Function of the Epoche inPhenomenological Interpretations of Religion
      • for: epoche, epoche - interfaith applications, Deep Humanity, DH, polycrisis, political polarization, religious polarization

      • comment

        • I performed Google search for "Epoche and application to interfaith religion"
        • The reason is that I am exploring a hunch of the salience of applying epoche for deep interfaith understanding
        • political polarization constitutes an existential threat and is one important crisis in our current polycrisis
        • Unless we find ways to effectively and rapidly reduce polarization, the other crisis's such as climate crisis, biodiversity crisis and inequality crisis will likely not be resolved
        • religious polarization form ingroups / outgroups and is a major contributing factor to political polarization and violent conflict
        • hence it becomes important to understand how interfaith understanding can be enhanced
        • epoche appears to be one possible way to accelerate interfaith understanding
  11. Oct 2023
    1. They were so set in their categories that they couldn’t make a distinction between the Palestinian people and a genocidal cult that claimed to speak in that people’s name

      this.

    1. In 2022, PRRI asked Americans their views on the utility of violence as a political tactic. Three in 10 Republicans said they agreed that “because things have gotten so far off track, true American patriots may have to resort to violence in order to save our country.” That was about three times the percentage of Democrats agreeing with the same sentiment.
    2. There was former Ohio congressman Anthony Gonzalez (R) — a former professional football player — who deemed the hostility he faced after opposing Trump too much of a risk for his family. Former Wyoming representative Liz Cheney (R) described similar fears from other legislators, as did former Michigan representative Peter Meijer (R). That these three are all former legislators is not a coincidence: They resigned or were beaten in primaries largely because they saw how the party had turned against them. See also: Romney, Mitt.

      The threat of physical violence is silencing those in power even on the right. We're already at war except for the bullets.

  12. Sep 2023
      • for: Christian nationalism, Christian national, far right politics, Christian right, political extremism, MAGA fuel
      • comment
        • the extreme right, MAGA Republican party is fueled by a movement composed of threatened Christian nationalists entering politics to assert power.
        • The extremism in the far right politics is in direct proportion to the high degree to which they perceive threat
        • Religious faith can inspire extremely powerful emotional responses and devotion. When combined with politics this can lead to extreme events, such as the Jan. 6 insurrection.
        • The mobilization of Christian nationals into local school boards has turned education into a political battleground.
    1. that's that is the Dirty Little Secret 00:12:08 of where we're at right now with Americans at each other's throats politically it's being created caused on purpose by the Chinese and the Russians who are manipulating people 00:12:22 through um use of phony websites and other disinformation campaigns being run which is a type of warfare that's being run 00:12:34 against the American people and they're falling for it
      • for: example, example - internet flaws, polarization, disinformation,, example - polarization, political interference - Russia, political interference - China
      • example: polarization, internet flaws
  13. Aug 2023
    1. The January 6th insurrection on Capitol Hill over one year ago, and the United States’ ongoing struggle to respond effectively to threats such as the COVID-19 pandemic and climate change, warn us of the dangers posed by unchecked polarization.
      • for: polarization, political polarization, conflict, water, violence, trump
      • Paraphrase
        • current example of polarization
          • The January 6th US insurrection on Capitol Hill
          • COVID-19 pandemic
          • climate change,
        • warn us of the dangers posed by unchecked polarization.
    1. signs of collapse include
      • for: collapse, polycrisis, political collapse
      • signs of collapse
        • misinformation
        • disinformation,
        • propaganda
        • censorship,
        • scapegoating,
        • disenfranchisement,
        • suppression of dissent,
        • widespread surveillance,
        • overt and large-scale corruption,
        • emergence and use of paramilitaries,
        • widespread
          • arrests,
          • incarcerations and
          • ‘disappearances’,
        • election interference and fraud,
        • election cancellations and
        • the dismantling of democratic institutions. Over the past decade, most of these have been employed in many countries, and their use is becoming widely normalized in much of the world.
    1. Was Ronald Reagan's shift in politics an example of “It is difficult to get a man to understand something, when his salary depends upon his not understanding it!” (Upton Sinclair)? (see also: https://quoteinvestigator.com/2017/11/30/salary/)

      Link to https://hypothes.is/a/Kft7kDOrEe6TQKcW-dREwQ in The Big Myth on Regan's shift in political views while working for General Electric.

    1. 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.

  14. Jul 2023
    1. at third act where we organize old people like me over the age 00:05:36 of 60. we're concentrating on democracy and on climate they seem uh they seem the twin crises that we face
      • for: polycrisis, dual crisis, climate change and political polarization

      • key insight

        • we have to deal with climate crisis AND political polarization simultaneously
        • unless we solve the political polarization problem, we will be stuck in policy gridlock
    1. there's really shocking data that shows red zip codes are getting red or redder and blue ones Bluer and Bluer
      • US political polarization at local level
        • there's really shocking data that shows
          • red zip codes are getting red or redder and
          • blue states are getting Bluer
        • people are self-selecting into communities based on their political beliefs
          • and this is the highest rate we've ever seen it since polling began in that space
        • The phenomenon is really hyper localized
  15. May 2023
    1. An analysis of the modern capitalist state that distinguishes between political society, which dominates directly and coercively, and civil society, where leadership is constituted through consent

      What is the current separation of political and civil society in America in 2023? Do the differences in these two (particularly with respect to Antonio Gramsci's framing) still have distinguishing features?

    2. the Prison Notebooks, contain Gramsci's tracing of Italian history and nationalism, as well as some ideas in Marxist theory, critical theory and educational theory associated with his name, such as: Cultural hegemony as a means of maintaining and legitimising the capitalist state The need for popular workers' education to encourage development of intellectuals from the working-class An analysis of the modern capitalist state that distinguishes between political society, which dominates directly and coercively, and civil society, where leadership is constituted through consent Absolute historicism A critique of economic determinism that opposes fatalistic interpretations of Marxism A critique of philosophical materialism
  16. Apr 2023
    1. In Vice, Maggie Puniewska points to the moral foundations theory, according to which liberals and conservatives prioritize different ethics: the former compassion, fairness and liberty, the latter purity, loyalty and obedience to authority.
  17. Mar 2023
    1. The starkest danger of the “consumer in charge” narrative is that itdepoliticizes the challenges before us, at a time when a citizen politicsis most called for. With consumers in charge, only the softest and mostbenevolent policy interventions are required from governments, likeproviding consumers with information on the environmental and so-cial characteristics of products, and information on how to use theseproducts in a better (especially more effcient) way. For these reasons,the consumer sovereignty narrative is attractive to politicians, as itshifts responsibility away from producers, retailers, and those taskedwith regulating commercial activity

      // - this, however, can be transformed through coordination. After all, it's the same principle of having enough people in consensus - one is in the economic arena, the other is in the political (voting). We can and should do both

  18. Jan 2023
    1. you you have to back politicians who are   00:52:41 willing to change this and unfortunately there's  no party that's uh in favor of canceling student   debt or any kind of debt in the united states  because the political parties are subsidized   by the banking in the financial sector so  uh i don't see uh i don't see a way out

      !- Michael Hudson : The realities of debt writedown of any kind - Not pragmatic because no political party will support it because all political parties are subsidized by banking and financial sector

    2. as long as the system of  of political finance and you know parties and   campaigns and media and think tank you know  are largely controlled by by large wealth   00:29:11 holders you know our collective ability to  change the distribution of wealth and the   you know through through taxation or that  consolation and or what you know whatever   the method is going to be limited so it will take  major political fights and in some cases you know   changing the political rules of the game and the  political institution to to to changes and and   you know the good news is that this has  always been like this or this has always   00:29:39 and and still sometimes you know it has worked  in the in the past but it has worked you know   i mentioned the french revolution you know of  course that's a huge popular mobilization uh also   in the 20th century i mentioned after world war  ii after world war one well let's be clear it's   only because there was a very powerful uh you know  labor movement a socialist movement and communist   counter model in the east which in the end put  pressure uh on the on the uh and you know and on   00:30:09 the in effect and the elite governing elite in in  in the west so that they they they had to accept   a number of decisions you know which which were  limited in their scope but still which transform   the economic and social system in in a very  substantial way as compared to the pre-world   war one and 19th century economic system but it's  only through this enormous political mobilization   00:30:34 and collective organization and you know it will  be the same in in the past

      !- Thomas Piketty : limited ability for real change as long as elites can lobby governments - but in the past, there has been success, as the two cases previously mentioned - so it is possible, but will take just as enormous a political mobilization of the people

  19. Nov 2022
    1. i think so like in social terms the conservatives would say well i like that it benefits from the wisdom of math already invented you're not 00:36:39 throwing anything away you're not you're not throwing it all away and starting over you're taking what we already have and you're you're using it that's great and a libertarian might say i really like that you're free to create as you see fit you can make anything you 00:36:52 want and you're working within this background framework that's minimally invasive it doesn't make a lot of rules for you but it is highly functional i like that it kind of keeps everyone in line while 00:37:03 like satisfying some formal contracts or something while still being uh i'm still free to create and a progressive might say i like about category that theory that everyone can contribute to 00:37:15 making their own world making it more rich adding new ideas uh making it more meaningful understanding connections between things a modern viewpoint would say i like that 00:37:26 it's completely rigorous that it's been used in proving well-known conjectures that people thought were important to prove but also that it's interesting it's useful in science and technology and a postmodern person might say i like 00:37:40 that um that no perspective is right that that there's just all sorts of different categories but that navigating between these perspectives lets you look at problems from all sides or a hippie might say i like that it's 00:37:53 all about relationship and connection or irrelevant i don't know what that means maybe a practical person might say that i like that it's that we can actually use it to organize and learn from big data in 00:38:06 today's world or to manage complexity of software projects that are that are very large and changing all the time i like that you can think about ai and other complex systems with this stuff i think it's relevant and 00:38:19 practical for right now so that's that's my uh tutorial or that's the the part i'm going to record and now i'm going to open it up for questions

      David Spivak discusses how category theory may appeal to different political ideologies for a variety of reasons.

    1. He outspent Bass by very wide margins, largely using his own money (see below).

      https://laist.com/news/politics/2022-election-california-general-live-results-los-angeles-city-mayor-bass-caruso

      What the hell is Rick Caruso doing spending over $100M!! to defeat Karen Bass? He put in $101,477,500 of his own money along with $3.4M from a group opposing Bass compared to Bass's roughly $18M raise.

      So many better things he could have done with that money, if in fact, people really think that he's got ideas that will actively make the city better.

      Caruso outspent Bass 5 to 1.

      Caruso spent $400 per vote for the 252,476 votes he got (as of 2022-11-09 9:24 AM).

  20. Oct 2022
    1. Forbidden Fruits: The Political Economy of Science, Religion, and GrowthRoland Bénabou, Davide Ticchi, and Andrea VindigniNBER Working Paper No. 21105
    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.

    2. To assume that one side works on behalf of God while the other works in rejection of Divine order is a perversion of the unity that could exist in, at least, recognizing shared spiritual ideals. That spiritual unity cannot exist when we suggest that true Christians either wear red hats and carry “Don’t Tread on Me” flags or do not.

      The Spirit unites us through our shared commitment to Jesus the Messiah as our Lord. When we see political opponents as our divinely sanctioned enemies due to their holding contrary views, we reject the divine word concerning our neighbor and thereby commit the sin of blasphemy.

  21. Sep 2022
    1. In 1990, 15.1 percent of the poor were residingin high- poverty neighborhoods. That figure dropped to 10.3 percent by 2000,rose to 13.6 percent for 2010, and then fell to 11.9 percent for 2015.

      Is there a long term correlation between these rates and political parties? Is there a potential lag time between the two if there is?

    1. Even our ability to detect online manipulation is affected by our political bias, though not symmetrically: Republican users are more likely to mistake bots promoting conservative ideas for humans, whereas Democrats are more likely to mistake conservative human users for bots.
    1. quote "half the US coast" is a fabrication, the person in the video said "half the coast of a large continent, which we may not like due to its aggressive policy" the "US coast" is not mentioned, nor does it contain a "chilling warning to West" Just a strange presentation of military equipment and capabilities to a large group of children.

  22. Aug 2022
    1. Class discussion reflected onthe emphasis on “family values” in recent news coverageof politicians looking for issues near election time.Perhaps you were stimulated by what the pundits had tosay. Or maybe you were offended by the superficiality ofthe “soundbites” – after all, you had just read Odysseustelling Agamemnon in Book Eleven that “empty wordsare evil.”

      What a fantastic juxtaposition!

  23. Jun 2022
    1. It’s the story of millions of American Christians who, after a lifetime spent considering their political affiliations in the context of their faith, are now considering their faith affiliations in the context of their politics.

      an interesting twist to American cultural life

    2. FloodGate’s attendance soared as members of other congregations defected to the small roadside church. By Easter 2021, FloodGate was hosting 1,500 people every weekend.

      What drives the attendance at churches like this? Socializing, friends, family? Is it entertainment, politics, solely the religious part, or a conflagration of all of these? A charismatic minister?

    1. in the book i 00:14:51 tried to stay away from politics mainly because what i found was if you don't understand the concept of collective illusion if your first introduction to it is something very polarizing that issue tends to just be the all the thing you 00:15:04 can think about right so it's like you want your head around the actual concept but what's interesting from the political standpoint is not surprisingly our national politics are driving a lot of these illusions and it's happening on 00:15:17 both sides um but it's it's really leading to both both seeing the other side as very extreme when it's not really true but most importantly and even more damaging 00:15:30 we're seeing within any one political party the misunderstanding of our own party

      Introducing the concept of collective illusion within highly polarized context tends to reduce its conceptual understanding. The political impact of collective illusions is that it is a self-reinforcing feedback loop that drives further entrenchment, misunderstanding of one's own ingroup as well as the outgroup.

  24. May 2022
    1. A global ceasefire could be declared for between 2022 and 2030 to enable all nations to undertake an emergency hyper-response.

      State level government officials would need to undergo some kind of global open Deep Humanity type education to begin to shift their inner worldviews, paradigms and value systems, along with business leaders, as the close ties between the influence of business lobbies on governments has a very powerful controlling influence.

      Of course, this would be easier if there were a concerted global effort to nominate proactive, empathetic ecocivilizationally and social justice minded women to positions of power.

    1. pretty much all the arguments that we would be making too if we've met a bunch of Jesuits fear right of kings and reveal the faith and it's actually it's 00:41:37 the indigenous sort of looking rationally

      Perhaps summarizing Graeber and Wengrow too much here, but..

      The Enlightenment came to us courtesy of discussions with Indigenous Peoples from the Americas.

    1. Frank Wilhot's: "Conservatism consists of exactly one proposition, to wit: There must be in-groups whom the law protects but does not bind, alongside out-groups whom the law binds but does not protect." https://crookedtimber.org/2018/03/21/liberals-against-progressives/
    2. Libertarianism is notionally grounded in the idea of self-determination and personal responsibility, but in practice, powerful libertarians routinely trade off (others') freedom for (their own) tax savings.

      An intriguing thesis.

      Too often we trade away others' freedom(s) for small benefits to ourselves. This pattern has got to stop. The system should be closed in such a manner that the small trade-offs are balanced out across all of society.

      Cory Doctorow also highlights the recent Texas abortion law which targets abortion providers. Rich Republicans who have backed this law will still have the power and flexibility to drive or fly to another state for their abortions when desired. There are no consequences for them because they're not in a closed system. If abortions were illegal everywhere and anyone getting one were to be prosecuted regardless of where they got their abortion, then the system would be more "closed" and without loopholes they could use. As a result, laws like this would never be passed because they would apply equally to those who were making them. Legislators and judges should think more about walking a mile (or a lifetime) in another person's shoes more often.

      For lack of a better term let's use the idea of "political calculus" to describe this. Calculus is the mathematical study of small changes. So a small change to an individual isn't a big thing, but in the aggregate it can have profound and destructive effects on large swaths of the people.

      In large part, this is how institutionalized and structural racism flourishes. We take small bites of powerless individuals which in aggregate causes far more harm.

      This is all closely related to the idea of "privatizing profits and socializing losses".

    1. What did Franklin himself think about abortions? In 1728 during his early years as a printer, he generated controversy over something he would end up doing himself. According to “Benjamin Franklin: An American Life” by Walter Isaacson, he “manufactured” an abortion debate, largely because he wanted to crush a rival, but his own opinions may not have been too strong about it. Franklin wrote a series of anonymous letters for another paper to draw attention away from Samuel Keimer’s paper: The first two pieces were attacks on poor Keimer, who was serializing entries from an encyclopedia. His initial installment included, innocently enough, an entry on abortion. Franklin pounced. Using the pen names “Martha Careful” and “Celia Shortface,” he wrote letters to Bradford’s paper feigning shock and indignation at Keimer’s offense. As Miss Careful threatened, “If he proceeds farther to expose the secrets of our sex in that audacious manner [women would] run the hazard of taking him by the beard in the next place we meet him.” Thus Franklin manufactured the first recorded abortion debate in America, not because he had any strong feelings on the issue, but because he knew it would help sell newspapers.

      Benjamin Franklin manufactured the first recorded abortion debate in America to help sell his newspapers and to crush a rival.

    1. lationship (offset) to Coordinated Universal Time (UTC). (This is distinct from some usage in scheduling applications where a local time and location may be known, but the actual relationship to UTC may be dependent on the unknown or unknowable actions of politicians or administrators. The UTC time corresponding to 17:00 on 23rd March 2005 in New York may depend on administrative decisions about daylight savings time. This specification steers well clear of such considerations.
  25. Apr 2022
    1. Member States

      Perhaps this should be addressed not just to Members States, but, more explicitly to educational stakeholders. In many cases, for example the UK (2022), the "Member State" does not really have the means or the disposition to take seriously any of these recommendations. It is down to institutions and professionals within the territory of the Member State to take the lead, and therefore they are the ones to whom this recommendation should be addressed to.

    1. Prof Peter Hotez MD PhD [@PeterHotez]. (2021, December 15). Many thanks @Finneganporter while i predicted some of this, a part that caught me off guard in the pandemic was the rise of contrarian intellectuals from conservative think tanks or even Harvard Stanford so desperate for relevance they aligned themselves with far right extremists [Tweet]. Twitter. https://twitter.com/PeterHotez/status/1471100070250508288

    1. Amy Maxmen, PhD. (2020, August 26). 🙄The CDC’s only substantial communication with the public in the pandemic is through its MMW Reports. But the irrelevant & erroneous 1st line of this latest report suggests political meddling to me. (The WHO doesn’t declare pandemics. They declare PHEICs, which they did Jan 30) https://t.co/Y1NlHbQIYQ [Tweet]. @amymaxmen. https://twitter.com/amymaxmen/status/1298660729080356864

  26. Mar 2022
    1. Posting a new algorithm, poem, or video on the web makes it a vailable, but unless appropriate recipients notice it, the originator has little chance to influence them.

      An early statement of the problem of distribution which has been widely solved by many social media algorithmic feeds. Sadly pushing ideas to people interested in them (or not) doesn't seem to have improved humanity. Perhaps too much of the problem space with respect to the idea of "influence" has been devoted to marketing and commerce or to fringe misinformation spaces? How might we create more value to the "middle" of the populace while minimizing misinformation and polarization?

    1. This is what free societies converging on an idea looks like.

      Or political pressure being applied to every company (from people, not the government). Suspending business in Russia costs less than the repetitional hit of continuing there.

      Though arguable that's the same as a "free convergence on an idea" -- since such pressure only exists when many people agree on something.

    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.

  27. Feb 2022
    1. We also know that theaverage length of TV soundbites has steadily declined over the lastseveral decades (Fehrmann, 2011). During the U.S. presidentialelection in 1968, the average soundbite — that is, any footage of acandidate speaking uninterrupted — was still a little more than 40seconds, but that had fallen to less than 10 seconds at the end of the80s (Hallin 1994) and 7.8 seconds in 2000 (Lichter, 2001). The lastelection has certainly not reversed the trend. Whether that meansthat the media adjust to our decreasing attention span or is causingthe trend is not easy to say.[17]

      Ryfe and Kemmelmeier not only show that this development goes much further back into the past and first appeared in newspapers (the quotes of politicians got almost halved between 1892 and 1968), but also posed the question if this can maybe also be seen as a form of increased professionalism of the media as they do not just let politicians talk as they wish (Ryfe and Kemmelmeier 2011). Craig Fehrman also pointed out the irony in the reception of this rather nuanced study – it was itself reduced to a soundbite in the media (Fehrman 2011).


      Soundbites have decreased in length over time.

      What effects are driving this? What are the knock on effects? What effect does this have on the ability for doubletalk to take hold? Is it easier for doubletalk and additional meanings to attach to soundbites when they're shorter? (It would seem so.) At what point to they hit a minimum?

      What is the effect of potential memes which hold additional meaning of driving this soundbite culture?

      Example: "Lock her up" as a soundbite with memetic meaning from the Trump 2016 campaign in reference to Hilary Clinton.

    2. Our brains work not that differently in terms of interconnectedness.Psychologists used to think of the brain as a limited storage spacethat slowly fills up and makes it more difficult to learn late in life. Butwe know today that the more connected information we alreadyhave, the easier it is to learn, because new information can dock tothat information. Yes, our ability to learn isolated facts is indeedlimited and probably decreases with age. But if facts are not kept

      isolated nor learned in an isolated fashion, but hang together in a network of ideas, or “latticework of mental models” (Munger, 1994), it becomes easier to make sense of new information. That makes it easier not only to learn and remember, but also to retrieve the information later in the moment and context it is needed.

      Our natural memories are limited in their capacities, but it becomes easier to remember facts when they've got an association to other things in our minds. The building of mental models makes it easier to acquire and remember new information. The down side is that it may make it harder to dramatically change those mental models and re-associate knowledge to them without additional amounts of work.


      The mental work involved here may be one of the reasons for some cognitive biases and the reason why people are more apt to stay stuck in their mental ruts. An example would be not changing their minds about ideas of racism and inequality, both because it's easier to keep their pre-existing ideas and biases than to do the necessary work to change their minds. Similar things come into play with respect to tribalism and political party identifications as well.

      This could be an interesting area to explore more deeply. Connect with George Lakoff.

    1. This article is for those who want to keep traveling despite restrictions due to covid. Basically giving tips on how to navigate the multiple governmental restrictions and policies including links to airline or country websites for choosing destinations. Because of this trend in travel advice in covid times, we may see attitudes towards travel shift to travel knowing the risks involved (quarantine, masks requirements, etc.) and hence see tourism rise again. Last minute covid holiday packages. What if the trend for remaining home also stayed the same for next five years and the adventure seekers become the avatars for the folks who want to stay at home.

      The crisis is changing the way how people will enjoy their international holiday, with an extra concern on testing and quarantine expenses and risk taking. That may have an impact on the tourism market, asking the airline companies to provide flexible policies /products and may witness the booming of travel insurance market.

  28. Jan 2022
    1. In an era where funding for good projects can be hard to come by, or is even endangered, we must affirmatively make the case for the study of how to improve human well-being. This possibility is a fundamental reason why the American public is interested in supporting the pursuit of knowledge, and rightly so.

      Keep in mind that they're asking this in an anti-science and post-fact political climate. Is progress studies the real end goal, or do we need political solutions? Better communication solutions? Better education solutions? Instead? First?

      Are they addressing the correct question/problem here?