What do you think is more valuable: Me telling you what’s going on here — or you working some of it out on your own (and asking questions on anything unclear)? Even if I told you, it wouldn’t be compelling without seeing the story behind it (and how it it all connects to everything you see in our society).
None of the echo chambers above are entirely wrong, but bonding within them makes you think you’re entirely right — on everything! Blind belief would bore the hell out of me — I don’t know how you stand it. And I’ve always thought there’s something wildly out of whack with pursuing values in a manner devoid of virtue. In one form or another, inevitably there are consequences for convictions unguided by conscience. Politicians and pundits are not gods. When you treat them as such — you do a cosmic disservice to them, yourselves, the country, and the world as well.
Look around!
If someone came along and told me a hero of mine has a history of mendacity, I’d set out to make mincemeat of their arguments. But if I found that I couldn’t — I’d realize I’d been wrong all along. I’d be sad but glad that now I see the light.
America has no such notion.
If the people you put on a pedestal are so smart, why do you behave so stupidly? There was a time when people understood how to understand — and didn’t blame the source because the material doesn’t magically unfold for standard scrolling with ease. It was a time when you stopped to think about things before breezing on by clips at the crux of the story — then bitching because you don’t understand what you didn’t stop to think about.
There was time when people saying, “Show Me the Evidence” — would look at it when you did. It was a time when newfangled ways of “argument” wasn’t all the rage — where you furiously fire off some fashionable form of “You’re wrong!” and dish it all day long: Insisting on “affirmation independent of all findings” (borrowing from Peck who borrowed from Buber).
I don’t roll that way.
You’re wrong — and here’s why
That’s the discipline — to have a work ethic in the way you think. Without “here’s why,” you’re just whistlin’ Dixie.
Incredibly, some of the most intelligent minds of the day are unaware of how wishful thinking rules in their reign (and how they instill savagery in those they inspire to fight for the cause). It boggles the mind that people far smarter than me can’t see the counterproductive nature of endlessly beating issues into the ground in entirely transactional tactics.
The solution to this problem is more truth, not less
No, it’s not. You cannot forever beat something into the ground and think it’ll magically make a dent someday. And even if by some miracle it does, wouldn’t you want to know if you could have cut out years or even decades had you been smart about it?
And what does it say to you that such simplistic thinking as “more truth, not less” — is canon within these echo chambers that think they’re part of some revolution in reason (then outright reject it whenever reason doesn’t conform to their formula). Speaking of formulaic folly: Repeatedly rehashing issues is not the mark of problem solving — it’s the mark of a market. All these channels are blunt instruments (including those I agree with).
If you’ve got a better idea on how to turn the tide . . .
I’m all ears — you’re not!
If you think you’re making progress because of ever-increasing attention to your concerns:
I suggest you reconsider . . .
The opening imagery . . .
Has a lot in common with the imagery below (as it’s all an illusion to align yourself with something you believe to be true that is demonstrably false). That is delusional by definition:
- A delusion is a mistaken belief that is held with strong conviction even when presented with superior evidence to the contrary
- Characterized by or holding idiosyncratic beliefs or impressions that are contradicted by reality or rational argument
- Something a person believes and wants to be true, when it is actually not true
Even 20 years ago . . .
It would have been impossible for Trump to be seriously considered, let alone win. If you’re not lookin’ into that, you’re not lookin’. Alas, everyone seems more interested in talking about problems than solving them. In The unconscious is not what you think it is TEDx Talk, Dr. Joel Weinberger proudly proclaimed the following on being right about Trump’s 2016 win:
How did we get it right and everyone else get it wrong?
By miserably failing to ask the right questions years before — you unwittingly created the conditions to “get it right.” And now look where you are — outraged over Roe v. Wade and Trump on the rise once again (oblivious to how you brought it all on yourselves). For the party of intellectualism — that’s pretty f#@king stupid.
A rare response of reasonableness on Twitter (or anywhere, for that matter):
Your documentary was ahead of its time
I may be a nobody, but this nobody was way ahead of everybody. If I came across this and hadn’t done my homework, on the title alone — my first thought would be, “I must be missing something pretty big.”
you have other ideas:
Button your lip and don’t let the shield slip
Take a fresh grip on your bulletproof mask
And if they try to break down your disguise with their questions
You can hide hide hide behind Paranoid Eyes
“And now, even now” . . .
The cat . . . TOTALLY out of the BAG!
And still — you don’t get it . . .
And nowhere is that more crystal clear than on the biggest and most costly lie in modern history. Nobody nails Democrats better than Glenn Greenwald’s gold-standard from a 2008 article on Salon.com:
Here we have a perfect expression of the most self-destructive Democratic disease which they seem unable to cure. More than anything — they fear looking weak. To avoid this, they cave, surrender, capitulate — and stand for nothing.
Case in point:
But how proud you are to plaster the web with quotes so keen on your insight into the readily obvious on our times. Never mind your dumb, dishonest, and delusional ways that helped create them. Right & Left, you all cry and cry to get your way:
Bemoaning the decline of America as if you had nothin’ to do with it.
Wrong!
It was a picture-perfect wedding
We had the whole world at our feet
Everyone thought we were
Heading down a lovers easy street
We’d have a house out in the country
A picket fence, the whole nine yards
They said our love would last forever
It was written in the stars . . .
Wrong!
I should have known it all along
When the future looks too bright
Can’t be anything but right
Wrong!
I was all but devastated
When she told me we were through
In a while the heartache faded
And I found somebody new
I swore that this time would be different
I had it all figured out
I wouldn’t make the same mistakes
I knew what love was all about
Wrong!
I should have known it all along
When the future looks too bright
Can’t be anything but right
Wrong!
Everything was going strong
The sky was always blue
Thought my dreams had all come true
Wrong!
Wrong!
V for Victory and Venom for Values
I don’t understand. I don’t know understand. It’s all so incoherent and confusing with all these things I have to stop and think about.
That’s because you wallow in a world of paint by numbers — where people telling you what you wanna hear every goddamn day: Package it all neatly into nursery-rhyme narratives (turning your mind into mush). Isaac Newton and Einstein were brilliant — partisan hacks and high-minded influencers fueling your fix, are not. And after all that brilliance you broadcast about your beloved geniuses:
Whining about my website and acting like a child is the best ya got?
Apologists make it impossible to discuss even a single screenshot — and you think failing to meet your website style-guide standards is the problem? It’s the same charade it’s all always been — just new branding to believe whatever you want and see yourselves as bastions of virtue for it. “New media” is just newfangled gloss on the Gutter Games of Government.
America’s in perennial pursuit of ideologies: Warfare waged with galactic levels of baggage & bullshit bolstered by . . .
opinions lightly adopted but firmly held . . . forged from a combination of ignorance, dishonesty, and fashion
— Theodore Dalrymple, Life at the Bottom
Life at the Bottom could not be more fitting for the folly of America’s future — defined by proudly refusing to learn from the predictable folly that paved the way in the past. Taking on the entire country by myself is worlds away from what everyone else is doing. In reference to its opening image on Without Passion or Prejudice, I wrote: “Half the country is with me on this — and I just lost the other half. Had I started with the image below — it would be the opposite half.”
When you instantly make up your mind on perception alone: In what parallel universe does that qualify as critical thinking? And it takes some stupefying feats of psychological gymnastics — for people who never learn anything to act like they know everything. What part of “This Does Not = That” do you not understand? And there is no measure for how preposterous it is that people who can’t even get the self-evident straight:
Have the bottomless gall to belittle me on making correlations in 3 dimensions while you wallow in one.
But you know best
The March of Folly of Mentality Always Does
Like many alternatives, however, it was psychologically impossible. Character is fate, as the Greeks believed. Germans were schooled in winning objectives sby force, unschooled in adjustment. They could not bring themselves to forgo aggrandizement even at the risk of defeat.
— Barbara Tuchman
Unschooled in Adjustment
It ain’t what you don’t know that gets you into trouble. It’s what you know for sure that just ain’t so.
— Attributed to Mark Twain
In this fantasyland for fragile egos: You can win an argument without even knowing what the issue is about. What you do in denying the undeniable daily would be unthinkable for me to do ever.
Any questions?
Fuggedaboutit for those who follow The Yellow Brick Road: Path of America’s Predictably Counterproductive Pursuits
True folly, Tuchman found, is generally recognized as counterproductive in its own time, and not merely in hindsight. In Tuchman’s template, true folly only ensues when a clear alternative path of action was available and ruled out.
Across all the echo chambers of V for Victory and Venom for Values
Are people taking endless delight in flooding the internet with ceaseless claims about their immaculate critical thinking skills. But the second they’re challenged on anything that is even perceived as threatening their interests:
don’t do any of this . . .
What does it say to you that across communities where claims of critical thinking are everywhere — I haven’t found it anywhere? I’ve got an idea and it’s got teeth. All ya gotta do — is do what you say you do. And my idea is a framework for debate that boxes you in to do exactly that. You won’t like it — but here’s the deal: Your opposition won’t either.
And who knows, you might learn to love embracing challenge, changing your mind, and the fruits from demanding across-the-board accountability.
This — is not that
This — is Broadcasting Beliefs About That
“Wut”
In my youth, I could not have imagined a world in which even people with PhDs would act like imbeciles in the face of information they don’t instantly understand. That an entire country could take satisfaction in insulting your own intelligence on a daily basis just astounds me.
Adulthood is about spending the time to think before talking . . . Adulthood is about controlling our emotions, learning to take a deep breath and modulating our moments of anger or frustration.
“WUT” reflects a society tuning in to people who perpetuate problems under the pretense of seeking to solve them. Some are sincere (or at least started out that way). But they all lose their way in the adulation and rewards from feeding the frenzy. I coined Star Wars Syndrome to capture the plague of allowing nostalgia to create the illusion that a movie is far better than it actually is. In and of itself, wildly exaggerating the quality of movies is harmless.
But when it becomes habit in how you see everything — either gushing with over-the-top praise or seething with over-the-top scorn:
That’s a plague!
You think I just come up this stuff out of thin air?
What am I to do with a country that requires the self-evident to be explained? Even that wouldn’t be so bad if you were actually listening. What am I to do with people who can’t even comprehend what actual objective scrutiny looks like (not your empty claims reinforced by surrounding yourself with Like-minded people who think in equally empty ways).
In these echo chambers of self-congratulations (for accomplishing absolutely nothing and making matters worse to boot): Regurgitating garbage gets people to Like you — celebrating “victory” by clicking “bravo” to bad manners and bunk. A world where the rush is everything:
- The rush to respond
- The rush you get from responding
- The rush to roll out the next issue of concern
- Repeat and never reflect
It’s not my writing, my graphics, or my doc: The flaw is within you and it always has been. You have no original ideas and not a molecule of courtesy or curiosity for those who do. I have to spoon-feed you like a child while you spit it out and cry about being hungry. You have no imagination and are utterly devoid of any virtue that would allow for actual conversation to take place.
Not that lickety-split, self-satisfied crap you flood the internet with daily.
Imagine America as an engine and you come along with a cross-section of it to explain why it’s not working. Since your audience shares your concerns, you’d think they’d be interested in understanding the internals of the problem. But they spend all their time talking about parts made by people they don’t like — never considering the defects in their own parts.
And even though you’ve got a rock-solid idea for how to fix the engine (or at least make it run on reason): They’d rather spend the rest of their lives complaining about problems than take responsibility for their part in creating them. The image above is for my 15-part series on factions acting as force fields of fallacy for the Left & Right: Shielding you from the whole truth while you’re pursuing part of it believing you’re after all of it.
Then again . . .
Do people you put on a pedestal really wanna solve problems anyway? Do you?
Man is at least as much a problem-creating as a problem-solving animal. Better a crisis than the permanent boredom of meaninglessness.
— Theodore Dalrymple, Life at the Bottom
It’s pure fantasy to think that you can ignore key dimensions of a problem and magically solve it. The problems that plague America are interrelated, and anything short of addressing that is going nowhere. But everyone’s wrapped up in their wheelhouse — operating under umbrellas of interests that don’t account for complexities outside of them.
You know what they say: Fail, fail again, fail better, succeed
They say other things too – like “work smarter, not harder.” By all means, keep trying — but examine the efficacy of your efforts and adjust accordingly. Just picking the “root cause” that works for you doesn’t cut it.
You’ve gotta look at interconnected causes across-the-board.
The trite & trendy thinking that created this clusterf#@k of a country in the first place:
Until the rise of podcasts, twitter, and the various forms of independent media / journalism, people weren’t really aware how legacy media was influencing their thinking. I think people are finally waking up and may surprise you here, especially if more talk about it.
New formats for funneling information that caters to your cravings is not what I’d call enlightened. And those who couldn’t spot clearly dishonest actors before — think they’re wide awake now? The Twitter bio behind that quote begins with “Groupthink averse.”
It would never occur to him that everything in that Tweet is Groupthink 101.
The Substack Sector
(revised version renamed to title below)
That you don’t understand how you’re all being played is bad enough, but that you make it nearly impossible to explain it to you reflects how new media has hardened you even more than legacy did. None of these boxes of beliefs are entirely wrong: But bonding within them makes you think you’re entirely right:
On everything!
Echo chambers across social media worship channel hosts as “National Treasures” — treating them like they’re some of the greatest minds to ever live. At the helm of these cesspools of certitude — are people who peddle repeatedly rehashed insight their followers praise like they split the atom. To be sure, some of it is insightful. But these “geniuses” are so wise in their ways: They’re oblivious to how they’re feeding the very problems they’re ostensibly trying to solve.
Long before brain imaging to understand human behavior, we already had all the tools we needed for a hopeful humanity. We didn’t take advantage of the gifts we were given, and what a shocker — we don’t make good use of those fancy new insights either.
The human understanding when it has once adopted an opinion … draws all things else to support and agree with it. And though there be a greater number and weight of instances to be found on the other side, yet these it either neglects or despises … in order that by this great and pernicious predetermination the authority of its former conclusions may remain inviolate.
— Francis Bacon, Novum Organum Scientiarum, 1650
Just where do I go for in-depth discussion on original ideas with people who would never insult their intelligence with “WUT” in response to anything? When you’re all part of the same shitshow of America going out of its mind — is there anyone out there who can walk and chew gum at the same time? Because it appears there’s not a person left who can process anything that doesn’t come in the form of fodder in a trough.
Just What am I to do . . .
When This is the World of Your Making:
And this is the world of mine:
“I am a maker” . . .
Just because you slap a banner on a building doesn’t make it true. “We are Purdue. Makers, All.” No, you’re not — but I am (as these words reflect a lifelong record in what do, not simply what I say):
I think work should be about making things work. Better, Faster, Smaller, Smarter. So I build bridges between what’s known and what’s not. I tinker. I toil. I write poetically in an abundance of languages (including code). I hack. I dissect. I have an insatiable desire to un-complicate the complicated. I am easily inspired.
I believe that just because it hasn’t been thought of doesn’t mean it won’t be. Potential is my thrill ride. Imagination is my most-used tool. I am a maker. And I am what moves the world forward.
Funny they mention that about that bridge. Stick around — you’ll see!
Surely a discussion on the importance of expertise coupled with a rock-solid idea on how to address this problem in a way that would actually make an impact that matters: Would be welcomed by a culture craving a return to a time when expertise was respected and considered with seriousness.
Of course not! What was I thinking?
Building on his enormously successful first edition. Tom Nichols confirms his thesis and proves that the assault on expertise has only intensified.
So, outside of selling books and building a following, you didn’t succeed — at all. But who cares about the efficacy of your efforts when failure is a pretty profitable enterprise these days. When a deservingly popular book didn’t make a dent in 7 years (and everything’s gotten worse to boot): I fail to understand the excitement for an expanded edition doesn’t have a snowball’s chance in hell of making a dent either.
Such questions do not compute with this crowd or any other:
Congratulating yourselves for ordering a book and broadcasting it for Likes: It’s all so goddamn pointless (as there’s no purpose beyond pretending you’re part of some glorious pursuit of the truth and what’s right). Never mind you all refuse to listen to any expertise that challenges you — which flies in the face of the whole f#@king point!
That cat is so fitting for the folly of our times:
“And now, even now” . . .
The cat . . . TOTALLY out of the BAG!
Your followers are so passionate about expertise — that they blow off the person who was years ahead of you in explaining this problem (and in far more sophisticated ways):
Not to mention offering real-world ideas on what to do about it.
The same person telling you that new edition has exactly zero chance of doing of any better than the first (in actually accomplishing anything). And when that prediction comes true: All your audience will care about is congratulating you when you come along advertising the 3rd edition:
Waiting in line for the signed copy they crave!
Unbelievable!
To understand how far America has fallen in its folly: You’d have to see the essence of the entire story and how it all connects. You’d have to follow the facts for real. And who how has time for that when so busy faking your love for them among friends.
on that note:
Half the country took the word of professional know-it-alls over nuclear scientists. And when your camp came up empty on WMD — you just bought more bullshit from the same people who sold you the first batch:
Shrewd!
Preach responsibility and take none
You can’t seem to comprehend that I don’t care what damage the truth inflicts upon politicians of any brand. I have this crazy idea that across-the-board accountability is always in the best interests of the nation.
As for my frustration — I have this thing about people who regurgitate nonsense in the face of overwhelming evidence that counters their baseless beliefs.
— Richard W. Memmer: Act II
It’s bad enough I gotta deal with that.
But I gotta deal with the other side’s bullshit beliefs as well. I call a spade a spade, period. I don’t who it’s about or what it’s about — and whether it’s in my interests or not is irrelevant.
Marching to Black Lives Matter with the first black president sitting in the White House — was that a smart move? The answer should be abundantly clear and yet the question is not even considered. I’ve been blocked on Twitter for just politely suggesting that BLM is a counterproductive cause.
Instead of considering how you could fight for justice more intelligently — you act like I’m saying you shouldn’t fight for it at all. And whatever I think of the Right:
They’re right on the money about the impossibly stupid pampering of woke:
I don’t see what the problem is
— Typical Tweeter tapping earth-shattering insight
You don’t see — a lot!
Your track record is not what I would call astute — and the Right doesn’t have anything to write home about either.
All this over-the-top engineering of sensitivity has gotten totally out of hand. Excessive sensitivity breeds hypersensitivity. When you water things down to be politically correct, our nation’s ability to discern decreases right along with it: Creating a culture that’s increasingly more easily offended and radically irrational — across the board.
It just never ends . . .
In our culture of instant offense, we ban before we think. However, banning isn’t a sign of strength or resolve, but an admission of defeat, of showing how little we have engaged with whatever the bigger issue that belies the ban.
Instead of asking or addressing the roots of violent racism in the South in 2015 — far too difficult, far too intimidating — we focus on symbols. If we take a flag down, if we remove a TV show from the schedules, it shows we are doing something.
It shows our hearts are in the right places.
Renaming teams and pancake products, kneeling, knocking down monuments, wiping Indians off boxes of butter, banning Dukes of Hazzard, and Microsoft’s Inclusiveness Checker to program you proper:
Enough already!
These are not serious-minded measures for problem solving.
Elaine’s exasperation x 10 =
How impossibly stupid it is that they banned The Dukes of Hazzard
But the high five is just so stupid!
From as far back as I can remember, I loved the Land O’Lakes Indian. And then they butchered the spirit of it for the sake of sensitivity. If such measures had any chance of actually making an impact that matters — I’d gladly sacrifice my precious brand of beauty.
For those who would try to educate me by saying I don’t understand the feelings involved in empty overtures that accomplish absolutely nothing:
No, you don’t understand . . .
And don’t even get me started on how homelessness is a problem perpetuated by those most sensitive in their approach to solving it. If you wanna start solving problems instead of perpetuating them, it’s gotta get ugly.
Or as ol’ Bill perfectly put it:
Was that smart move?
Instantly firing back with boilerplate beliefs is not an indicator of understanding the premise of that question (or even caring to). Such inquiry requires reflection and the willingness to examine the efficacy of your efforts: And what role you play in harming your own interests by the manner in which you pursue them.
And on that note
The Right wants the Left and the black community to get its act together on matters deeply woven into the fabric of America’s long history of brutality and disgrace: Slavery, Jim Crow, lynchings, murder, decades of civil rights violations, questionable shootings, and so on.
While the Right won’t even look at the material properties of a tube. What’s wrong with that picture — and this one?
Hmm, so the dimensions exactly match the tubes used in Iraq’s history of manufacturing the Nasser-81 mm artillery rocket (a reverse-engineered version of the Italian Medusa)
There was a time when intrigue would have been found in the face of the imagery below. Incredibly, in a sea of sameness — the new norm is you know “WUT” is the way of the world now. If I came across this and hadn’t done my homework, on the title alone — my first thought would be:
I must be missing something pretty big!
you have other ideas:
Button your lip and don’t let the shield slip
Take a fresh grip on your bulletproof mask
And if they try to break down your disguise with their questions
You can hide hide hide behind Paranoid Eyes
I point you to a 7-part, 2 hours and 40 minutes doc — that distills a story that demanded a massive amount of effort, thought, research, and writing: And you tap a Tweet with a talking point or two — thinking you can inform me. Almost every post points to an identifiable disconnect — enough to know that something’s not right with people you put on a pedestal. But you’re not looking to learn, you’re looking to respond.
And entire industries are engineering that need.
We get rewarded by hearts, likes, thumbs-up — and we conflate that with value, and we conflate it with truth.
“I think we have created tools that are ripping apart the social fabric of how society works,” . . . Palihapitiya’s criticisms were aimed not only at Facebook, but the wider online ecosystem.
I offered you overwhelming and irrefutable evidence that exhaustively exposes the biggest and most costly lie in modern history — taking both parties to task for it (on that issue and then some): You refused to even glance at the doc while deriding my efforts with pleasure.
What is Truth
That the reaction is not to think it through, not to question, not to assemble facts, not to make arguments — but instead to wave banners and spout slogans such that you could hardly distinguish what they were doing from a manifesto that would come out of [does it matter?]
— Glenn Loury, Tucker Carlson Today
When the context suits you, such words are solid gold. What you do when it doesn’t — determines the worth of your word.
Ripping on woke is all the rage . . .
And outrage industries of dish it but can’t take it — would talk about race and responsibility till the end of time. But heaven forbid we have a single conversation about war and responsibility.
And this [$#%^^>)* _ #!*&%-@+$]
Lied about a war and you whine about a website:
As a distinguished scholar once said: “The first thing a man will do for his ideals is lie.”
— Thomas Sowell
The man’s a magician:
As I’m practically spit on by people promoting principles I followed to find he didn’t. Simply by virtue of writing those words, he couldn’t possibly do the same in service of his own ideals?
And lo and behold — sleight of hand is how they pulled it off.
Thomas Sowell is a magician who makes magical thinking for a living: A snake oil salesman who carved out a career craftily complaining about snake oil salesmen. It’s painfully obvious what this guy’s up to. He’s engineering an illusion — and you bought it.
You assume I’m out “DESTROY” him — and right on cue, you play the hate-card.
Never mind that assuming bad motives is in gross breach the standards Sowell espouses. But why bother abiding the principles you preach when he doesn’t either?
I couldn’t agree more
But there’s another reason why so many people misunderstand so many issues.
Professional know-it-alls like you pull stunts like this while peddling lines like that as cover: To whitewash your record of patently obvious hypocrisy and lies. What would you call someone who shoots their mouth off without addressing the evidence — but banks on their fabricated reputation to create the impression that they did?
This man has a patently obvious history of hypocrisy & lies — and yet he’s worshipped as some kind of saint-like Sherlock Holmes.
You walked into the party
Like you were walking onto a yacht
Your hat strategically dipped below one eye
Your scarf it was apricot
You had one eye in the mirror
As you watched yourself gavotte . . .
And all the girls dreamed that they’d be your partner
They’d be your partner and . . .
Well I hear you went up to Saratoga
And your horse naturally won
Then you flew your Lear jet up to Nova Scotia
To see the total eclipse of the sun
Well you’re where you should be all the time . . .
To be fair . . .
Which is what this is ultimately all about: That last line is not true 100% true (but I’m guessing 98’s a safe bet). How come Sowell’s not a “National Treasure” for his spot-on assessment of Trump in 2016? If you wanted to honor him as a Maverick in this instance — here was your chance to deliver, as he did. And right on cue, his crowd can’t wait to sling some link about Sowell changing his mind on Trump. I’m sure ulterior motives had nothin’ to do with it: Just as you let motive make a Maverick out of someone who isn’t one . . .
Then ignore his sound words when he was.
Just for kicks — do you ever want to think about what someone’s saying before firing back with what you wanna say?
Well-crafted common sense
Advertised and delivered:
I don’t understand. I don’t know understand.
I’m not surprised!
In this shithole you call home:
I’ve never seen so much ass-kissing in all my life.
It’s just pathetic!
It’s also — an opportunity!
Yeah, yeah, yeah — you don’t understand, I got it!
Consequences matter or should matter more than some attractive or fashionable theory.
— Thomas Sowell
I couldn’t agree more
Except there were no consequences on the fiasco for the ages driven by this manifesto: The outcome of which fashioned a culture of no consequences.
At what point does it dawn on you and your beloved genius — that blind loyalty to that cause would be colossally counterproductive to your others? I’m not brilliant and I figured that out all by myself. The Right treating Bush like the Second Coming of Christ — set the stage for the rise of the Rock Star they spent the next 8 years railing against.
That doesn’t strike me as sound strategy. Dumb, dishonest, and delusional wars don’t either.
Nice work!
Sowell’s hailed as a folk hero for calling out problems he helped create (and takes no responsibility for any of it).
A lot of that goin’ around
So you found one small crack in Sowell’s character where he defended Iraq having WMD, does that hurt his credibility?
This man muddied the waters of debate to serve himself: On a little matter of war in the Middle East in the aftermath of 9/11. On top of unconscionably ignoring irrefutable evidence of world-altering consequence, he has a habit of toeing the party line. Not only did Sowell flagrantly fail to follow the facts on all-things Iraq — he brazenly ignored the debauchery in his own party to politely pounce on the other.
In light of his history being wildly out of sync with his sanctimonious claims: That “one small crack” is a wide-open window into his character and credibility.
I wouldn’t care if Sowell cured cancer:
You don’t get a pass for basking in baseless beliefs that cripple the country — and have the bottomless nerve to preach responsibility & accountability to boot. That is a cancer of its own. The poison he pumped into the atmosphere helped destroy the internal organs of America. So we have very different standards as to what qualifies as a “National Treasure.”
At every turn . . .
The faithful tap dance around reality — oily evading anything that requires them to hold Sowell to his own standards.
Hard to Imagine:
That I have to explain that quote to people who seemingly live to flood the internet with his words.
He and his flock incessantly complain about the media — and they don’t make policy. But the second I scrutinize Sowell — suddenly you have new standards.
180 — how fitting
First time I ever heard of John McWhorter was in a 2017 interview. In talking about take a wild guess, he said:
He has a rather narcotic joy in dismissal and belittlement
A lot of that goin’ around
To see the character of the government and the country so sported with, exposed to so indelible a blot, puts my heart to the torture. . . . Or what is it that thus torments me at a circumstance so calmly viewed by almost everybody else? Am I a fool, a romantic Quixote, or is there a constitutional defect in the American mind?
Were it not for yourself and a few others, I . . . would say . . . there is something in our climate which belittles every animal, human or brute. . . . I disclose to you without reserve the state of my mind. It is discontented and gloomy in the extreme.
I consider the cause of good government as having been put to an issue and the verdict against it.
I was fan of Loury & McWhorter, but I changed my mind when seeing that the savagery in defense of Sowell was even worse than what I’ve witnessed for decades. And the likes of Loury & McWhorter are feeding that frenzy:
Producing a toxicity of venom I hope they’d find sickening if they realized what they were doing.
Maybe when you’re done talking race, woke, and CRT for the ten-thousandth time — we can consider approaching problems in a more multi-dimensional manner?
Just a thought!
You introduce statements and arguments of people who aren’t Thomas Sowell
As this story is also
About the behavior of the echo chamber around Sowell — it’s kinda necessary to include other people to properly illustrate the problem. And I wouldn’t mind explaining everything — if you thought about anything.
Shallow thinkers do not think beyond the immediate and the observable. They usually take information at face value and only look at immediate consequences. They are not capable of looking at all sides of an issue or think deeply about the issue before making decisions or drawing conclusions . . .
They also believe that their opinion is based on deep thinking because they genuinely believe that their opinion is based on truth and facts. Whereas, deep thinkers look at the whole sequence of events and the consequences.
When we dig deeper, we understand better. We can compare different outcomes, examine, tear apart, and make cognizant judgments that are derived from different mental models.
Left and Right, I’ve yet to find a single person who digs beyond the depth of their immediate domain of interest. In our entirely transactional times, America endlessly rehashes topics of today — never once considering the totality of events that created them (or even having a notion of the need to).
With the issues I address — you might as well be saying the Civil War wasn’t germane to the assassination of Lincoln.
This nation has no remorse
Not for relatively recent wrongdoing, anyway. It appears I’m more horrified by my typos than America is with dumb, dishonest, and delusional wars. And truth be told, those who landed on the right side on Iraq: Most of ‘em don’t know jack either. Just because you were right doesn’t necessarily mean you arrived at it intelligently — and being reinforced by casual conviction makes for increasingly sloppy & stupid thinking.
[W]e must accept responsibility for a problem before we can solve it
— M. Scott Peck, The Road Less Traveled
In a nation that incessantly blames and complains (seemingly for sport) — no one’s taking responsibility for anything. The ever-rising ocean of partisan pettiness is gluttony under the guise of concern. What would you call untold millions marching to a Twitter-rage parade on WMD — dishing on the deaths of Rumsfeld and Powell (and whatever anniversary marks the moment):
But too lazy to get off your ass to see what we can do about it. Of course, that would require holding your own accountable as well:
So there’s that
Happy 20th Anniversary!
Seize the day to be jacked up on fuel to fire off your fury and excuses in a nation that never learns: But loves to light it up in lip service to virtues.
Ever-so bold behind force fields of fallacy that butcher those “beliefs.“
About that bridge
How do we make people realize they’ve been lied to? You have to knock down one small pillar that’s easier to reach.
The people who Tweeted those lines I combined from a conversation I came across — had no idea that they perfectly captured the principle of my Clear the Clutter plan.
I’ve got the perfect pillar:
As Exposing Sowell is My Bridge to Expose It All
Tuchman alighted on a root cause of folly that she called “wooden-headedness” — defined in part as “assessing a situation in terms of preconceived fixed notions while ignoring or rejecting contrary information.”
She also saw wooden-headedness as a certain proclivity for “acting according to wish while not allowing oneself to be deflected by facts.”
A lot of that goin’ around too
A Conflict of Visions . . .
And then some!
Following Facts Where They Lead
“Said so and so”? . . . that’s one helluva trip you took there, Mr. Sowell.
Stirring Defense!
To take a story this complex and convoluted and boil its essence down to a few minutes in Trillion Dollar Tube was no small feat:
Imagine what I did with 160
“There is no skimming over the surface of a subject with [Hamilton]. He must sink to the bottom to see what foundation it rests on.”
— Major William Pierce (Ron Chernow, Alexander Hamilton)
Wouldn’t it be absurd to share that quote if my clip contained nothing but trite talking points? Some circles are not burdened by squaring their walk with their talk. They seem to think that advertising virtue equates to embodying it.
Case in point
People who talk glibly about “intelligence failure” act as if intelligence agencies that are doing their job right would know everything.
— Thomas Sowell
D.O.E’s standard is to spin a tube at 20% above 90,000 RPM before failure — so 48,000 short is a pretty loose definition of “rough indication.”
And since the entire point of testing should be to replicate the conditions of centrifuges, one would think that the full-blown testing would be performed before the N.I.E. was completed.
— Richard W. Memmer: Act II
Between Sowell’s words and mine
Which ones strike you as glib?
And these are on the mild end of the savagery I’ve seen.
You couldn’t carry Sowell’s jockstrap!
Seriously? Get a life. It doesn’t matter what you say, he’s better than you basically in everything.
You deserved to be treated that way! You’re a moron and pathetic character assassin
Holy shit…. a video of a circle jerks with a nut in the center talking about RPMS. Yet somehow Thomas Sowell is a liar.
How do you reconcile that with this?
I’m not just taking Thomas Sowell to task because he’s got it comin’ — I need this guy for what I have in mind to right this ship. The ultimate irony is that blind loyalty limits him — while my criticism could elevate him to heights that hero-worship ensures he’ll never go.
So, you’re saying that your plan will elevate Sowell to worldwide recognition — by holding him accountable? That if he comes clean — he could be the catalyst to turn the tide?
That’s exactly what I’m saying
It won’t matter that he blew it on WMD or why — all that matters is having the guts to say: “I was wrong and I’m trying to make it right.” In a culture consumed with feeling right, wouldn’t it be refreshing to talk about the immeasurable value in the willingness to be wrong?
Don’t just tell people how to behave: Lead by example — especially when it comes at a cost! Compelling him to admit where he’s wrong will work wonders for where he’s right.
There are far worse culprits on all-things Iraq, but I’ve been down that road for decades. Discovering Sowell and the underworld of absurdity that shields him — makes him ideal to put these lies in their place once and for all: And change the dynamic of debate to boot. Elevating him is not my aim, but I can live with it to stem the systematic self-delusion that’s taken this nation totally off the rails:
Left & Right!
My doc was designed as a tool for honest debate. Now? It’s intended for a larger framework to clear the clutter that’s crippled this country. My plan calls for fiercely independent thinkers (to be fully realized), but right now — one will do.
One voice began to echo through the night. One voice raised in song. The song was terribly out of tune — but sung with great enthusiasm.
One voice became two — and two became three.
— Admiral McRaven
Various versions of this video have racked up over 70 million views. Since my site was named after the turning point in his SEAL-training story, obviously I’m a fan. What I’m not a fan of is celebrating beliefs then abandoning them the instant they become inconvenient:
Particularly when the whole point is about rising to the occasion.
Back then it was about going up against institutions and all of America. Now? It’s about getting to one man. A professional know-it-all who fabricated a fantasyland of “following the facts where they lead.”
And that’s a Fact:
truth verifiable from experience or observation
Of course, you’re welcome to try to prove me wrong on that claim by simply following the facts where they lead. And since I put it all on a silver platter for you, you’ve got it pretty easy. But you’ve got a big problem on your hands in such discoveries:
What hard evidence do you have?
— Thomas Sowell
Hard enough to drop the hammer on you a hundred times over.
Consider yourself lucky that concrete evidence of mathematical certainty doesn’t qualify with your flock when it comes to protecting you and their shortsighted interests. Nor does any notion of responsibility and accountability.
Those things only apply to people you don’t like!
The cult-like following of Thomas Sowell is unlike anything I’ve ever seen. As I’ve been in the trenches battling hermetically sealed minds for decades, that’s saying something. His disciples see him as some kind of saint-like Sherlock Holmes:
Never mind his history being wildly out of sync with his sanctimonious claims.
On top of flagrantly ignoring evidence as concrete as it gets, he has a habit of toeing the party line: All of which flies in the face of the principles upon which he’s put on a pedestal. For anyone who challenges that — they share their values with venom.
Wait till you hear the whole thing so you can . . . understand this now . . .
This is just a summary on the essence of the idea:
Or — we can stick to tradition:
Wooden-headedness, said Tuchman, was finally — “the refusal to benefit from experience.”
— Russ Hoyle, Going to War
The Refusal to Benefit from Experience
[D]eep thinkers look at the whole sequence of events and the consequences . . .
Path of America’s Predictably Counterproductive Pursuits
The following quote captures far more than the source of it comprehends. It would never dawn on him that he helped create the ugliness he so beautifully articulated:
The thing that is most disturbing to me, in a sea of disturbing things — is that there is no opportunity in all of humanity, to observe the world we live in, and to see all the scope of life in the world, like being President of the United States. You sit there, and for 4 years, or for 8 years — the crème de la crème of society is presented to you.
“Here’s the bravest man and woman in the military. Here’s the smart scientists. Here’s the most dedicated children in their learning.”
You get to see the ugliest . . . what are terrorists doing in torture camps. You see the world from a vista that only a man, or one day a woman, can have that outlook. And I thought to myself: “Surely, when he won . . . he would change as a result of that.”
Every day, you’re having meetings and talking to serious people. And then you come into the Oval Office to “Here’s the winners of the Spelling Bee of San Diego.” . . . And you meet these people, and life just comes washing over you. Your heart and your mind open up. What a learning experience — how much you learn about the world.
And I thought, “It’s gonna change him.” . . .
He didn’t change one f#%@g gram!
That says a helluva lot more about America than it does about Trump. Who said it? Does it matter? To defenders of the indefensible — oh yeah! Because the source is what you’d seize on to deflect & deny the obvious: Then go right back to bitching about the opposition doing the same.
I’m not saying you’re necessarily wrong:
I’m saying your staggering hypocrisy is sickening and so is the other side’s.
Lara walked along the tracks following a path worn by pilgrims and then turned into the fields. Here she stopped and, closing her eyes, took a deep breath of the flower-scented air of the broad expanse around her. It was dearer to her than her kin, better than a lover, wiser than a book. For a moment she rediscovered the purpose of her life.
She was here on earth to grasp the meaning of its wild enchantment and to call each thing by its right name, or, if this were not within her power, to give birth out of love for life to successors who would do it in her place.
― Doctor Zhivago (referenced in Into the Wild)
Remember what it was like to be uplifted by the genuine spirit of America? Maybe it wasn’t as real as I imagined it to be, but that authenticity is worlds away from where we are now.
Thank you for reading!
When you open your eyes to what’s underneath — it intrinsically trains your mind to see with increasing clarity.
One Voice Became Two 