There are multiple issues underscoring the dilemma Americans face. It seems that the vast majority of citizens are either apathetic or feel powerless that they can effect change and so remain quiet. Other citizens who have bought into the MAGA belief system are a hodge-podge of different pathologies. I emphasize this is opinion, my opinion, based on years of learning from others through thousands of conversations within the context of life vs death decisions.
Most Americans are not analytical. Most Americans do not read literature of any kind. Most Americans have deficits in their attention span that cause anxiety if there is an in-depth conversation or if an honest confrontation occurs. Most Americans feel great unease in seeing a POTUS with cognitive impairment despite (a) their problems with cognition, and (b) the choice of a malignant personality that never left the childhood stage of "me-me." I provide some examples below.
At a conference on prostate cancer with an audience of patients and their significant others, I discussed the importance of a "second opinion." I set the groundwork by posing, "what do you call the medical student that graduates first in his class?" "Doctor." "And what do you call the med student who graduates last in his class?" Again, "Doctor." And with that said, related to the evaluation of a man with prostate cancer (like Biden), the Gleason Score is an important determinant. Still, most pathologists are general pathologists and not focused on prostate cancer. Given this, most readings of the Gleason score are either underscored or overscored. You need to have a second opinion on issues of great importance. One gent stood up in the audience and said, "My doctor drives a Mercedes. If he can afford such a car he must be a good doctor, and I don't need a second opinion."
This very much conveys the kind of responses I have received from pro-Trumpers. There is no deep thinking. Conclusions are based on nonsensical thinking or Fox Media misinformation.
As a Nation, most Americans are at the analysis stage of trying to explain what Trump and his sycophants are doing. And the sources being used in such analysis are social media and Fox Media. I won't justify Fox by using the word "News."
My love of medicine is that it is an art involving detective work. When used properly, it changes lives. It necessitates immediate intimacy with a stranger that is both a privilege and an opportunity to feel that one has left the world in a better place. So much of our life is more understandable as metaphor. I can explain complex medical issues metaphorically, such that an uneducated person can understand them.
But I do not think the American public at-large has been addressed in ways that allow an understanding of the depth of our political calamity. We are seeing the theme of Cool Hand Luke played out. "What we have folks, is a problem in communication." The difference is that in our present situation, it is not a gun shoot-out but the death of a Nation.
Only recently has the mainstream media, such as MSNBC, used the term "fascism" to describe Trump and his Administration. In other words, the Press has only had the insight or perhaps, the testicular fortitude, to make a firm analysis. They should be stating this unequivocally to viewers and pointing out the equivalences of what Trump et al have done and are doing to Stalin, Mussolini, Franco, Hitler, and Putin. Don't confuse the public with "authoritarian" or some other word that does not convey to the masses what a mess we are in. You don't tell the patient, "you have Gaussian cellular growth within the hepatic parenchyma that is obstrucing biliary flow." Instead, you relate the bad news. You have a cancer that has started in your liver. The yellowish color of your skin and your eyes is called "jaundice" because liver cancer has blocked the normal passage of bile, which the liver produces.
The real issue Now, is, what do we do with this dire situation? What are the treatment options?
The public has to be informed that Trump is openly violating the US Constitution and that the Founding Fathers have written that this is an impeachable offense.
The public has to be informed that the hallmarks of fascism involve the loss of the freedoms guaranteed by the Constitution. The freedom of speech, the freedom of the Press, the freedom of assembly, the guarantee of due process are all clearly stated in the Constitution. Read to the uninformed public these Amendments- the First, Fourth, and Fifteenth.
The public has to be told that the GOP members of the House are complicit in Fascism. They are complicit in not acting to uphold the Constitution. They must change their antics or be voted out of office.
And that, dear people, just may no longer be possible. What we have taken for granted, our election process being honest and not rigged, may be gone with the advent of a malignant POTUS and a correspondingly malignant House. Remember Lincoln's words: "A House divided cannot stand."
You are a witness to one of the great tragedies of history. The Destruction of Our Great Experiment. That is what DOGE, Trump, and his followers are all about. See you soon in El Salvador. Adios amigos.
It's really fascinating to hear this all get spun out. From the human side of things (wouldn't that be a worthy perspective!?), it turns out that people stuck in craving certainty and order gravitate to mathematical axioms and symmetries that are really primitive compared with where human experience has gone. These are people who have been denied their normal human emotional self-mastery, raised instead on obedience to artificial norms dictated by someone else. They're not grounded in the experience of natural reality, and are thus confused by it, craving this symmetry that collapses into a fractal reality. But we live in a quantum universe, folks, with simultaneous realities and entanglements, the uncertainty of the big bear around that rock, the hunter who get your prey first, slipping on a stream rock and getting swept over the falls. We have learned to deal with all these things, even to avoid them with our curiosity and self-mastery. I'm really sorry for all the people falling down the logical rabbit holes of libertarian thought -- what a sick and weak world to live in. No wonder they fall prey to irrational and murderous antagonism.
There are multiple issues underscoring the dilemma Americans face. It seems that the vast majority of citizens are either apathetic or feel powerless that they can effect change and so remain quiet. Other citizens who have bought into the MAGA belief system are a hodge-podge of different pathologies. I emphasize this is opinion, my opinion, based on years of learning from others through thousands of conversations within the context of life vs death decisions.
Most Americans are not analytical. Most Americans do not read literature of any kind. Most Americans have deficits in their attention span that cause anxiety if there is an in-depth conversation or if an honest confrontation occurs. Most Americans feel great unease in seeing a POTUS with cognitive impairment despite (a) their problems with cognition, and (b) the choice of a malignant personality that never left the childhood stage of "me-me." I provide some examples below.
At a conference on prostate cancer with an audience of patients and their significant others, I discussed the importance of a "second opinion." I set the groundwork by posing, "what do you call the medical student that graduates first in his class?" "Doctor." "And what do you call the med student who graduates last in his class?" Again, "Doctor." And with that said, related to the evaluation of a man with prostate cancer (like Biden), the Gleason Score is an important determinant. Still, most pathologists are general pathologists and not focused on prostate cancer. Given this, most readings of the Gleason score are either underscored or overscored. You need to have a second opinion on issues of great importance. One gent stood up in the audience and said, "My doctor drives a Mercedes. If he can afford such a car he must be a good doctor, and I don't need a second opinion."
This very much conveys the kind of responses I have received from pro-Trumpers. There is no deep thinking. Conclusions are based on nonsensical thinking or Fox Media misinformation.
As a Nation, most Americans are at the analysis stage of trying to explain what Trump and his sycophants are doing. And the sources being used in such analysis are social media and Fox Media. I won't justify Fox by using the word "News."
My love of medicine is that it is an art involving detective work. When used properly, it changes lives. It necessitates immediate intimacy with a stranger that is both a privilege and an opportunity to feel that one has left the world in a better place. So much of our life is more understandable as metaphor. I can explain complex medical issues metaphorically, such that an uneducated person can understand them.
But I do not think the American public at-large has been addressed in ways that allow an understanding of the depth of our political calamity. We are seeing the theme of Cool Hand Luke played out. "What we have folks, is a problem in communication." The difference is that in our present situation, it is not a gun shoot-out but the death of a Nation.
Only recently has the mainstream media, such as MSNBC, used the term "fascism" to describe Trump and his Administration. In other words, the Press has only had the insight or perhaps, the testicular fortitude, to make a firm analysis. They should be stating this unequivocally to viewers and pointing out the equivalences of what Trump et al have done and are doing to Stalin, Mussolini, Franco, Hitler, and Putin. Don't confuse the public with "authoritarian" or some other word that does not convey to the masses what a mess we are in. You don't tell the patient, "you have Gaussian cellular growth within the hepatic parenchyma that is obstrucing biliary flow." Instead, you relate the bad news. You have a cancer that has started in your liver. The yellowish color of your skin and your eyes is called "jaundice" because liver cancer has blocked the normal passage of bile, which the liver produces.
The real issue Now, is, what do we do with this dire situation? What are the treatment options?
The public has to be informed that Trump is openly violating the US Constitution and that the Founding Fathers have written that this is an impeachable offense.
The public has to be informed that the hallmarks of fascism involve the loss of the freedoms guaranteed by the Constitution. The freedom of speech, the freedom of the Press, the freedom of assembly, the guarantee of due process are all clearly stated in the Constitution. Read to the uninformed public these Amendments- the First, Fourth, and Fifteenth.
The public has to be told that the GOP members of the House are complicit in Fascism. They are complicit in not acting to uphold the Constitution. They must change their antics or be voted out of office.
And that, dear people, just may no longer be possible. What we have taken for granted, our election process being honest and not rigged, may be gone with the advent of a malignant POTUS and a correspondingly malignant House. Remember Lincoln's words: "A House divided cannot stand."
You are a witness to one of the great tragedies of history. The Destruction of Our Great Experiment. That is what DOGE, Trump, and his followers are all about. See you soon in El Salvador. Adios amigos.
Religious fundamentalism seems to be exacerbating this dystopian outcome as well
It's really fascinating to hear this all get spun out. From the human side of things (wouldn't that be a worthy perspective!?), it turns out that people stuck in craving certainty and order gravitate to mathematical axioms and symmetries that are really primitive compared with where human experience has gone. These are people who have been denied their normal human emotional self-mastery, raised instead on obedience to artificial norms dictated by someone else. They're not grounded in the experience of natural reality, and are thus confused by it, craving this symmetry that collapses into a fractal reality. But we live in a quantum universe, folks, with simultaneous realities and entanglements, the uncertainty of the big bear around that rock, the hunter who get your prey first, slipping on a stream rock and getting swept over the falls. We have learned to deal with all these things, even to avoid them with our curiosity and self-mastery. I'm really sorry for all the people falling down the logical rabbit holes of libertarian thought -- what a sick and weak world to live in. No wonder they fall prey to irrational and murderous antagonism.
Let’s all reread Colin Turnbulls book “The mountain people”
NOTE there are no IK tribes existent today.
Their absence of altruism killed em all
Fuck theil,fuck andreesen fuck to death all the anarco capitalism boys
Such a great summation of my own journey in political philosophy. I was also a libertarian, but more of an objectivist than anarcho-capitalist.
Worked for the GOP for a decade, went into another industry entirely and then ran from the party in 2016.
Not enough people are making the case for classic liberalism. We need to organize.
Keep up the great work, Mike. Looking forward to following you more closely as a subscriber now.
You shd tell us what prompted you to look outside liberterianism. And did you look into conversatisim, if there is such a thing.