QOTD 0
Leonard Goldberg:
Everyone is an idle gossiper if the gossip is interesting enough.
Goldberg, Leonard, The Daughter of Sherlock Holmes (New York: Minotaur, 2017) p. 88.
A Tune for the Times 0
Mangy’s voice is a bit off, but his lyrics are spot on.
Republican Thought Police 0
A Trump-appointed judge wants law schools to commit originalist sin.
The Graham Cracker 0
At The Charlotte Observer, Isaac Bailey argues that that cookie crumbled long ago. A snippet:
He’s not.
Read the full article for Bailey’s evidence.
This Trumpled Kleptocracy 0
Sam and the crew discuss how the robber barons of this new gilded age are poisoning dis coarse discourse.
In Translation 0
At Psychology Today Blogs, Nikolay Kukushkin offers insight into the thought processes (sic) of Donald Trump.
It’s All about the Benjamins 0
All Hallows Eve it not until next week, and I was just subjected to a Christmas commercial.
Furrfu.
It’s the Stupid, Economy, Reprise 0
At the Portland Press-Herald, Jody Telfair Richards runs the numbers and concludes
Follow the link for said numbers.
The Wannabe 0
Seth takes a closer look at the news that Donald Trump’s former chief of staff, John Kelly, has attested that Trump meets the definition of a fascist and that Trump has praised Hitler in his presence.
My father fought against Hitler in the Ardennes.
He did not do that so we could elect a wannabe Hitler to be our president.
Please watch this. It is worth your while.
“An Armed Society Is a Polite Society” 0
We are again reminded that politeness is a family value.
Polarization Nation 0
At Psychology Today Blogs, David Evans considers why dis coarse discourse has become so coarse and offers some suggestions for reducing today’s political polarization. In our current political climate, his article is well worth a read.
Here’s a tiny bit; follow the link for the rest.
But around the year 2000, the country began to be more polarized.
(snip)
A big factor has to do with the way we receive our news. Early in the twentieth century, the radio came into prominence, and the government required that all broadcast stations be licensed. Herbert Hoover as Secretary of Commerce at the time, recognized that the stations were a public trust and shouldn’t favor one political party over the other. So he instituted the Fairness Doctrine.
The Fairness Doctrine required that a broadcast entity, when it reported a story about one political party, had to also give the other side a chance to respond. Both political parties needed to be treated fairly and equally.
But Ronald Reagan, as president, vetoed the Fairness Doctrine, and the equal treatment of both political parties in the news vanished. Before long, partisan broadcasters such as Rush Limbaugh appeared and, soon after that, Fox News.