zeke5123
1yr ago
I am a tennis fan. On the tennis Reddit page, they are discussing Novak’s comment that he isn’t anti-vax but stood for the proposition that bodily integrity meant he shouldnt be forced to take the vax.
The five bullets you list explain perfectly how the propaganda affected the main heavily upvoted response on Reddit.
The highly upvoted poster makes the claim taking the vax isn’t about freedom but that Novak was selfish putting others at risk by refusing the jab and thereby not getting to herd immunity.
This was a common refrain during the pandemic. It appealed to people’s emotions, it repeated a simple idea, it didn’t wrestle with other arguments, and it vilified a small subset (the selfish people refusing to take a safe jab to protect everyone else).
The poster never seemed to stop and think about the particulars. For example, Novak already had covid. Why did he need a vaccine? Why would a vaccinated person need protection from non-vax? How far did this principle go (ie should fat people be required to have medical surgery to lose weight given that their fatness imposes a strain on the health system)? How effective were the vaccines at creating herd immunity compared to a prior infection? How deadly was covid? If someone was very scared of covid, what protections could they take themselves instead of demanding everyone else take precautions? Did susceptible people have the right to force medical interventions onto others so that susceptible people could live their lives more normally? What amount of risk is appropriate to impose on someone for the good of the collective? Who gets to determine what is the appropriate risk? What process should be used?
There are a ton of meaty issues there. Maybe you determine on net you are still pro socially sanctioned vaccine taking but it isn’t obvious and it isn’t obviously selfish to oppose it. Indeed, in Novak’s case he sacrificed a lot for his principle (skipped numerous tournaments which could’ve cost him the all time slams lead) so kind of weird to even call him selfish — seems a lot more selfless compared to the redditor smugly denouncing him with no cost to the redditor. But I think it’s because propaganda worked. The pro vax redditor repeated the simple talking points drilled into his or her head during an emotional time and identified Novak as a villain.
What’s really odd is that the propaganda still works on vaxes! The redditor continues to make these claims in light of the severe underperformance of the vaccine in stopping the spread. You would think that would cause him or her to say “did I make a mistake somewhere in my thought process” but nope.
Makes me think “where do I have these blinders.”
zeke5123
1yr ago
I have some for your reading pleasure.
Biden supported and gave encouragement to BLM riots which among other things included CHAZ.
Biden knew the renter moratorium was unconstitutional. His advisors told him as such. The SCOTUS said this is illegal but since you told us you are ending it we will let you end it in an orderly fashion. He then said “fuck it — I will extend it and hope it will take months or years to overturn what I knew was against the constitutional Order.
Biden conspired with others in the Obama administration to frustrate the peaceful transmission of power to the Trump administration from by trying to sabotage that admin via the bureaucracy including Biden suggesting trying to trap Flynn using the laughable Logan act (has some similarity to Trump — sure in theory he was exercising what is facially a legal authority but the local authority could say that was pretext).
zeke5123
1yr ago
So basically Hunter did something that any normal American would’ve gone to prison for a long ass time, the DOJ tried its best to prevent charges from ever being filed, they even seemed to conspire with Hunter in Delaware to slap him on the wrist, but now because of public pressure they are forced to indict him in California.
But of course that now will prevent Hunter from testifying before Congress and will anyone be surprised if when no longer useful the DOJ enters a plea deal (more painful than Delaware but only marginally so)?
Trying to say “it works for both sides” ignores the massive purposeful missteps re Hunter Biden. His lawyers were willing to extend the SOL but DOJ let them expire!
zeke5123
1yr ago
Why use minor attracted person? First it is three words instead of pedophile. Like all woke language it is ugly. Second, it is often used to try to legitimize something we should keep highly hated.
zeke5123
1yr ago
Yeah if you exclude all of the things Biden has done then he is centrist.
Instead Biden has:
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Tried to unilaterally cancel about 500b of student debt that everyone (including Pelosi) thought required congressional approval since you know generally congress has to approve buildings.
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Required effectively all working adults to take a vaccine they didn’t want to try to stop the spread of a virus when they knew the vaccine couldn’t do that once again without congressional approval.
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Sic the FBI on parents calling them domestic terrorists for..being involved with school board meetings in a way that went against his beloved teachers union.
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Engage in significant censorship and tried to create a disinformation board.
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Used the bully pulpit to support gender affirming care calling laws to stop it “close to sinful” or used that bully pulpit to claim benign voter lawyers as “Jim Eagle.”
It really is tiring hearing supporters of Biden continue to claim “he is centrist” when he has been anything but and the only reason he didn’t have more progressive policies passed was because Manchin.
Also of course there appears to be the vast amount of bribes he took so that you know undermines the whole “don’t do illegal acts” thing.
zeke5123
1yr ago
District court judge making a grand political conclusion antithetical to the law isn’t exactly uncommon. See for example the Republican judge in Texas and the abortion in the mail ruling.
It is and remains a joke of an opinion.
zeke5123
2yr ago
Why? Why would no reasonable person fear for their lives?
It seems pretty clear that Neely was a bad dude with a history of violence. While the people on the train likely didn’t know that, violent weirdos give off an aura.
Second his language certainly indicated he was willing to do extreme things.
Third, people read of crazy people like Neely doing crazy dangerous violent things.
zeke5123
1yr ago
Yes you can acknowledge the differences and remain a classical liberal. The problem is it does very much matter why there is a difference contra Hanania.
It matters because government, corporations, and academia keep trying to solve problems that can’t be solved due to HBD. Their premise is Group X performs worse than Group Y therefore it must be discrimination. Let’s do all of these programs (transfer wealth, affirmative action, decry success) to help alleviate the difference. That is, they are willing to incur a cost because they think at the end of the day the status quo ante is not optima due to racism (ie if you do enough, Group X will act like Group Y resulting in a benefit that exceeds the cost).
However, if the status quo ante is not due to racism but merely gene luck, then it doesn’t follow all of the costs should be borne because the payoff will never be realized.
zeke5123
1yr ago
I think the whole “Vivek is smarter than Trump so he will succeed” totally misunderstands how government (or even very large) organizations run. In very large organizations, the CEO needs to rely on trusted lieutenants to help implement the CEO’s vision.
The government is an even more extreme version of this. The president being smart is a necessary condition but not sufficient to the president being successful. The main ingredient is predicated on the team he can build combined with knowing when and how to burn political capital.
Edit: Vivek has shown zero ability to delegate successfully in a large organization. Instead, his business success seems to have come from the ability to bamboozle investors instead of running a successful business venture.
zeke5123
1yr ago
It seems oddly kids fifty years ago had both more freedom and more specific rules. Modern liberal parents are both deeply involved but have a weird “well they are going to do it anyway attitude” to many things they shouldn’t.
zeke5123
1yr ago
To add to this, Obama didn’t campaign for gay marriage. Now you have Biden actively promoting gender transition and calling attempts to stop it in minors as “close to sinful.” This is by far the most leftist administration in American history yet we are being told it is centrist? I hate the gaslighting.
zeke5123
1yr ago
Care to wager? SCOTUS need only say “the law is not self executing; congress passed a law saying what insurrection is, Trump wasn’t found guilty, therefore he is eligible.”
That is of course the prudential thing to do. The Baude argument is and remains silly.
zeke5123
1yr ago
If you don’t punish the most obvious bribery scandal at the national level in probably a century, then you clearly invite more bribery. All of the other things are more important in the short term, but for the long term health of the government you must punish obvious bribery.
Also, it isn’t clear it won’t go anywhere. If the inquiry can show (1) that Joe Biden personally benefited, (2) that State Dept didn’t want to fire the prosecutor (which seems like it was already proven) and (3) there were payments to Joe Biden shortly afterwards, then (4) Democrats would be forced with either trying to rally behind an obviously corrupt unpopular president or dumping said president for someone who might not be as tainted.
The real question is can the inquiry provided enough hard evidence to make the case beyond a reasonable doubt. Right now the Republicans have enough evidence that most people believe Biden is a crook. The question is whether this inquiry will turn that belief into knowledge. If so, then even democrats will vote to convict (or more likely Democrats like Obama will pull a Barry Goldwater)
zeke5123
1yr ago
DeSantis proved to be a very effective governor. I suspect that if you really wanted to roll back the admin state, he’s your man.
zeke5123
1yr ago
Which is the whole point behind SOLs. There is no way to mount a proper defense.
Of course, if I was a jury and the defendant merely stated “I was drugged” and there was zero corroborating evidence I don’t see how I could vote to convict.
Feminism has been very successful at changing people’s default assumption (ie if there is an allegation it is probably true).
zeke5123
2yr ago
I actually think that is most people’s gripe. They know something is wrong but have trouble sorting it out so they latch onto things like “not historically accurate” or “ruins the immersion” when in reality it is that the creator of this new work hates you the white consumer and therefore wishes to vandalize works you love with vulgar political displays.
zeke5123
1yr ago
Assuming counseling is highly effective. I’ve never seen someone start therapy graduate from therapy. I have seen people with illness stop going to see the specialist once cured.
I think therapy is a racket.
zeke5123
1yr ago
Not to defend Chapek, but seems to me most of Disney’s problems were Iger problems.
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Iger did the disastrous Fox deal.
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Iger pushed into the disastrous streaming business.
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Iger forced a fight with DeSantis over culture war issues that have soiled the Disney brand.
I don’t know why an activist investors hasn’t put two and two together that Iger is the one who needs the boot.
zeke5123
1yr ago
It seems terrible in that allegations are enough to demonetize someone who earns income from the internet meaning their ability to fully defend themselves (legally and in court of public opinion) is curtailed.
I hope Dame Caroline is accused of something, loses her income streams as a result, cannot defined herself, and goes to prison for something of which she is innocent.
Edit: I don’t know if Brand is innocent, guilty, or somewhere in between. I do know that what Dame is doing is wrong.
zeke5123
1yr ago
I’m sure that’s what the educators say and believe but it doesn’t follow that is good for the kids. The whole debate is who is in the best position to make an intelligent decision: the kid, the educator, or the parent.
The kid is young, dumb and subject to peer pressure with limited long term thinking.
The educator has little skin in the game.
The parent has a ton of skin in the game and likely can be a bit more long term thinking.
zeke5123
1yr ago
A couple of points.
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This puts to lie “trust the experts.” If the experts are willing to lie even if for supposedly noble reasons, then you cannot trust what they are telling you is accurate. No, you need to trust that what they are telling you is for the common good but why would those so called experts be more of an expert of what is the common good compared to you? It also wouldn’t be entirely surprising if they believed that the common good is consistent with what they do (eg I am trying to prevent a future pandemic and therefore what I do is good and anything that gets in the way is bad). But that’s largely self deceit.
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If we know what the institutional pressures are within this area, then it is entirely reasonable to assume publications would skew towards not a lab leak. The fact that people publish evidence supporting not a leak is consistent with the incentive structure people in this field clearly possess. It is akin to being SHOCKED that Phillip Morris’s research indicated no cancer due to smoking. That doesn’t mean they are wrong, but we aren’t looking at honest open science.
zeke5123
2yr ago
I am a pretty law and order guy. But there is something untoward about running for office on the idea of prosecuting person X or persons Y for activity Z performed prior to becoming DA. It is side we prosecute crimes; not men. This seems the opposite.
zeke5123
1yr ago
The legal arguments seem incredibly weak.
First, you need to define “what is an insurrection.” The amendment is silent on that. Next, you need to determine whether the proposed candidate in fact engaged in an “insurrection.” The amendment doesn’t specify the process, standard, or who gets to answer that question.
It would be an incredibly weird provision that takes away both the right of voters and the right of a candidate to seek office yet doesn’t answer these very basic questions.
Indeed, it is hard to square with the 14th amendment’s own guarantee of due process (ie we acknowledge the importance of due process except here where we will let a county clerk decide unilaterally based on whatever standard he or she likes that someone is an insurrectionist). All the more so in the context when the 14th amendment was adopted — do you really think the north wanted to give the southern states carte blanche to strike whomever they wanted from the ballot without due process of law?
Those are the infirmities before the question is even answered whether the article even applies to the presidency (there is a strong argument it doesn’t since the provision specifies, inter alia, electors but is silent on the presidency). And then there is the still procedural question of even if the amendment is self executing absent congressional action did congress act and therefore occupy field (which again arguably yes since it defined insurrection and provided a process / penalty for the crime).
All of those questions are before you get to the merits (ie did Trump engage in an insurrection, were Trump’s statements protected by the first amendment).
That is, the argument advanced in toto is betting on hitting an inside straight flush (ie it has to win on numerous arguments; rebuttal on one). The infirmity of that legal position heavily suggests the argument is bogus and prudentially SCOTUS needs to nip this in the proverbial bud on procedural grounds.
Follow up post time.
There was a discussion awhile back about whether Jamaal Bowman pulled a fire alarm to help delay a bill relating to the government shutdown.
New footage is out. https://www.zerohedge.com/political/rep-bowman-issued-criminal-summons-pulling-fire-alarm
It seems:
Bowman doesn’t try to open the door.
Bowman takes down signs.
Bowman pulls the alarm and walks away without changing how he walks (ie no indication he then tried to use the door).
To me, this seems like very strong evidence he pulled the alarm to cause a disruption.
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