A Primer for New Users
When you see users using group specific terms like "d0ughnut", "hydrate", troll, etc. see if they are also exhibiting any of these classic warnings signs of unsafe groups and cults. Potentially unsafe...
View ArticleGhosts
We are the 300. You do not think of us often, if at all. How do we know this? Because you are glib; you describe your rivals as people who have "drunk the Kool-Aid." If you knew what we knew, you would...
View ArticleMedia Quarantine of Single-Payer Continues- But Americans Don't Realize It!
Its been 15 long years since the Clinton Administration's plan to give all Americans healthcare coverage was foiled by their own stupidity in not pushing for a single payer plan, and the rights foil,...
View ArticleMore than a Mob Mentality
Having listened with much chagrin at the uncivil discourse at these Town Hall forums, I'd like to ask a few questions, rather than return fire with my own incredulous anger. Rather than ripping into...
View ArticleObama's Bait and Switch
Obama has gone back on many of his major campaign promises, and yet people claim it's not his fault. He has continued much of the worst Bush-era policies regarding civil liberties and while it was...
View ArticleCompany Town
[Cross-posted at The Left Coaster.] Buried beneath the headlines of healthcare triumph this morning is equally precious news on education: college loan reform finally passed and looks likely to be...
View ArticleThe Hollow Men...
We are the hollow men We are the stuffed men Leaning together Headpiece filled with straw. Alas! Our dried voices, when We whisper together Are quiet and meaningless As wind in dry grass Or rats’ feet...
View ArticleEconomics, Save Us!
[Cross-posted at The Left Coaster.] The big three of social sciences—sociology, economics and political science—have had a negligible impact in the real-time American environment and their actors. Not...
View ArticleIf You Don't Agree, There's Something Wrong With You
There has recently been some heated discussion on dailykos whether there is more than one acceptable way to feel about the price of tea in China. This diary is an attempt to clarify this question...
View ArticleGroupthink: Annals of The Culture of Politics
Joseph Stiglitz, former chief economist of the World Bank and globalization critic, has a must-read essay in the current Vanity Fair, excerpted from his forthcoming book. He analyzes the consensus...
View ArticleLet’s Get Beyond Left “Groupspeak!”
Let’s Get Beyond Left “Groupspeak!” by Susan C. Strong, Founder & Executive Director, The Metaphor Project, http://www.metaphorproject.org As I write, the 2012 home stretch is still a few months...
View ArticleA Critique of the Faulty Congressional Rationale for Bombing
A Critique of the Faulty Congressional Rationale for Bombingby Susan C. StrongThe following item started as a comment attached to my previous 9.06/13 post, Re Syria: Say "We Can Do Better than...
View ArticleThe Dangers of Groupthink in The Age of Neoliberalism
I'll start this essay with some generalizations about some basic principles with which I think most people of good will agree. Namely, our overall understanding about the meaning of living in a...
View ArticleSuperstition: Social Justice Greatest Obstacle
This week marked the second anniversary of the Occupy Wall Street movement, and as I'm sure most people reading this will agree with, it's not a particularly joyful commemoration.A social justice...
View ArticleHow deaf people can teach us about effective communication
If you ever tried to work with others in a group together before, and found the communication to be lacking or that it took too long to effectively solve a problem together.... then you might want to...
View ArticleHillary & Establishment Groupthink Are Consistently WRONG
Mainstream thinking, not just Republican thinking, is consistently wrong. Justification and support for the Iraq War? WRONG. Catastrophically wrong. Multi-generational even. Centennial even. An...
View ArticleThe Two Gatekeepers
These days here in the "reality-based community", we like the idea of following the consensus opinion of scientific experts; but it could be argued that this is a form of the classical logical fallacy...
View ArticleA Passive Aggressive David Brooks Obliquely Criticizes The GOP?
David Brooks discusses the role of religion in his latest op-ed , and he does so in a wide angle view of the issue. He discusses the issue in terms familiar to many progressives. For example he notes...
View ArticleVicious
What makes people mistreat people in horrendous ways, trade their lives for a pocket full of gold or kill them because if is inculcated that you have to kill them first?Fear usually motivates the...
View ArticleIs War Inevitable?
Failure is remembered because it leaves a comma instead of period on the cite of a serious decision. That comma questions the way you handled something. It brings higher judgment into play. The mind,...
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