Friday, November 11, 2016

Hmm …

… Maybe stop calling Trump supporters dumb | Washington Examiner.



Let's be honest. I have a college degree, and I did some time in grad school. The people I went to college and grad school with were certainly not dumb. But they weren't all Einsteins, either. Ray Nocella, my roofing contractor, has as sharp a mind as anyone I know. I love talking philosophy with him. Abstract knowledge is not the only kind there is. Nor is it always the right kind.

11 comments:

  1. You link to a fair enough article, which points out that anyone anywhere, college degree or street smart, dope or genius, can be duped by a bigoted, phlegm-spewing bully. As I begin my posting for today, I link to this article, in which Sen. Reid also has it right, and which is tied right into the demonstrations against the mistake we made, electing a bigot president elect: Harry Reid breaks silence: Trump's election has 'emboldened the forces of hate and bigotry'

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  2. Sen. Reid, who lied about Romney's taxes and later said he was proud of what he had done. Maybe the people who voted for Trump simply made a choice different from yours, Rus. He was hardly running against a paragon of honesty.

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    1. Which puts Ried in the same bucket of truth-stretchers (liars?) as Trump, but doesn't make him, Ried, wrong about other matters (nor Trump either, for that matter).

      Trump, from The Art of the Deal:'I play to people’s fantasies. People may not always think big themselves, but they can still get very excited by those who do. That’s why a little hyperbole never hurts. People want to believe that something is the biggest and the greatest and the most spectacular. I call it truthful hyperbole.' (p. 58)

      Fantasies? Well, we will indeed see.

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  3. Nazis claim victory, Frank. The Nazi's won: Loyal White Knight. Republicans were warning the country not to vote for him. In the final days, Gov. Weld, Libertarian candidate for Vice President, told people that too much is at stake, to vote for Hillary.

    We fought the Nazi's, if you recall, in the 40s. I don't as I was born in the 50s. It was a great victory and time for the USA, something to be proud of. Today, Nazis claim victory on our own soil.

    Sen. Reid did not lie about Trump's victory emboldening the forces of hate and bigotry.

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  4. These kids are right to be afraid: Kids’ post-election fears spur trauma counseling in schools this week. They feared his racist threats, and now he will be president. Kids are attempting suicide. It's our new reality.

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  5. Name-calling and labelling are counterproductive and generally downright inflammatory, divisive, and hence dangerous. It would be wise to learn from certain experts -- whoops, perhaps I'd best not use that now dirty word -- ok, people with experience in mediation and conflict resolution: for example, the late Marshall Rosenberg.

    Here is one link worth listening to, but there are many others.

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YwXH4hNfgPg

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  6. I have better things to do with my life than get bent out of shape over election results. Politics is a necessary evil, and the political class is not where I look for heroes. I'm also not on the lookout for anybody to lead me anywhere. But we can take a tip from President Obama and Secretary Clinton and act like grown-ups, face reality, and try to work together as best we can for the welfare of the country as a whole. Name-calling and demonizing and petulant demonstrations will not get us anywhere worth going to.

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  7. Many people are justifiably frightened that we have a person who acts racistly often, and who often enough puts down his opponents with disgusting remarks and diatribes, being the president elect. This does not make him a 24/7 disgusting racist pig, no, just often he acts like one, if there is such a thing anyway, if we can imagine such an individual actually existing, not there is. Now, however, people in the USA and around the world fear him more than before, and fear that other people often support him in his often disgusting and often racist (and other negative-ist) behavior. Those of us who are disabled, for instance, and/or children and adults of color, for another instance, need to prepare for often disgusting behavior on the part of people whom, when they are not being openly disgusting, Nazi members for instance (not that anyone could be Nazi 24/7, but people who sometimes or often sympathize with the Nazi movement), are not openly disgusting people. People who often or sometimes behave in negative manners toward other people, not that there a negative people per se, have been empowered.

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  8. I am 75 years old and I can't remember ever encountering anyone who sympathized with Hitler's National Socialist movement. I am sure, though, that the disabled often encounter boorish behavior and worse. I seriously doubt that things will turn out as apocalyptically under a Trump adminstration as we are being led to think. Which is not to say his adminstration will not have its failures. And it may turn out overall to be a failure. But there is still no reason to hurl epithets and incite riot. You either believe in the rule or you do not. Those who do not are generally thought criminal.

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  9. If you take Trump at his word, he may not be Republican or Democrat, but he is racist. If you don't take him at his word, then he was just saying racist things to get elected.

    I should add here, that he is currently under IRS audit, and has become their boss. Also, Trump University was being brought to court for being a scam operation, and now any people who have been wronged and ought to be compensated, will probably have to settle for much less than justice would prevail.

    We are in a terrible situation, and must now find a way to deal with it, before he gets out of control. This guy cannot be trusted, indeed raised his own kids not to trust anybody, including himself. If we wanted a Hitler, then this is how we would do it. If you wanted to raise psychopaths, then that is how you would do it, if that's possible.

    In this country, we have the right to assemble. This is what is happening, and it is urgent, people of color, for instance, are under great threat. It is no time to be silent. This is the United States, not China or North Korea. We can be vocal in our objections to social injustices, in fact have a duty to, no matter how many people want to turn a deaf ear, or have us go away and enjoy our tax cuts, assuming they are forthcoming.

    I turned my prior post into a poem, for the people who are threatened by the people who are earnestly objecting to a guy who acts if he is a Nazi, being elected as president: Put Another Way.

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  10. We have a right to assemble. We do not have right to riot. Or destroy other people's property. I also think we have an obligation to behave in a civilized manner, which includes not labeling large swaths of our fellow citizens as racists, misogynists, xenophobes, and the like.

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