It may only be 14% of Americans who believe the Big Lie. The question remains: how many Americans does it take to exist in an alternate epistemological reality before the political structures begin to crumble? Maybe 14% is a dangerous number. Something to consider I think.
It may only be 14% of Americans who believe the Big Lie. The question remains: how many Americans does it take to exist in an alternate epistemological reality before the political structures begin to crumble? Maybe 14% is a dangerous number. Something to consider I think.
Kara posted link to a rather insightful opinion piece by Paul Krugman. His digging in to the “why” of the current character of a majority of the Repubs is spot on.
He contends it is the cowardice, not the craziness that is the threat to democracy.
that makes logical sense, but the situation may well be more like compromat (sp?). Hard to understand unless idjt has something on folks. Lindsay Graham comes to mind. Just doesn't make sense unless there is some money or secret being wielded.
Yes, Graham in particular is suspect. He changed his tune in the course if a single golf game with Trump. But ALL of them? That's a crapload of blackmail material and/or money. I suppose it's possible, but if I wrote it into a movie script it would be rejected as implausible.
And unfortunately they feel exactly the same about you...two sides of the same problem. Two parties that, in the view of "the other side", are moving towards the extremes and leaving the center bare...and available for new parties to emerge and better represent all of the people.
Though I agree with you in principle, I think the urge to declare that both sides are equally to blame is a dangerous one. The U.S. is not divided along progressive and conservative lines, not really. What we have is an extreme, radical right wing battling to pull the country ever further into their nihilistic vision with moderates and progressives resisting that pull. Practically speaking, the end result has been that the center is far from bare; rather, the extremity of the rightward pull exerted by Tea Party/Trumpists had dragged the entire debate to the center and away from true progressive values.
But you have to look also at the stresses and strains in the Democratic Party showing similar movements away from what was called the center. Biden is not a SuperHero with infinitly stretchable limbs enabling to hold the different sides together and keep a foot in both camps indefinitely on his own. Then I would say that, currently, the center is stretching thin in the elected sense and not in the electors sense of things. The largest part of the electorate will always huddle around the middle and thus the parties are leaving space for others to represent them more closely.
If I understand what you are saying here, the insistence of the progressive wing of the party is exerting a strain from the left, but I would contend that what the progressives are advocating are inherently centrist views. Universal health care, racial justice, wealth redistribution, tax fairness, and reproductive rights are only controversial because a radical right has indoctrinated so many people to think of those principles as dangerous socialism, when what they are in fact is common sense and simple decency.
Reid, I agree. For a number of years, I’ve watched this shift in the political spectrum. It makes me laugh, when rightists tar progressives with the Leftist Liberal brush. There is, in effect, no Left left. The space formerly occupied by moderates is now to the right of center. Center is as far left as we go. When the center is viewed as radical socialism, something’s bad wrong.
You know, I've been thinking for some time now that how in the heck did we, as a country, come to accept "cheating" as an OK thing? We're taught from an early age not to cheat and yet the Republicans have now agreed that cheating is fine. It is as basic as that.
I disagree with that Stuart. Its a false equivalence to compare the fringes of both parties. One is full on pro voter suppression, rigging elections, gerrymandering, a big lie, promoting and passing laws to make it lawful to refuse to vote certification, and validating political violence as a means to do more than intimidate. While the other is working for equality before the law, the establishment of laws to protect citizens from extrajudicial killings (legal murder before being charged or taken to jail), stronger voting rights. These are not equivalent. One is working towards totalitarianism, the other towards individualism. We can not have both in this country.
Why should she be expected to? Despite her clarity of vision in regard to the ex-president and the "big lie," she is still a right wing Republican in full support of that party's anti-democratic agenda on both national, state and local levels.
If course she refused. She just wants Trump out of the way for her own run. Most Repubs these days “need” the voter suppression to win. Or do they think.
It is interesting to note, though, isn't it, that most of the Never Trump conservatives seem to be sitting this fight out and waiting to see what happens. They don't seem to realize that THEY are what is needed to make something happen. I have a bit of concern that inertia could allow that boisterous 14% to continue to control the party. The loud and aggressive almost always prevail in American politics.
She certainly doesn't see herself remaining in the role of Woglunde, Wellgunda or Flosshilde.....rather as Erda, the earth mother! That however makes Trump into Wotan whom she warns to "foresake the ring". I would see Trump more in the role of Aberich corruptly obtaining the gold in the first place...and then losing it. The opera still has 3 operas to go to complete the Ring.....time for the "good gods" to sort out themselves and the world hopefully. in the meantime, the music is going to be highly "emotional".
The patron and financier of Wagner, the unfortunate Ludwig of Bavaria (and brother of Sissi the last Austro Hungarian Empress), came to a very sticky end when he really started to embarass the "powers that be" in Munich.
Much prefer Puccini and Verdi anyway! Not all the gods have gone of into the wild blue yonder however as we still have the god of money being worshiped everywhere.
As an opera fan, I felt like I "had to" do the Ring Cycle at least once and I fell in love with it. It's an immersive experience and incredibly moving. Also reactionary and slyly white supremacist, but overall it's (in my reading) about the struggle to remain relevant in a changing world, the evils of greed, and, above all, the deep ambivalence and emotional work of being a parent. I have now been to two complete cycles (Seattle and San Francisco) and will gladly do another when Covid gives me the opportunity.
I agree, Bayreuth would be the gold standard; 145 years of history! Not sure I could ever justify the trip just for that, but combined with other joys (read: things that would make my wife agree the trip was worthwhile) I might be able to do that. The problem being that for four or five days I'm sitting in an opera house and she is...doing what? Probably never happen.
it can be done mostly in the evenings and you get to dress up but 4-5 hours is a long, hard slog if you are not an afficionado. I must say , i had more fun doing a matiné of Madame Butterfly at Covent Garden or standing in the "gods" in Vienna to hear Ruggiero Raimondi in Mussorgsky's "Pictures at an exhibition" and being able to go have dinner somewhere after.
Think of that same 43,000,000 may actually keep American society from reaching herd immunity by willfully refusing to vaccinate against COVID 19, and you get the idea how much influence they wield.
No they won't prevent herd immunity, but herd immunity is not a viable end to the pandemic due to ever changing virus. What they will do is provide bodies for more virulent strains to mutate. This group includes. Sen. Rand Paul.
43 M represents about 13% of the population. Most models assume "herd immunity" will be achieved with between 60 and 80% of the population resistant to the virus. Some studies (reported on PBS, for instance) suggest that 41% of Republicans are refusing the Covid jab. That leaves only 5% of the population who are total refusniks and as such they would not be a threat to their neighbours...at least for this...and the bug would not be able to maintain itself.
The vaccines do slow it down considerably but they don't stop it as they only partially protect against infection and transmission. Their true gift is to drastically reduce the need for hospitalization and the death rate. I think though that we can "look forward" to a seasonal bout with the disease as it wafts its way round the world year after year. Vaccinations will probably become annual...just like the Flu in its current "mature" state.
And just like the flu, the risk is in the variants. We only need to get a flu jab each year because of the rotating cast of different subtypes. Interesting research is going on for both flu and Covid vaccines to see if perhaps a more long-lasting immunity can be induced, I assume by targeting some antigen or another that all variants have in common. Science may save us yet!
The rate of genetic transformation of the Covid virus is apparently sufficiently slow to permit vaccine development to keep up. What i've read is that "only" one micro changes happen every one or two transmissions!
I just saw last night that only 2% of Japan is vaccinated and they are experiencing a big surge, to the point of hospitals being overwhelmed. At present, the Tokyo Olympics are still planned to be held. There is serious concerns about it being a superspreader so I TRULY hope the IOC cancels it.
Not good fir Japan. Worse if it’s the new Indian and UK strains that are spreading. Seychelles had 62% vaxed and still had a crushing outbreak that overwhelmed their hospitals.
43 million zealots, led by the dictator wannabe. How many are already in our legislative and judicial branches? Percentages are closer to 50% there, eh?
Would you feel better if a more accurate headline began: 14% of 600 Republicans polled believe...
I believe you would feel better. In fact, maybe you wouldn’t bother reading the article. Polls can be wrong because they are a very small sampling. Just ask Hillary Clinton.
9% of the country think that 30million died of covid, a 100million think that Donald Trump was elected because of Russia, exponentially more people have been convinced of far bigger lies.
So you think there has been some turnaround in the press coverage in the last 10 months? Where have you been for the last 10 years, Hannity, Maddow, same thing they sell fear as a virtue, panic as logic and hate all day.
It's an opinion tracker. A poll. It measures people's responses to the press coverage, not the press coverage itself. Press coverage may or may not have changed significantly, but circumstances have definitely changed, to the point that I think there may have similar changes in the people's opinions in the last 10 months.
And where I've been for the past 10 years isn't watching some member of the talking herd on the boob tube.
It may only be 14% of Americans who believe the Big Lie. The question remains: how many Americans does it take to exist in an alternate epistemological reality before the political structures begin to crumble? Maybe 14% is a dangerous number. Something to consider I think.
That’s 43,000,000 people who believe the big lie.
Has there ever been 1 million marchers for any cause just or unjust in DC before?
So I am not at ease with 13-14%. The threat to democracy remains concrete at 43 million deluded cultish followers.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_protests_in_the_United_States_by_size
If one were to include the whole world in the 2017 Women's March, the number would be 7,000,000 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2017_Women%27s_March
OOh. That was fun. Thanks.
Kara posted link to a rather insightful opinion piece by Paul Krugman. His digging in to the “why” of the current character of a majority of the Repubs is spot on.
He contends it is the cowardice, not the craziness that is the threat to democracy.
Of course they’re all afraid of bully Cheeto and losing their power.
But if they all just got together and said, "Go away, Donald," they could diminish his power, I would think.
They’re just too afraid of him l think. He is vengeful.
that makes logical sense, but the situation may well be more like compromat (sp?). Hard to understand unless idjt has something on folks. Lindsay Graham comes to mind. Just doesn't make sense unless there is some money or secret being wielded.
Yes, Graham in particular is suspect. He changed his tune in the course if a single golf game with Trump. But ALL of them? That's a crapload of blackmail material and/or money. I suppose it's possible, but if I wrote it into a movie script it would be rejected as implausible.
Yes I see your point.
But happily not 74 million. It's a start and it leaves 31 million for Liz Cheney etc to chew on.
Yes, Stuart, but that makes me uneasy also. Just so hard to trust Liz or any other Repub.
And unfortunately they feel exactly the same about you...two sides of the same problem. Two parties that, in the view of "the other side", are moving towards the extremes and leaving the center bare...and available for new parties to emerge and better represent all of the people.
Though I agree with you in principle, I think the urge to declare that both sides are equally to blame is a dangerous one. The U.S. is not divided along progressive and conservative lines, not really. What we have is an extreme, radical right wing battling to pull the country ever further into their nihilistic vision with moderates and progressives resisting that pull. Practically speaking, the end result has been that the center is far from bare; rather, the extremity of the rightward pull exerted by Tea Party/Trumpists had dragged the entire debate to the center and away from true progressive values.
Yes. Well said. Sadly.
But you have to look also at the stresses and strains in the Democratic Party showing similar movements away from what was called the center. Biden is not a SuperHero with infinitly stretchable limbs enabling to hold the different sides together and keep a foot in both camps indefinitely on his own. Then I would say that, currently, the center is stretching thin in the elected sense and not in the electors sense of things. The largest part of the electorate will always huddle around the middle and thus the parties are leaving space for others to represent them more closely.
If I understand what you are saying here, the insistence of the progressive wing of the party is exerting a strain from the left, but I would contend that what the progressives are advocating are inherently centrist views. Universal health care, racial justice, wealth redistribution, tax fairness, and reproductive rights are only controversial because a radical right has indoctrinated so many people to think of those principles as dangerous socialism, when what they are in fact is common sense and simple decency.
Reid, I agree. For a number of years, I’ve watched this shift in the political spectrum. It makes me laugh, when rightists tar progressives with the Leftist Liberal brush. There is, in effect, no Left left. The space formerly occupied by moderates is now to the right of center. Center is as far left as we go. When the center is viewed as radical socialism, something’s bad wrong.
It's propaganda, pure and simple. Pound away at a lie long enough and loudly enough and it eventually becomes a self-evident truth.
Just like Goebbles used.
I agree Reid.
Depends where you put the goalposts; where they have been or where one might like them to be.
Or whether you allow one team to illicitly drag the goalposts to a position that favors their side.
You know, I've been thinking for some time now that how in the heck did we, as a country, come to accept "cheating" as an OK thing? We're taught from an early age not to cheat and yet the Republicans have now agreed that cheating is fine. It is as basic as that.
Which is what the Republicans have been doing since Reagan. The “center” is much further right than it once was.
that's the name of the game.
I disagree with that Stuart. Its a false equivalence to compare the fringes of both parties. One is full on pro voter suppression, rigging elections, gerrymandering, a big lie, promoting and passing laws to make it lawful to refuse to vote certification, and validating political violence as a means to do more than intimidate. While the other is working for equality before the law, the establishment of laws to protect citizens from extrajudicial killings (legal murder before being charged or taken to jail), stronger voting rights. These are not equivalent. One is working towards totalitarianism, the other towards individualism. We can not have both in this country.
I'm not comparing them, Ted, just saying they are pulling further apart.
ah, got it. Too many people here are using that argument.
Why should she be expected to? Despite her clarity of vision in regard to the ex-president and the "big lie," she is still a right wing Republican in full support of that party's anti-democratic agenda on both national, state and local levels.
If course she refused. She just wants Trump out of the way for her own run. Most Repubs these days “need” the voter suppression to win. Or do they think.
Liz is making a good bet. Numbers are on her side,
It is interesting to note, though, isn't it, that most of the Never Trump conservatives seem to be sitting this fight out and waiting to see what happens. They don't seem to realize that THEY are what is needed to make something happen. I have a bit of concern that inertia could allow that boisterous 14% to continue to control the party. The loud and aggressive almost always prevail in American politics.
Cowardice is why they APPEAR to be “sitting this fight out”.
Courage has rarely been the "forte" of the quiet and somewhat timerous!
If she's got the "chuzpah" . She's got the money.
Going off on a tangent... https://youtu.be/52YxdYmLq24
Yes sir! Yes it does
She certainly doesn't see herself remaining in the role of Woglunde, Wellgunda or Flosshilde.....rather as Erda, the earth mother! That however makes Trump into Wotan whom she warns to "foresake the ring". I would see Trump more in the role of Aberich corruptly obtaining the gold in the first place...and then losing it. The opera still has 3 operas to go to complete the Ring.....time for the "good gods" to sort out themselves and the world hopefully. in the meantime, the music is going to be highly "emotional".
The patron and financier of Wagner, the unfortunate Ludwig of Bavaria (and brother of Sissi the last Austro Hungarian Empress), came to a very sticky end when he really started to embarass the "powers that be" in Munich.
It would also behoove us to recall that, despite their erstwhile hegemony, the gods walk over the Rainbow Bridge into irrelevance.
Much prefer Puccini and Verdi anyway! Not all the gods have gone of into the wild blue yonder however as we still have the god of money being worshiped everywhere.
As an opera fan, I felt like I "had to" do the Ring Cycle at least once and I fell in love with it. It's an immersive experience and incredibly moving. Also reactionary and slyly white supremacist, but overall it's (in my reading) about the struggle to remain relevant in a changing world, the evils of greed, and, above all, the deep ambivalence and emotional work of being a parent. I have now been to two complete cycles (Seattle and San Francisco) and will gladly do another when Covid gives me the opportunity.
I find it a bit of a hard, long slog but would like to do it in Bayreuth if anywhere as there it's a "total happening" .
I agree, Bayreuth would be the gold standard; 145 years of history! Not sure I could ever justify the trip just for that, but combined with other joys (read: things that would make my wife agree the trip was worthwhile) I might be able to do that. The problem being that for four or five days I'm sitting in an opera house and she is...doing what? Probably never happen.
it can be done mostly in the evenings and you get to dress up but 4-5 hours is a long, hard slog if you are not an afficionado. I must say , i had more fun doing a matiné of Madame Butterfly at Covent Garden or standing in the "gods" in Vienna to hear Ruggiero Raimondi in Mussorgsky's "Pictures at an exhibition" and being able to go have dinner somewhere after.
a very bad deal nonetheless and he didn't keep it long. He ended up with no love and no gold!
Boy, is that ever a potent metaphor!
I know, right? How far the country has fallen if we are looking to her to save us.
Think of that same 43,000,000 may actually keep American society from reaching herd immunity by willfully refusing to vaccinate against COVID 19, and you get the idea how much influence they wield.
No they won't prevent herd immunity, but herd immunity is not a viable end to the pandemic due to ever changing virus. What they will do is provide bodies for more virulent strains to mutate. This group includes. Sen. Rand Paul.
The most likely solution is natural selection.
Unfortunately, for that to work they have to die before they reproduce. 😁
Exactly.
43 M represents about 13% of the population. Most models assume "herd immunity" will be achieved with between 60 and 80% of the population resistant to the virus. Some studies (reported on PBS, for instance) suggest that 41% of Republicans are refusing the Covid jab. That leaves only 5% of the population who are total refusniks and as such they would not be a threat to their neighbours...at least for this...and the bug would not be able to maintain itself.
https://www.pbs.org/newshour/health/as-more-americans-get-vaccinated-41-of-republicans-still-refuse-covid-19-shots
Need higher than 80% globally. As long as there is a reservoir, pandemic Continues. The rate of vax is also critically important.
The vaccines do slow it down considerably but they don't stop it as they only partially protect against infection and transmission. Their true gift is to drastically reduce the need for hospitalization and the death rate. I think though that we can "look forward" to a seasonal bout with the disease as it wafts its way round the world year after year. Vaccinations will probably become annual...just like the Flu in its current "mature" state.
And just like the flu, the risk is in the variants. We only need to get a flu jab each year because of the rotating cast of different subtypes. Interesting research is going on for both flu and Covid vaccines to see if perhaps a more long-lasting immunity can be induced, I assume by targeting some antigen or another that all variants have in common. Science may save us yet!
The rate of genetic transformation of the Covid virus is apparently sufficiently slow to permit vaccine development to keep up. What i've read is that "only" one micro changes happen every one or two transmissions!
I just saw last night that only 2% of Japan is vaccinated and they are experiencing a big surge, to the point of hospitals being overwhelmed. At present, the Tokyo Olympics are still planned to be held. There is serious concerns about it being a superspreader so I TRULY hope the IOC cancels it.
Not good fir Japan. Worse if it’s the new Indian and UK strains that are spreading. Seychelles had 62% vaxed and still had a crushing outbreak that overwhelmed their hospitals.
But as a quick aside, when you add the folks who cannot get the vaccine, 43 M “refusniks” can change the outcome.
Yep.
Seychelles. 38% unvaccinated, kept epidemic going and overwhelmed their hospitals.
Yes. This is a very important thing to remember. We just don’t know enough about the virus and the vaccines yet.
43 million zealots, led by the dictator wannabe. How many are already in our legislative and judicial branches? Percentages are closer to 50% there, eh?
Primaries favour extremists when that much money is floating about.
No it’s not. At least a third of eligible voters in most states did not even vote.
13% of 331 million=?
Tears
What percentage of Congress is the thing to consider....
Would you feel better if a more accurate headline began: 14% of 600 Republicans polled believe...
I believe you would feel better. In fact, maybe you wouldn’t bother reading the article. Polls can be wrong because they are a very small sampling. Just ask Hillary Clinton.
Epistemological reality, really?
9% of the country think that 30million died of covid, a 100million think that Donald Trump was elected because of Russia, exponentially more people have been convinced of far bigger lies.
https://www.kekstcnc.com/media/2793/kekstcnc_research_covid-19_opinion_tracker_wave-4.pdf
The information in your link might be more persuasive if it wasn't ten months out of date.
So you think there has been some turnaround in the press coverage in the last 10 months? Where have you been for the last 10 years, Hannity, Maddow, same thing they sell fear as a virtue, panic as logic and hate all day.
It's an opinion tracker. A poll. It measures people's responses to the press coverage, not the press coverage itself. Press coverage may or may not have changed significantly, but circumstances have definitely changed, to the point that I think there may have similar changes in the people's opinions in the last 10 months.
And where I've been for the past 10 years isn't watching some member of the talking herd on the boob tube.
Best not to try to prove your points by being offensive and rude as you make your points.
As I've said elsewhere today, this might not be the forum for you.
May you find peace wherever you end up.