CharonY

Ok, can anyone tell me that we are not in bizarro world?

I think the issue boils down to what we discussed elsewhere with regard to populism. There might be real concerns somewhere, but they build easy narratives which is frequently dismissive of facts or expert knowledge. That way everything can rolled into whatever solution one might like and/or simply use it to rail against... something. A similar approach that techbros are doing.

I suspect that given how harebrained folks are getting, even more reputable media will shift, too. After all, they will be getting a new generation of journalists eventually and larger societal changes can only be slowed so much by incumbents.

Yeah the NPR article I linked above is a bit more nuanced, this one squarely presents a slice that, in isolation, is one of the less crazy ideas. At the same time, they are (not by chance I would guess) the most nebulous ones.

It is great to have redundancy in the efficiency department by having redundant leadership. In a redundant manner. They will probably also be a bastion against cancel culture. Such as this:

Well, some like him enough (or are afraid of Trump) https://www.cnn.com/2024/11/15/politics/johnson-ethics-report-gaetz/index.html

Some tidbits on research: (https://www.npr.org/2024/11/12/nx-s1-5183014/trump-election-2024-nih-rfk) While some of the issues they identified are correct later on in the article, the issue is that the GOP is only going to use it as a pretense to shoehorn in their agenda. Before the COVID-19 pandemic, the Trump administration dismantled the pandemic task force and claimed that it would create a leaner, more efficient system by cutting of bloat (https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2020/03/16/no-white-house-didnt-dissolve-its-pandemic-response-office/). The pandemic has dramatically exposed that lie.

But they need a white supremacist, it seems (photos have emerged of him having white nationalist tattoos, which was apparently also flagged by the military).

https://thehill.com/homenews/house/4992351-jim-jordan-matt-gaetz-donald-trump-attorney-general-pick/ It's my understanding is such a weasel phrase. Especially as they should know the rules as part of their job. I mean, when you are right, you are right.

! Moderator Note Based on the description of the topic there is likely no good discussion to be had, especially as it involves illicit drug abuse and might encourage harmful self-experimentation.

There were already assumptions that RFK Jr. will be tapped for health secretary, but it seems official now. At least it made kind of sense why he was so into dewormers. Next thing we know, we'll replace vaccines with well, disease, I presume.

I do think that this is also, and perhaps primarily driven by societal inclinations. Malicious actors exploit it, but it only works because folks were already half way there. Indeed, though one could argue that over time (at least for cigarettes) evidence was amassed and eventually became a fact in public consciousness. In this current information climate, I am not sure whether that would happen anymore.

I was thinking a little bit about what (up to this point) has been the biggest damage done by this new form for right-wing populism. And the element I keep getting back to is the full erosion of trust in institutions. While folks might have distrusted politicians, which is a good thing in terms of checks and balances, it has become a lack of trust into virtually anything, be it media, public health agencies, scientists and so on. This created a situation where anyone could appeal and win over folks, and especially giving algorithms and their companies outsized power over the public.

Yes, because it highlights that some of these parameters might have explanatory power to those differences. Two contradicting arguments are often made with regards to gun control in the US. 1) gun violence is just a thing that cannot be stopped structurally. It is just bad people making bad decisions; and 2) we cannot compare the US to anywhere else as the US is just so unique. Unless the argument is that the US is just uniquely bad, it must mean that the US has some structural issues.

Are you sure that is isn't the case though? But I will highlight again that lazy is not necessarily the point. Spending time on something else is not a sign of laziness, but of prioritization. Edit: I should add, that there are not a lot of incentives to do so, even before the rise of social media. Schools and Universities were the institutions where such skills were trained, with incentives to do so. Their influence has eroded as well and the modern media landscape and social media has a distinct anti-intellectual slant. Not necessarily out of maliciousness (though it adds to it) but in part simply because we reduced attention spans to less than a minute now.