Friday, February 6th, 2015
An Anonymous Member of Congress, - Vox
Stephan: The Congress has become so fundamentally degraded we are beginning to see whistleblowers telling us the suppressed truth. This is the state of American democracy, and it is not a happy story. Not particularly his first point, that Congresspersons are not out of touch with the people that elect them. Ultimately in a democracy people get the kind of government they vote for. Note also his second point: Congress listens first and foremost to money.
Credit: voices.washingtonpost.com
I am a member of Congress. I’m not going to tell you from where, or from which party. But I serve, and I am honored to serve. I serve with good people (and some less good ones), and we try to do our best.
It’s a frustrating, even disillusioning job. The public pretty much hates us. Congress polls lower than Richard Nixon during Watergate, traffic jams, or the Canadian alt-rock band Nickelback. So the public knows something is wrong. But they often don’t know exactly what is wrong. And sometimes, the things they think will fix Congress — like making us come home every weekend — actually break it further.
So here are some things I wish the voters knew about the people elected to represent them.
1) Congress is not out of touch with folks back home
Congress is only a part-time job in Washington, DC. An hour after the last vote, almost everyone is on the airplane home. Congress votes fewer than 100 days a year, spending the rest of the time back […]
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Friday, February 6th, 2015
Michael Coblenz, - Alternet (U.S.)
Stephan: When I was at university I was required to read Friedrich Hayek's The Road to Serfdom. Even though Hayek was a Nobel Laureate his writing reminded me more than anything else of Ayn Rand's work, which a friend had just read, nagged me into reading, and which he was constantly quoting. I thought both books were pretentious and sophistic, although I was intimidated by Hayek's prestige, and my own sense my understanding of economics was inadequate. History has proven that my original impression was correct. In spite of the obvious evidence of the wrongness of both Rand and Hayek, I am constantly counseled by Rightists that if I would just read their work I would see the revealed Godly truth, and it would drive my "indulgent socially progressive delusions away like a fog," as a Rightist reader recently wrote me. And his is not an isolated perspective, if you go to almost any Theocratic Right website you will still find their thinking quoted or paraphrased. Representative Paul Ryan does it all the time.
Friedrich A. Hayek
Credit: www.britannica.com
Since the 2014 midterm elections, Democrats have been trying to figure out what happened. There are probably dozens, if not hundreds, of reasons for the Democratic bloodbath. But one reason, in my opinion, is that Democrats never discuss, much less analyze, the fundamental theories of modern conservatism. As a result, erudite-sounding nonsense is passed off as wisdom, and sways an electorate grasping for answers. Republican calls for limited government find fertile ground with workers whose wages are stagnating.
One of the intellectual foundations of this idea of limiting government comes from an Austrian émigré economist named Friedrich A. Hayek, in his 1944 book The Road to Serfdom. Conservatives use that term as shorthand for the idea is that socialism and centralized economic planning don’t work and ultimately lead to totalitarianism, which ends up enslaving the people and impoverishing a nation. That idea taken alone isn’t necessarily wrong, but the theory actually takes a step back and says that any form of centralized economic planning, including government […]
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Friday, February 6th, 2015
Caitlin Millett, - The Conversation
Stephan: If you read SR regularly you know I have been writing about the neuroscience of prejudice, fear, and politics for about five years. The research just keeps piling up and I have come to the conclusion that this is a major factor in our politics. I like this report because it makes the point that there are things we can do not to be driven by the neuroscience of prejudice and fear. Unfortunately in the Red value states exactly the opposite conditioning is happening.
Credit: Shutterstock
Humans are highly social creatures. Our brains have evolved to allow us to survive and thrive in complex social environments. Accordingly, the behaviors and emotions that help us navigate our social sphere are entrenched in networks of neurons within our brains.
Social motivations, such as the desire to be a member of a group or to compete with others, are among the most basic human drives. In fact, our brains are able to assess “in-group” (us) and “out-group” (them) membership within a fraction of a second. This ability, once necessary for our survival, has largely become a detriment to society.
Understanding the neural network controlling these impulses, and those that temper them, may shed light on how to resolve social injustices that plague our world.
Prejudice in the brain
In social psychology, prejudice is defined as an attitude toward a person on the basis of his or her group membership. Prejudice evolved in humans because at one time it helped us avoid real danger. At its core, prejudice is […]
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Friday, February 6th, 2015
Miranda Leitsinger, - NBC News
Stephan: Alabama may be headed to a Constitutional crisis as this report describes. However, I think the important point here is that Alabama voters voted this buffoon back into office after he was thrown off the court for his theocratic rightist blatant bias. Roy Moore represents the majority thinking in Alabama.
Alabama Chief Justice Roy Moore.
Credit: AP Photo/Dave Martin
Alabama’s top judicial official, Roy Moore, issued a memo on Tuesday telling the state’s probate judges that they’re not required to issue marriage licenses to same-sex couples though a federal court has ruled they must.
It was the latest exchange over a federal judge’s decision in early January striking down Alabama’s gay marriage ban. After Moore said he believed the ruling only applied to the state attorney general, the federal judge responded that it meant state judges had to provide the licenses.
Moore, Alabama’s controversial state Supreme Court known for installing a plaque of the Ten Commandments in 2001, issued a memo to the probate judges a few hours after the 11th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals declined to hear the state’s challenge to ending the gay marriage ban.
“I hope this memorandum will assist weary, beleaguered, and perplexed probate judges to unravel the meaning of the actions of the federal […]
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Thursday, February 5th, 2015
Brian Fung, - The Washington Post
Stephan: This is some wonderful news. The process is still not complete but the right decision appears imminent. Tele-communications are going to be seen as public utilities, equally open to all. There is still a vote to go, so it wouldn't hurt to write the FCC once again and tell them you support Chairman Wheeler's draft.
Federal Communications Commission (FCC) Chairman Tom Wheeler speaks
Credit: MSNBC.com
The chairman of the Federal Communications Commission just said he’s proposing the “strongest open Internet protections” the Web has ever seen.
In a Wired op-ed, FCC Chairman Tom Wheeler announced he wants to regulate Internet providers with the most aggressive tool at his disposal: Title II of the Communications Act. In addition to covering fixed broadband providers such as Comcast and Time Warner Cable, the draft rules would cover wireless providers such as T-Mobile and Sprint. The rules would also make speeding up or slowing down Web traffic — a tactic known as prioritization — illegal. And it would ban the blocking of Web traffic outright.
It all adds up to the most significant intervention ever undertaken by federal regulators to make sure the Web remains a level playing field. It is, depending on your ideology, either an unprecedented example of government overreach that will ruin the republic or the most egalitarian, pro-competitive thing the FCC may do in the 21st century.
“My proposal assures the rights of Internet users to go where they […]
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