Stephan: One of the major divisions in America is the schism between those who have been educated to think rationally, and those who have not and as a result are easily manipulated by their emotions. Here is some data that explains this division.
The front lines of America’s cultural clashes have shifted in recent years. A vigorous wave of progressive activism has helped push the country’s culture to the left, inspiring a conservative backlash against everything from “critical race theory” to the supposed cancellation of Dr. Seuss.
These skirmishes may be different in substance from those that preceded them, but in the broadest sense they are only the latest manifestation of a half-century trend: the realignment of American politics along cultural and educational lines, and away from the class and income divisions that defined the two parties for much of the 20th century.
As they’ve grown in numbers, college graduates have instilled increasingly liberal cultural norms while gaining the power to nudge the Democratic Party to the left. Partly as a result, large portions of the party’s traditional working-class base have defected to the Republicans.
Over the longer run, some Republicans even fantasize that the rise of educational polarization might begin to erode the Democratic advantage among voters of color without a college degree. Perhaps a similar phenomenon may help explain how Donald J. […]
Thom Hartmann, - Alter Net//Independent Media Institute
Stephan: My takeaway from the California recall is that Republicans picked not the man who actually looked like he could be a competent governor, had been a mayor, understood how government worked had, for a Republican, presented a centrist view, Falconer, choosing instead a MAGAt orc, Elder. What this tells me is that as with the Republican anti-vaxxer position, MAGAt world is more interested in supporting White supremacy christofascist authoritarianism, then competent functioning democracy. That is quite scary.
March 4, 2017 // About 700 people gathered at the Minnesota capitol building to show support for Republican President Donald Trump. This was part of “March 4 Trump events around the country. Around 100 people were also there protesting against Donald Trump. // This man was yelling, “TRUMP! TRUMP! TRUMP! TRUMP! TRUMMMMMP!” Credit: Fibonacci Blue
I’m sitting in my home office working on the next morning’s Daily Rant when I hear what sounded like a man in my driveway yelling, at the top of his voice, “You f*cking c*nt!” and other female-specific obscenities. Walking to the window, I saw a guy in his 40s, red-faced, giving my wife the finger with both hands and cursing her out as he climbed into his car and squealed out of the driveway.
Louise, it turns out, had invited a local contractor to give us a bid on some repairs and she’d (very nicely) asked him, before letting him into the house, if he was vaccinated. He exploded and marched back to his car screaming curses at her.
Brian Schwartz, Politics and Finance Reporter - CNBC
Stephan: When I tell you that as a result of Citizens United the United States Congress is so corrupt it would put a banana republic in Latin American to shame, am I exaggerating? Read this. The fact is rich Republican christofascists understand very clearly how bad the corruption has become, and are putting their money where their prejudices are believing that they can rent Congress members as needed.
Robert Mercer and Rebekah Mercer attend the 2017 TIME 100 Gala at Jazz at Lincoln Center on April 25, 2017 in New York City. Credit: Patrick McMullan | Getty
The wealthy family led by Robert and Rebekah Mercer invested nearly $20 million last year into a dark money fund that allows donors to keep secret the ultimate destination of their contributions.
The Mercers, whose money helped propel Donald Trump to victory in 2016, hadn’t made a political contribution this size through their foundation since at least five years ago.
Some recent contributions to the Donors Trust have gone toward groups that pushed claims of election fraud before and after President Joe Biden defeated Trump in last year’s election.
The wealthy family led by conservative megadonors Robert and Rebekah Mercer, whose money helped propel Donald Trump to victory in 2016, invested nearly $20 million last year into a GOP-friendly dark money fund that allows donors to keep secret the ultimate destination of their contributions.
The Mercers’ donation, delivered through their family foundation, went to the Donors Trust, according to a new 990 disclosure form. […]
Stephan: This survey, which I think is very important, does not surprise me at all, but it gives us factual data. If I were in my 20s today, I would be both angry and scared because I would see my chance of having a family and a life anything like my parents or their friends as increasingly unlikely if not improbable. I consider anyone in a position of authority who is trying to block funding to upgrade our infrastructure in anticipation of what is coming, or who is blocking exiting the carbon power era by continuing to support the carbon energy industry, which is to say a few Democrats and most Republicans, to be a traitor. They have placed some other priority ahead of the wellbeing of the nation and the people they are sworn to serve.
This survey also tells me that our politics are about to change in a good way. These young people are not going to sit by passively while elderly old grifters like Mitch McConnell and Joe Manchin, or young cretins... well you know their names... destroy their future.
Credit: BBC
A new global survey illustrates the depth of anxiety many young people are feeling about climate change.
Nearly 60% of young people approached said they felt very worried or extremely worried.
More than 45% of those questioned said feelings about the climate affected their daily lives.
Three-quarters of them said they thought the future was frightening. Over half (56%) say they think humanity is doomed.
Two-thirds reported feeling sad, afraid and anxious. Many felt fear, anger, despair, grief and shame – as well as hope.
One 16-year-old said: “It’s different for young people – for us, the destruction of the planet is personal.”
The survey across 10 countries was led by Bath University in collaboration with five universities. It’s funded by the campaign and research group Avaaz. It claims to be the biggest of its kind, with responses from 10,000 people aged between 16 and 25.
Many of those questioned perceive that they have no future, that humanity is doomed, and that governments are failing to respond adequately.
Many feel betrayed, ignored and abandoned by politicians and adults.
PHIL ZUCKERMAN - ANDREW L. SEIDEL, Associate Dean of Pitzer College | Director of Strategic Response at the Freedom From Religion Foundation - Salon
Stephan: The Founders disagreed about a number of things, but one thing they mostly did agree on was they wanted religion and the state to be completely separate. Why did they feel so strongly about this? Probably because they or others within their immediate family history had suffered from the fact that in Britain church and state were one. Since Henry VIIIth the king had also been the head of the Anglican Church, and the Founders did not want that in their new country. But throughout our history, there have always been those who did want their religious beliefs and institutions to control the state. And at this moment our Supreme Court has become a hotbed of such individuals. As the recent decision by the court in the Texas abortion rights case illustrates we are in serious danger of destroying an already compromised judicial system.
This essay, with which I concur, accurately lays out reality. I find it is interesting that Associate Justice Amy Coney Barrett, in classic fascist denial protocol, denied the obvious when she said the justices of the court were not partisan hacks.
Amy Coney Barrett, Clarence Thomas and Brett Kavanaugh Photo illustration by Salon/Getty
The government of the United States of America is not, in any sense, founded on the Christian Religion.”
What forthright American declared such words? Bill Maher? Christopher Hitchens? Emma Goldman? No. They come from the Treaty of Tripoli, negotiated under George Washington, approved unanimously by the U.S. Senate and signed by President John Adams in 1797.
This early declaration — along with the First Amendment, which Thomas Jefferson solemnly revered “as building a wall of separation between church and state” — illustrates the unprecedented experiment our founders sought to test: a secular republic ruled by democratic laws, not sectarian faith; a nation whose government based its authority upon “we, the people” and not commandments handed down by distant gods. It is a brilliant endowment, given that in a pluralistic democracy such as ours, with people of many faiths and no faiths at all, we purposefully govern ourselves via secular legislation, not religious decrees.
But today, this bold pillar of American democracy is rotting fast. It is under attack by theocrats, especially those who sit on […]
