BEWITCHED, BOTCHED AND BEWILDERED ON MID-EAST DIPLOMACY

(For a retrospective on the current Syria crisis, I am re-posting this newspaper column written by me last year)

Have decades of Middle Eastern conflict made us safe or wise? Last year in back-to-back interviews, the consequences of political pandering and slipshod journalism converged.

Matt Lauer’s bungled interview of Donald Trump failed to reveal this flip-flop: Trump was for the war before he was against it.

“And what is Aleppo?” asked Libertarian candidate Gary Johnson, fudging a question from Mike Barnicle on MSNBC. ”You're kidding,” replied Barnicle incredulously.

Which is worse? Our slovenly state of partisan debate, or failures of journalism to properly cover the news?

ABOUT YOUR INTERNET PRIVACY (MEANING THE LACK THEREOF)

Your Internet Service Provider (ISP) has won the legal right to monitor your browsing history and sell these data for profit — without your knowledge or permission.

It means your online transactions, your email, your social contacts and conversations … all your secrets … can be sold to any bidder. Your life in Cyberspace is now an open book. Goodbye, privacy. Hello, blackmail. 

In conservative circles, the new Internet bill will level the playing field and humble the thousand pound guerrilla known as Google. Despite this claim, the new bill signed into law puts another Big Brother in your living room. Conservative double speak masks a hidden agenda.

HOW THE DARK SIDE OF SUPPLY SIDE UNLEASHED THE ZOMBIE APOCALYPSE

The giant sucking sound came without warning, the sound of 1,400 jobs moving to Mexico. “We recognize the impact on employees, their families, and the community,” intoned the president of Carrier Corporation.

“Yeah, [expletive deleted],” an angry voice shot across the room. After years of record productivity and earnings (plus a $12 billion stock buyback), the layoff came as a betrayal ... and a giant sucking sound heard across America.

WELCOME TO THE NEW WORLD DISORDER

Churning and turning in the widening quagmire, the best are having conniptions while the worst are full of it. So son-in-law Jared has a new job - to transform democracy into a democrazy. Daughter Ivanka is put in charge of Klepto-Incestpotism. And the Trumpaparazzi have sold out to the Putinazi. Surely, a crisis is at hand. Hardly are these words spoken when every new visage troubles our sight. With each passing day, we ask: What rough beast, its hour come round at last, slouches in the White House to reap more havoc?

Agenda for Woodfield Residents' Meeting – April 2

FIRST:  Please accept your blog invitation so you can activate your membership and participate in this forum.

THE ART OF WILLFUL SELF-DELUSION

Motivated reasoning and cognitive bias are terms used by psychosocial researchers to describe a tendency among people to filter information, turn off eyes and ears, and consider only the evidence they want to hear.

Everyday in our local newspaper, I read letters to the editor.  Letters from shills and hotheads.  Letters from bigots who rationalize their bigotry even as they deny it.  Most remarkable is the inventiveness of people who go to extraordinary lengths to rationalize the irrational and engage in willful self-deception.

UNNERVING INNERVATIONS

Here is a variation of the knee reflex test. Called the "hammer strikes thumb" test (self-explanatory), its purpose is to measure the time it takes for a pain signal to reach the brain and elicit an "ouch" response. As a measure of the bullshit threshold, some people wince faster than others. Wham!