I am unable to comprehend the huge objection that the GOP Tea Partiers have to Obama.
How Romney tricked the right
The key: Recognizing that conservative opposition to ObamaCare has nothing to do with the details of ObamaCare
http://www.salon.com/2012/03/27/how_romney_tricked_the_right/singleton/
I don’t like Obama, in fact I like him less than I liked Bush and I really didn’t like Bush (Bush was a moron, thus his idiocies could be explained; Obama is much more intelligent, thus his behavior is inexcusable). As a general rule, though, I can’t stand politicians because all I see are pathological liars corrupt to the point that they have become (or never were, I guess) immoral and unethical in the pursuit of their political goals, so my dislike is somewhat all encompassing.
Having said that, Obama has pretty much given the country everything that Bush tried to give the country (and plenty more!) so I am boggled at the vehement opposition to everything Obama. Are these people so completely blinded by racism? I don’t think it can be quite that simple, though, as Clinton (and I really didn’t like him, though I was firmly against the idea of impeaching him for getting a blow job in the oval office, what a fucking farce that was (which fortunately wasn’t made worse by actually convicting him)) got the exact same sort of treatment. Clinton, btw, was no godsend for the left either, though in my memory he wasn’t quite so dismissive of the left as Obama is (but my memory is notoriously poor, so it might just be rose colored).
I am a fond follower of Glenn Greenwald as someone who holds the left to the same standards now as he held the right when Bush was in charge. He has plenty of negative things to say about Obama, yet he is largely alone in his complaints. The ‘institutional’ left, for the most part, is completely OK with Obama committing the _exact_ same illegal acts as they complained so bitterly about when Bush was responsible.
Could it really be so simplistic that none of these people have a conscience? That, left or right, the vast majority of these people really only and exclusively care about ‘us’ vs ‘them’? That they will damn the same things that they supported and champion the things they vilified when they were in charge? Is the country made of sheeple so damn stupid that they can’t see the difference? Or, even worse, is the country filled with a populace so lacking in principle, intellectual honesty and self-awareness that they actively support this dichotomy?
Is this a human condition or something that is unique to the USofA? It really creeps me out to think that rather than being dumb-assed sheeple incapable of logical thought humans might actually be so Machiavellian that they happily will switch sides on an issue purely and simply so they can maintain their us vs them attitudes. Maybe I am just depressed right now and impugning too much intellect on people. Maybe they really are so stupid that they are unaware of how illogical and idiotic they are, but that begs the question how the hell did we, as a species, wind up achieving so much technology?
Perhaps my life-long goal of developing free enterprise in space is a really bad thing. Perhaps our species should remain on a single planet so we don’t run the risk of contaminating the universe.
Technology comes from 1%. It’s exploitation comes from a different 1%. Half the population is below average, intellectually. Much of the other half are improperly trained to use what they have.
Critical thinking is virtually non-existent. Group-think, which is a form of no-think, is the norm. Opinions are not held, they are passed out. If favor with one’s group requires flip-flopping, who’s to notice (unless one is denigrating it in another group.
A couple of generations after WWII were lucky: so much wealth was being produced that the mere crumbs falling from the table were enough to create relative prosperity for the 88% (10% still got screwed).
So I guess you are saying that the vast majority of humans are too stupid to be allowed to have any decision making capacity at all? To me that conclusion is inescapable if we agree that the average human is incapable of the Machiavellian thought necessary to consciously make these intellectual flip flops.
I have often characterized the humans species as seekers-of-low-energy points. What allows the species to improve its state is that a tiny minority (your 1% in technology, I guess) are the opposite and are hill climbers (technology inventors). These intrepid few explore all the local high spots and occasionally find new lower energy wells beyond the local high spots and with that as incentive the species flows to the new low energy spot. My father objected to that viewpoint and I have tried to find evidence against it, but seldom do.
I only know a few stupid people. I know a shot-pit full of people who don’t think, read, or discuss in any meaningful way. It is, as you say, a low-energy approach to daily life.
Few people care about things unless those things actually touch their lives. Who in the vast majority gave a crap about things like illegal search and seizure? It never touched them. Consider the loud hue and cry over the TSA. Finally, something intruded on their own space.
By the time enough people realize that their rights and powers have been abrogated they won’t have any tools left to remedy the situation.