The Dunning Kruger Effect: Part II

To paraphrase Dunning-Kruger: Fools lack the tools to recognize their foolishness; i.e. their limitations. The alternative to this lack of self-awareness is to blame someone else for their failures; to wit, that secret Muslim-Kenyan commie illegally occupying the White House. Naturally, this illegal occupation trope is being sold to the gullible as a promise by certain GOP presidential candidates to repeal every piece of legislation, every executive order, signed into law by our illegitimate president. Because freedom!

The Dunning-Kruger Effect: Part 1

“This might be seen as a sign that the American right has finally crossed the border into looney-land.” Perhaps observations from the field of cognitive science, the Dunning-Kruger effect, can help explain why.

The Powell Memo: Part II

It’s been a pretty straight line from the Powell Manifesto, to Citizens United, to the rise of anonymous billionaire financed Superpacs. As the crowded GOP presidential race has shown, there are no shortage of opportunists willing to prostitute themselves for a place at the table.

The Powell Memo: Part I

In an historical arc that began almost forty years earlier, Citizens United was the culmination of actions promulgated in The Powell Memo, aka The Powell Manifesto.

The Birth Of Jesus of Nazareth

Joshua Ben Joseph (Jesus) was born at noon, August 21, 7 B.C. But it’s impossible to get into the “Christmas” spirit in August, so we don’t even try.

Carpet Bombing Agrabah

41% of Donald Trump supporters support the bombing of the city of “Agrabah.” Unfortunately for them, the strategic value of same would be nil, since Agrabah was the capital of Princess Jasmine’s homeland in the animated Disney cartoon, “Alladin.” Ted Cruz voters prefer it be carpet bombing, to see if they could “make the sand glow in the dark.”

Lifeboat Ethics For Compassionate Conservatives?

There are no Compassionate Conservatives in lifeboats… or anywhere else. Confronted with the ethics of other in a lifeboat of their own making, five “leaders” tell it like it is. . . In Alfred Hitchcock’s classic 1944 film, Lifeboat, a few British and U.S. civilians, a German combatant, and a couple merchant marines are stuck in a lifeboat* together after their ship …