Cont: President Trump: Part 3

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Firestone said:
Twitter thread by Paul Krugman:

"Can we talk about working-class Trump voters for a minute? Will they ever realize or admit how completely they were scammed? ...
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No they probably won't. Like the guy in West Virginia told the interviewer: "Might lose my healthcare but at least I'll get my coal mining job back." Meanwhile the Alt-right crowd will be dismissing anything Krugman says as the words of a "New York liberal. Who cares?"
 
newyorkguy said:
No they probably won't. Like the guy in West Virginia told the interviewer: "Might lose my healthcare but at least I'll get my coal mining job back." Meanwhile the Alt-right crowd will be dismissing anything Krugman says as the words of a "New York liberal. Who cares?"
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The alt-right crowd, agreed: they are lost anyway for any sane policy.

But people like the guy in West-Virginia?

Will they all think that way when the jobs of the 1950's don't come back? I doubt it. They may not care for a New York liberal like Krugman, but they seem to care about the dire state of their local economy.
And when (and if) Trump doesn't deliver, at least some of these people will (hopefully) come to their senses.
 
According to fox & friends "Anti-Trump bias" means standing up for democracy and press freedom, doesn't that mean that trump is against democracy and freedom of the press?

"Fox & Friends" on Tuesday morning slammed newspapers for selling t-shirts with slogans that defend journalism, accusing the mottos of being "anti-Trump" even though they don't mention the president.

"Media bias on full display," the host begins. "Newspapers now cashing in on t-shirts splashed with anti-President Trump rhetoric. The Washington Post offering this shirt which says 'Democracy Dies in Darkness,' The L.A. Times selling shirts that say 'Journalism Matters,' and the Chicago Tribune's feature "speaking truth to power since 1847."
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http://thehill.com/blogs/blog-brief...ccuses-newspapers-of-anti-trump-bias-over-pro
 
Emily's Cat said:
Or, you know, I'm capable of being a complex person with many layers of thought.
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I have no doubt about that. I'd even suggest that you're more complex than you're admitting to, or are aware of.

Emily's Cat said:
I am appalled at the comment. That comment had only marginal impact on my decision. The two aren't incompatible.
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No. You said "that comment had only marginal effect on me personally".
You did not say "that comment had only marginal effect on my voting decision".
The context doesn't suggest that you were referring to your vote. If you were referring to your vote, then your first explanation of being complex and layered is a bit out of place. It's one or the other as an explanation.

Emily's Cat said:
You know, Trump's crotch-clutcher comment also appalled me. But it also had no material impact on my voting decision.
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That's very generous of you. I would have thought a reasonable person might give this, if not other things Trump said and did, more consideration.

Emily's Cat said:
Well, given that a large number of Clinton supporters have gone to great lengths in this thread to justify why her comment was perfectly acceptable... I was unaware that she herself had retracted it. Her supporters might take a page out of her book.
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Clinton supporters in this thread are not the issue. Why would you never have taken the time to do some research on the aftermath of the comment considering how strongly you feel about it? Considering how much other research you've done. If you've not given equal time to aggravating or mitigating arguments, would I be wrong to suspect bias on your part? Even now, you've made no concession.

Emily's Cat said:
Please show me where I've claimed to have greater understanding of 'the other side' than they have about me. While you're at it, why don't you fill me in on which side you think is mine? Maybe also point out where I've implied that the 'other side' was ignorant or uninformed, or only hold their view because they don't know any better?
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You've repeatedly mentioned the concepts of Naive Realism and the Illusion of Asymmetric Insight as if you're the only person aware of them, or the only one who does not fall foul of their effects. Neither of those are true. I do appreciate that you did bring them up though. I need the reminder of how my mind can trick me. I think others do too.
I made no mention of 'sides' at all, nor whether you were better or worse than anyone else at understanding either. I said you need to consider whether you're really being objective or not. I believe you think you are.

[[i realise that I have said "you" a lot in my recent posts. I apologise if you feel i'm attacking you personally, I don't mean it that way. I see your frustration at what you perceive as bias in the arguments from the 'left', but I'd point out that you've budged an equal distance - 0 - that's worth thinking about]]
 
I recently read an article about the way people process information. That 'critical thinking' usually takes a back seat to 'winning the argument.' Stanford University has done tests that have demonstrated this clearly. People have a strong tendency to embrace arguments that agree with their position and just plain reject arguments that don't. This can have serious consequences when people in government do it. An example is Scott Pruitt, the former attorney general of Oklahoma who Trump appointed head of the EPA.

Pruitt is a lawyer with no scientific background but he is poised to reverse a lot of EPA policy perhaps with the help of a Trump Executive Order. Pruitt is famous on the right for rejecting the role CO2 emissions play in temperature rise.
“There's tremendous disagreement about the degree of impact [of carbon dioxide], so I would not agree that it's a primary contributor to … global warming.” Link
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First, Pruitt is dead wrong when he says there is "tremendous disagreement" about the impact of CO2. If Pruitt is referring to the scientific community there is no disagreement. Even Republican scientists accept the role of CO2 in the warming of the upper atmosphere. This is from a science professor, a Republican, at Brigham Young University in Utah:
“The first thing we know,” Barry Bickmore says, “is that carbon dioxide is a greenhouse gas, which slows down the rate heat can escape from the Earth to space. “So the fact is — and this is just basic physics — if you put more carbon dioxide in the atmosphere, it will warm things up. [And] we know that burning fossil fuels puts more carbon dioxide in the atmosphere.”

We can also measure how much the concentration of CO2 in the atmosphere has increased, Bickmore says, and correlate that with changes in the global temperature. Doing that shows that the two are closely linked — as CO2 levels have gone up, temperatures have gone up. Basic physics predict this would happen; careful and widespread real-world data confirms that it has.
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The tremendous disagreement is mostly among hard core conservatives and the underlying issue is restrictions on burning fossil fuel which they oppose. As Al Gore said last night on PBS, the problem with leaders making policy based on philosophy rather than physical reality is the consequences. With Trump in the White House Pruitt is 'winning the CO2 argument,' and to his supporters, that's all that matters: winning the argument. But Pruitt's actions are likely to have consequences in the physical world that will produce the opposite of what Pruitt 'argues' they will.

In other words, you lose your healthcare AND you don't get your coal mining job back. ;)
 
newyorkguy said:
I recently read an article about the way people process information. That 'critical thinking' usually takes a back seat to 'winning the argument.'
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No, it doesn't! ;)

Stanford University has done tests that have demonstrated this clearly. People have a strong tendency to embrace arguments that agree with their position and just plain reject arguments that don't.
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Talk about confirming the obvious.
 
Argumemnon said:
...so?
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The "so" is that Exxon was ordered to provide Tillerson's emails to the New York Attorney General when the state was suing it for misleading investors, and the company may not have provided the ones that used Tillerson's alias. Honest mistake? Or concealing evidence?
 
newyorkguy said:
No they probably won't. Like the guy in West Virginia told the interviewer: "Might lose my healthcare but at least I'll get my coal mining job back." Meanwhile the Alt-right crowd will be dismissing anything Krugman says as the words of a "New York liberal. Who cares?"
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I read that interview as well and I could not believe how that guy was so easily duped.

And now, thanks to Trump and his supporters, he has lost both his job and his health care.
 
Fast Eddie B said:
Let me just add that most of the Trump supporters I have as Facebook friends are still at least outwardly optimistic.
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Mine, too. It's just that they're optimistic about banning those evil mooslims, or locking Clinton up, or that Trump's gonna do something about healthcare.

They don't seem aware that the Muslim ban was blocked by the courts, Trump isn't going after Clinton, and Trumpcare is going to cause 24 million to lose health insurance while increasing the out-of-pocket costs and decreasing the coverage for almost everyone else.
 
CapelDodger said:
Less than two months in and only most are still optimistic?

Regarding those few who aren't, are there any common factors behind their loss of faith?
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This wasn't directed at me, but in my Facebook feed, those who supported Trump before the election who do not appear optimistic about Trump anymore have simply stopped posting about any political issue.

Those who supported Trump before the election and appear optimistic now are those who claim not to trust "fake news" like CNN, and get all of their political news from Facebook memes spread by other Trump supporters.
 
Argumemnon said:
Oh, my. I can't believe Conway said you can spy people through their microwaves that turn into cameras...
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I've known that for years, which is why my microwave oven, TV, and cell phone are covered with duct tape. It gives me great comfort knowing that the government can't spy on me.
 
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