Via Progressive Review, I learn that the chance of:
Being killed by a terrorist is 1 in 20 million
Being struck by lightning is 1 in 6 million
Being executed in Texas is 1 in 1 million
Dying in a bathtub is 1 in 800,000
Dying in a building fire is 1 in 99,000
Dying in a car accident is 1 in 19,000
Until the terrorism threat approaches that of a car accident, I don’t see any point in worrying. So let’s shut down the national security state and bring back civil liberties and the rule of law.
Reader Jeff at Have Coffee Will Write sent me this link to a Australian TV show that seems to have as its premise asking advertising agencies to come up with campaigns for extreme ideas. They usually get a good response but when they asked for campaigns to ban all religions, for the first time ad agencies declined to take part, even though earlier suggestions such as ‘Invade New Zealand’ or ‘Bring back child labor’ or ‘Euthanize everyone over eighty’ had not dissuaded them.
(For other posts in this series, see here.)
Reader Jeff asked three good questions about some of the issues I discussed in my series on the logic of science that I would like to address here. What follows are his questions and my responses.
“First, in Part II you discuss the concepts of Know-How and Know-Why. I am curious as to what extent these concepts might be applied to understanding the differences between the Hard Sciences (Physics, Chemistry, &c.) and the Soft Sciences (Psychology, Sociology, &c.) Are what we call Soft Sciences sciences at all?”
Science has considerable prestige as providing reliable knowledge and as a result many fields of study aspire to that label. But the issue of what distinguishes science from non-science is as yet unresolved. The know-how/know why distinction of Aristotle ceased to be considered viable as a means of distinguishing science from non-science when Newton came along. His laws of motion and gravity were spectacularly successful in explaining the motion of objects, especially the solar system. He thus provided the ‘know-why’ that had been previously missing from the purely empirical field of astronomy, lifting it into the realm of science. [Read more…]
Reading the Sunday papers was really quick today. I skipped over all the articles that had anything to do with 9/11, which resulted in almost the entire front and the forum sections being eliminated, along with good chunks of the others. Even the comic section, my favorite, took less time because some of them took the occasion to voice some sappy sentiment.
I was interested in seeing how the paper would deal with the first game of the football season for our team but in this one area, they did not let the anniversary get in the way and produced a full sports section and a supplement on the coming season.
The paper may wallow in manufactured grief but it has its priorities. Nothing gets in the way of football.
In this interview on Canadian television, journalist Chris Hedges, author of the book The Death of the Liberal Class adds texture to the bleak picture that I have been painting of the consequences of the complete oligarchic takeover of the US.
(Thanks to Norm)
Glenn Greenwald’s discussion on the ACLU report on the steep decline of civil liberties in in the US in the wake of that event is well worth reading.
The preamble to the ACLU report highlights the four major ways in which freedoms have been seriously compromised.
Everywhere And Forever War
The report begins with an examination of the contention that the U.S. is engaged in a “war on terror” that takes place everywhere and will last forever, and that therefore counterterrorism measures cannot be balanced against any other considerations such as maintaining civil liberties. The report states that the United States has become an international legal outlier in invoking the right to use lethal force and indefinite military detention outside battle zones, and that these policies have hampered the international fight against terrorism by straining relations with allies and handing a propaganda tool to enemies.
A Cancer On Our Legal System
Taking on the legacy of the Bush administration’s torture policy, the report warns that the lack of accountability leaves the door open to future abuses. “Our nation’s official record of this era will show numerous honors to those who authorized torture – including a Presidential Medal of Freedom – and no recognition for those, like the Abu Ghraib whistleblower, who rejected and exposed it,” it notes.
Fracturing Our “More Perfect Union”
The report details how profiling based on race and religion has become commonplace nationwide, with the results of such approaches showing just how wrong and ineffective those practices are. “Targeting the American Muslim community for counterterrorism investigation is counterproductive because it diverts attention and resources that ought to be spent on individuals and violent groups that actually pose a threat,” the report says. “By allowing – and in some cases actively encouraging – the fear of terrorism to divide Americans by religion, race, and belief, our political leaders are fracturing this nation’s greatest strength: its ability to integrate diverse strands into a unified whole on the basis of shared, pluralistic, democratic values.”
A Massive and Unchecked Surveillance Society
Concluding with the massive expansion of surveillance since 9/11, the report delves into the many ways the government now spies on Americans without any suspicion of wrongdoing, from warrantless wiretapping to cell phone location tracking – but with little to show for it. “The reality is that as governmental surveillance has become easier and less constrained, security agencies are flooded with junk data, generating thousands of false leads that distract from real threats,” the report says.
After selling out to the oligarchy during his presidency, now that election season is back, expect to see Obama return to his feisty populist campaign mode and try to fool ordinary people once again that he really cares about their interests.
In January 2010, my disgust with Obama had reached the point where I said the following:
It used to be the case that I would detest hearing or watching George W. Bush speak. The disjunct between his smug and lofty words about democracy and freedom and the reality of his crass polices was simply too much to take. During the campaign I enjoyed hearing Obama’s speeches because he seemed to be making thoughtful statements about important issues and appealing to the best in people. But now I cannot bear to listen to him either. I find galling the unctuous hypocrisy of his words. If anything, the gap between his words and his deeds is even greater than that of Bush, because he promises more and delivers less.
Now Matt Taibbi has also reached that stage. Recently at an airport he was forced to choose between sitting at a crowded gate with lots of screaming children and another area that was nearly empty and quiet except for a TV showing Obama giving his Labor Day speech. He says he chose the former:
Listening to Obama talk about jobs and shared prosperity yesterday reminded me that we are back in campaign mode and Barack Obama has started doing again what he does best – play the part of a progressive. He’s good at it. It sounds like he has a natural affinity for union workers and ordinary people when he makes these speeches. But his policies are crafted by representatives of corporate/financial America, who happen to entirely make up his inner circle.
I just don’t believe this guy anymore, and it’s become almost painful to listen to him.
I wonder how many people have come to the same realization.
In Act 2 of George Bernard Shaw’s play Pygmalion (which became the hit play and film My Fair Lady), Eliza Doolittle’s father Alfred complains to Henry Higgins how ‘middle class morality’ tends to shun poor people like him because they are the wrong kind of poor.
“What am I, Governors both? I ask you, what am I? I’m one of the undeserving poor: that’s what I am. Think of what that means to a man. It means that he’s up agen middle class morality all the time. If there’s anything going, and I put in for a bit of it, it’s always the same story: “You’re undeserving; so you can’t have it.” But my needs is as great as the most deserving widow’s that ever got money out of six different charities in one week for the death of the same husband. I don’t need less than a deserving man: I need more. I don’t eat less hearty than him; and I drink a lot more. I want a bit of amusement, cause I’m a thinking man. I want cheerfulness and a song and a band when I feel low. Well, they charge me just the same for everything as they charge the deserving. What is middle class morality? Just an excuse for never giving me anything.”
I was reminded of this when reader Norm sent me this news clipping.
Glenn Greenwald talks with Chris Hayes about the increasingly lawless class that we have created.
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