Sunday, December 29, 2013

2016: Dems should nominate a 99%er woman for President, Not Hillary Clinton

The two progressive waves of our time shouldn't be split: an authentic champ of the 99% and the understandable desire for Dems to nominate a female presidential candidate. Sen. Warren is the natural match, but if she isn't running I think we should raise up another. I don't think Sen. Gillibrand or Sen. Clinton (who both made her millions in awful, awful ways) qualify. All who qualify seem to lack Clinton's ambition/crave for power. But I think one needs to be motivated to step forward. Otherwise we'll have to deal with the sad social psychological experience of millions of Democrats rationalizing support for dynastism, bribery (6 figures each for hundreds of speeches to rentier industries), and returning to power a first family that had a big role to play in deregulating Wall Street and supporting militarism. Why nudge the progressive masses into becoming this?

Wednesday, December 25, 2013

The Thriller concept destroyed by Adam Carolla

Maynard, I share your tastes (Rainbow's End by Vernor Vinge) but I've never seen our aesthetic destroyed more completely than by Adam Carolla's thriller parody concept. Terrorists hold the U.S. Olympic team hostage. The young Olympians defeat the terrorists by slightly besting world record physical achievements in battle with the terrorists (an 8.96m long jump across building tops, a 98.49m javelin throw to stop a terrorist, etc.). The existential implication is that the path to our survival will be either unremarkable, unlikely, or we're living in a thriller simulation.

Jesus and Most Biblical Characters -Composite Mythology or Real People?

I've been digging on Wikipedia and elsewhere, and I can't get a bead on if Jesus and certain biblical characters like Peter, Joseph and Mary are real or composite/mythological people. I think the problem is the discussion throughout history on all sides of this has been filled with the worst sort of bad faith empiricists. Let's dig in in good faith on this thread, and look critically at the theories and narratives from all sides.