Maggie's Farm

We are a commune of inquiring, skeptical, politically centrist, capitalist, anglophile, traditionalist New England Yankee humans, humanoids, and animals with many interests beyond and above politics. Each of us has had a high-school education (or GED), but all had ADD so didn't pay attention very well, especially the dogs. Each one of us does "try my best to be just like I am," and none of us enjoys working for others, including for Maggie, from whom we receive neither a nickel nor a dime. Freedom from nags, cranks, government, do-gooders, control-freaks and idiots is all that we ask for.

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Saturday, August 17. 2019

Saturday morning links

15 Stats That Show Americans Are Drowning in 'Stuff'


 My Time in the University Gulag


 Here’s why my fellow millennials are seduced by socialism




The American Left, and loathing America:





Some time ago, I noted the irreconcilable difference between the Left and the rest of America: the majority of our fellow citizens believe America is an inherently good nation that continues its pursuit of a more perfect union; the Left believes America is an inherently evil nation that must be transformed fundamentally into an oppressive socialist state—at best.




For the Left to win this existential argument, it must distort and revile America’s history to destroy the truth of American Exceptionalism. If the past is evil, the present has no choice but to reject America’s history and its defenders; and to embrace the dishonest leftist ideology and the agenda of those who loathe America.








Posted by Bird Dog in Hot News & Misc. Short Subjects at 07:46 | Comments (15) | Trackbacks (3)

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Amen to Americans are drowning in stuff and the packaging the stuff came in. It is compounded in some jurisdictions by the restrictions on garbage collection. My grands are drowning in clothes, toys, books and shoes. It's the shoes that really get me, that and my loathing for small toys that are chocking hazards. I don't know what to buy for presents anymore so I don't; birthdays are just another day. Nothing is special.
OT: I also don't believe that all the imported junk is screened for hazards, case in point, the asbestos contamination of Jojo Silwa's cosmetics for little girls.
#1 Exasperated on 2019-08-17 09:43 (Reply)
And yet in the article on the socialist "wavelet" in Chicago blames the success of socialist candidates in part on rising rents and people living paycheck to paycheck.
#1.1 mudbug on 2019-08-17 09:57 (Reply)
Speaking of packaging, a recent foray to a computer shop for some accessories had me pondering the amount of plastic these things are surrounded with.

A friend in the IT business once told me:

"The reason for all the extraneous clear plastic and cardboard is to reduce the ease with which shoplifting little shits - they are always male juveniles - can abscond with the inventory."

But, but... the children are our future!
#1.2 JJM on 2019-08-17 16:04 (Reply)
I avoid the "stuff" category with the overpackaging by gifting silver eagles to nieces and nephews and their kids. Easy to ship or transship as well. Kids love coins and stamps.
#1.3 indyjonesouthere on 2019-08-17 17:44 (Reply)
Friend showed me 2 cards that had been put at his house in South St Petersburg, Florida by 2 City Council candidates. Both talked about black reparations and making other people (not black) pay for things they want. The cards were professionally produced and looked very slick. No mention of trying to get along,just we want our stuff. Ironically one of the two City Council candidates was half black. So does mean the white half gives the black half reparations? Socialism in action, It's one thing to read about it here and another to see it closeup.
#2 Grant1863 on 2019-08-17 10:02 (Reply)
The climate change video was very good. I was aware that many reporting stations turn out garbage data but was not aware of the homogenization issue as a factor in corrupting good data.

Seems to me that an honest attempt to correct garbage data from UHI effects would require something like measuring the urban increase observed since 1910 (for example) and if nearby rural stations show essentially no warming, or even cooling, well, that urban increase is your UHI-induced error, quantified for you. Subtract it from current temps. Obviously this is an over-simplification but something like that would address UHI.

The other way to correct would be to ignore it. Do we need urban temperatures to see global, long-term temperature trends?
#3 Jeff Brokaw (Link) on 2019-08-17 10:28 (Reply)
There is a visual and pithy way to describe why Socialism fails and current leftist philosophy, what ever the form will lead to a bad place. In a nut shell, it is the inherent and stated zero sum philosophy of the left. The left has fully embraced zero sum philosophy along with nihilism and since 2008 has been using identity politics as a trust destroying sledge hammer.Based on game theory you can't ever build the trust needed for long term peak societal functionality with this philosophy. The main US culture use to be very trust based but that has been eroded by the number of people cheating the system and a sense of if I don't do it not only will someone else but I'll be the sucker holding the bag. I knew this kinesthetically when I lived in Louisiana for a short time. We have reached a tipping point in the main stream on the sucker holding the bag part and you can see it and feel it. There is a road back but you need leaders and a culture that inherently understands at a gut level why character matters. https://ncase.me/trust/
#4 Karen on 2019-08-17 10:33 (Reply)
Very nice comment. We need millions of Trump like leaders - just not with his personal baggage. I do believe that Trump is a good person at heart; he genuinely cares about people. The world could use a bunch more people that genuinely care about their fellow human beings.
#4.1 B. Hammer on 2019-08-17 11:28 (Reply)
Thanks. High trust culture wins WWII and goes to the moon, medium to low slide into sh hL.

Caught a little of Scott Adams the other day - hilarious and sad that he was proposing folks fill out a high trust form and use a high trust system for immigration that would penalize honesty and reward cheating (which we know is rampant already) when we use to have a proven system - just ask people that came in the early 60's when it was really hard to get in. Talk about low hanging, proven fruit that's being ignored. I do think that is one of our problems in the US - too much high trust system being used with a lower trust culture shift. But you can't tell Scott Adams anything in a tiny comment field and he's a bit allergic to hearing about his blind spots, as we all are. One of which is why character matters. Guess we are going to have to "rediscover" what we once knew at what Jordan Peterson calls a religious level (preverbal). In the mean time we need low trust systems and to rebuild a high trust culture.
#4.1.1 Karen on 2019-08-17 12:33 (Reply)
Wretchard at Belmont Club says:

The crisis of confidence in Western institutions can be described as a crisis of morality. The public has discovered that many public figures are shams. The #MeToo sex scandals, the accusations of collaborating with foreign powers, and most recently the Epstein case have undermined the reputation of our social betters. They are perceived are no better than the common clay and probably a good deal worse. This has undermined the trust that formerly allowed them to exercise authority over the public.

. . . What changed was the realization that without morality there is no trust and without trust, nothing works. Unchecked, this will result in a low-trust society where nobody can rely on the formal rules and reliance is placed on nepotism, tribalism, personal loyalty, and threats to transact business at all.

https://pjmedia.com/richardfernandez/terror-without-trust/
#4.1.1.1 feeblemind on 2019-08-17 13:28 (Reply)
Amen. Especially the part about defining the "new morality" as a moving target to consolidate power. I wish I knew if this was thoughtful and deliberate or an accident of human nature.
#4.1.1.1.1 Karen on 2019-08-18 09:32 (Reply)
The only way Socialism can really survive is as a set of attractive ideas being proposed to middle class people who have never experienced it for themselves, or as escapist politics for poor people. I know several formerly-middle class Venezuelans and it has been painful to see them navigate the past 20 years there. And I notice that all of the avowed Socialist mavens in our culture are ensuring they are conducting their evangelism from the comfortable bosom of a prospering Capitalist Republic. I don't see any of them propounding their message from bully pulpits in, say, Venezuela, or Algeria, or Cuba, or Nicaragua, or Vietnam. Nor do I see experts from Socialist countries being ambassadors of the Socialist message here in the USA, at the invitation of their comrades.

Go to Wikipedia and query "List of Socialist States". Ask AOC and Bernie and the Rest of the Reds what they admire most about each one, and where their retirement dream home would be located. And incidentally, the biggest subsection of the list of Socialist Countries is under the heading: "Former".
#4.2 Aggie on 2019-08-17 12:22 (Reply)
QUOTE:
The only way Socialism can really survive is as a set of attractive ideas being proposed to middle class people who have never experienced it for themselves, or as escapist politics for poor people.

It can't be put much better than this, Aggie.

QUOTE:
And I notice that all of the avowed Socialist mavens in our culture are ensuring they are conducting their evangelism from the comfortable bosom of a prospering Capitalist Republic.

It's a spectacular bit of parasitism, isn't it?

QUOTE:
Nor do I see experts from Socialist countries being ambassadors of the Socialist message here in the USA, at the invitation of their comrades.

Better to have ditzy AOC sell the dream than some poor bastard apparatchik from Venezuela describe the reality.
#4.2.1 Bill Carson on 2019-08-17 14:42 (Reply)
Remembering Woodstock: It mostly sucked

http://maggiesfarm.anotherdotcom.com/archives/12216-Remembering-Woodstock-It-mostly-sucked.html#comments
#5 feeblemind on 2019-08-17 17:48 (Reply)
Fascinating Story of Nick and Bobbi Ercoline, the Couple in the Iconic Woodstock Album Cover Are Still Together 50 Years Later!

https://www.vintag.es/2019/08/nick-and-bobbi-ercoline.html
#6 feeblemind on 2019-08-18 00:02 (Reply)

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