Very important… not so important… all depends…

 

Yesterday on this site, there was quite the kerfuffle regarding how important precedent is in American politics.  Our disagreement arose in light of the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, Colonel Mark A. Milley’s, “unusual actions” in the final days of the Trump presidency.  It was, indeed, an unusual time.

Several people, including Milley, Pelosi, and other power-players saw Trump as in an obviously (blatantly) declining and very unstable state-of-mind.  We all know, desperation cuts through everything, and Trump seemed quite desperate to stay in power, by hook or crook.  Many saw Trump as the proverbial “loose cannon” and were afraid he might try to start a nuclear WWIII, so he could then pretend to come back in and “fix it” (since he alone knows how to fix things).  Many suspect that Trump would have seen military action as a way of garnering enough patriotic political support to stay in power, in spite of the newly elected president, Joe Biden.  

Precedents, standards, protocols, chain of command, and in general the way stuff is normally done, seems to be falling by the wayside, in these strange political and tribal days.  So here are some questions to ponder:

-How important is political/legal precedent to you? 

-Where does old precedent end and new (some would say) “enlightened ways” begin?  How do you personally draw that fine line of when "what trumps what?"  What are the pivotal factors to consider?

-Should a society’s legal precedents be sensitive to the populace-at-large’s ever-changing values?  In other words, should precedents change as society changes, making instruments like The Constitution a “living document?”

Give us your thoughts on the concept of precedent.

Thanks for posting and recommending.

 

A new book updates the 1/6 coup attempt situation

Potential disaster #1: nuclear war with China

Last night, Rachael Maddow did a segment on her show about a book that will be released for sale next week. Two things jumped right out as extraordinarily big deals, not little deals. The first was how much fear there was about Lyin’ Donny’s (the ex-president) mental state. Chairman of the Joint Chiefs Gen. Mark Milley was deeply concerned that China was in a state of panic at the site of the 1/6 coup attempt. The Chinese government was afraid that Lyin’ Donny was preparing to start a war against China as a pretext to stay in power. The Chinese viewed the ex-president as a mentally unhinged loose cannon who just might attack China. 

It turns out that Gen. Milley viewed Lyin’ Donny about the same way as the Chinese. That is why he called his counterpart in the Chinese Liberation Army to calm him down and reassure him that the bizarre chaos of the 1/6 coup attempt was just democracy being “sloppy” and everything was under rock solid control in the US. Milley himself was actually unsure of how bad the situation was. In a phone call with House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, she repeatedly referred to the ex-president as crazy, a label that Milley explicitly agreed with. Pelosi and Milley discussed ways to stop the crazy ex-president from launching nuclear weapons in the event his poor mental condition led him to want to start a nuclear war.

In short, the situation in the federal government on 1/6 was highly chaotic and uncertain. It was so bad that a top US general was unsure of what our insane president might try to do. So, he (i) called the Chinese army to reassure them an attack on China was not imminent and everything was under control, and (ii) discussed the possibility of nuclear war with the Speaker of the House. 

An article today at The Hill comments:

The book claims Milley even discussed the possibility of the coup with his deputies.

 
“They may try, but they're not going to f------ succeed,” Milley told his deputies while discussing the possibility of a coup, according to the book. “You can't do this without the military. You can't do this without the CIA and the FBI. We're the guys with the guns.”

Potential disaster #2: the prospect of Pence blocking certification of the 2020 election

Another possible disaster was that Vice President Mike Pence was actually looking for ways to keep the ex-president in power. Pence’s search for a way to block or subvert the election came directly from the constant pressure that Lyin’ Donny was putting on him. The ex-president wanted Pence to commit election fraud on a massive, nationwide scale and Pence was craven, autocratic, stupid and corrupt enough to actually look for a way to do it and even discuss an electoral coup with at least one other person.

Clearly, Pence was trying to find a way to block or subvert the 2020 election so that the ex-president could stay in power. Pence called former Vice President Dan Quayle for advice about how he could subvert the election. Quayle warned him off of the idea of blocking or subverting the election. He told Pence to not even think about it because the idea was insane and dangerous. It was also blatantly illegal. Pence complained to Quayle about the pressure the ex-president was putting on him. 

A reminder of how far this anti-democratic, anti-election poison has spread

In the California recall election yesterday, the state’s fascist Republican Party (FRP) was blown out of the water. The governor was not recalled and it was not close. FiveThirtyEight writes:

Our colleagues at the ABC News Decision Desk projected that the recall would fail at 11:37 p.m. Eastern, barely half an hour after polls closed. As of this writing, 67 percent of voters voted against the recall, and 33 percent voted for it. That margin will almost certainly narrow as more votes are counted (the numbers we have right now are mostly mail ballots, which lean very Democratic), but it’s still likely that Newsom will survive by a large margin, perhaps even comparable to his 24-point win in 2018.

But even before the polls closed in California, the lead FRP candidate alleged widespread vote fraud. That candidate, Larry Elder (~43% compared to  ~10% for another leading candidate) is a fascist conspiracy theory crackpot and long-time radical right talk show host in Los Angeles. Elder believes the 2020 election was stolen. He may contest the recall election. As usual for FRP losers, Elder did not produce one shred of credible evidence of vote fraud. 

Elder’s alleged evidence of vote fraud was an alleged statistical analysis, Benford’s Law, of the votes used to detect vote fraud. The problem with that is that the statistical analysis cannot be done before an election. The votes have to be analyzed after an election. Despite that idiotic and fatal flaw, Elder was so enthusiastic about his vote fraud lie that he launched an anti-voter fraud website the day before the election, saying at that time that Newsome had won the election.

Clearly, the FRP’s election fraud poison has spread to states where FRP candidates lose. In states where FRP candidates win, there is no reason to allege fraud. The point is winning, not holding honest elections. That is fascism, or at least anti-democratic authoritarianism. 

Questions: 

1. What or who is the most alarmist and hyperbolic, (A) the FRP with its intense, nationwide attacks on non-existent fraudulent elections and constant resort to crackpot conspiracy theories about illegitimate elections, or (B) people who see and oppose the Republican Party and its attacks on elections as, among other bad things, anti-democratic and authoritarian or fascist? Or, is that a false dilemma logic fallacy, and if so, how is this issue better posited?

2. How close to nuclear Armageddon did the 1/6 coup attempt get us? 

3. How close were we to a subverted 2020 election from the pressure the ex-president put on the craven idiot Pence to subvert it?

4. Are people who do not see deadly threat from the FRP asleep at the switch, deluded by FRP propaganda and disinformation, or something else?

Adverse impacts of unvaccinated people on others

An opinion piece in the Washington Post makes it clear that people who refuse to get vaccinated can harm or even kill other people. The unvaccinated exercise their right to refuse to be vaccinated, but the harm they cause others and the economy, does not appear to be a major concern to most of that crowd. The WaPo writes:

This was Jan. 3, the start of an eight-month medical mystery. On Sept. 10, I was supposed to have the surgery that would finally let me breathe. Instead, a week before my doctors were scheduled to operate, my surgery was canceled because Tennessee’s hospitals have been overwhelmed by covid-19 patients.

I’m scared. I’m vaccinated, but a breakthrough case would be dangerous for me. I’m bone-deep disappointed. But mostly, I am angry. I did everything I was asked to do to avoid catching or spreading covid-19. I wanted to do my part to end this crisis. Now, I wonder: Are there any circumstances under which my neighbors would do the same to keep me safe?

It’s terrifying to experience a medical emergency during a pandemic.

That first lump made it impossible for me to breathe when I bent over. When I cleaned out the litter box or picked up a toy or put my laundry in the dryer, I held my breath. .... Psychologically, it was just easier to choose not to breathe than it was to be unable to breathe.

.... by the end of May, I felt like I was having trouble breathing again. Not in the same exact way as before — like the difference between being strangled and being smothered.

I went to another surgeon, but he said he didn’t want to operate without a clear diagnosis, because he didn’t want to crack my chest open without knowing what he was getting into or if he might be making it worse. As long as I was able to breathe, he’d hold off. It turns out that “able to breathe” is a more subjective standard than you might think.

I asked if there was a chance I could be bumped for covid-19 patients. She said yes, but that my surgery would be among the last taken off the calendar, due to the threat to my life.

And yet here I am.

Tennessee is a state where, as Hank Williams Jr. put it, “We say grace and we say ma’am. If you ain’t into that, we don’t give a damn.” Given that creed, if there’s any place where everyone should be helping their fellow Americans in a time of crisis, it should be here.

But instead, our hospitals are full of people who are very sick and dying because they couldn’t be bothered to get one of three safe and effective vaccines — or at the very least stay home as much as possible and wear masks when they had to go out. They wouldn’t do their civic duty, but they get access to hospitals in front of those of us who did. 

Intellectually, I know all the downsides to letting hospitals decide what patients they will and won’t take. I grew up through the AIDS crisis, and I witnessed the devastating evil of discriminating against patients with a particular illness. And I don’t want doctors to be deciding anyone is worthy of less care just because they have made some foolish decisions. I have and will make foolish decisions myself.

But I’m still so very angry that people who put their feelings before others’ well-being get to be first in the hospitals.  

The people who arrogantly claim that their choices not to be vaccinated and take precautions against covid-19 have no effect on anyone else need to know that isn’t true. I’m one of the people they’re hurting. What will it take to make them stop?

The moral question is should hospitals bump people who need treatment because they are full of unvaccinated patients with COVID?[1] Do the unvaccinated morally deserve equal treatment under current conditions where vaccines are available but rejected, while vaccinated people are suffering? Why is it that people who do their civic duty and are responsible tend to get this as a result of their good will and fair dealing with society?:

Questions: Is it fair and/or logical to blame (i) unvaccinated people, and (ii) politicians and propagandists who misinform, disinform, deceive and/or lie about the vaccine or COVID, for (a) the fear, harm and deaths they cause other people, and (b) the economic damage that flows from not being vaccinated? What is the morally or objectively right balance of blame, e.g., ~60% for group i and ~40% for ii, vice versa, or something else? How would Hank Williams see this, or should anyone (maybe other than Hank and his friends) not give a damn? 

Footnote: 

1. In a recent interview that NPR broadcast, a Harvard ethics professor argued that there is no moral reason to treat an unvaccinated person differently from one who is. His logic was that people often show up in hospitals after doing things they should not have done, and those people are treated no differently than ones who show up due to no fault of their own. That logic holds up under normal circumstances where there is adequate capacity to deal with both kinds of patients. But what about under current circumstances where (i) the unvaccinated people at fault have taken up all the capacity, leaving the not at fault patients to go pound sand and wait in suffering, and sometimes (ii) keep no-fault patients out of medical facilities simply to try to keep them from getting infected? IMO, the professor’s reasoning is flawed and not persuasive.

The mental state of the American radical right: Is civil discourse possible any more?

“There's a kind of notion that everyone’s opinion is equally valid. My arse! A bloke who’s been a professor of dentistry for 40 years doesn’t have a debate with some eejit who removes his teeth with string and a door!” -- Dara Ó Briain, Irish comedian exemplifying the informal logic fallacy called the balance fallacy or in the context of journalism, false balancing

The balance fallacy is an informal logical fallacy that occurs when two sides of an argument are assumed to have equal or comparable value regardless of their respective merits, when in fact one side is invalid or false. Accepting the bad side as valid or at least debatable can lead to the conclusion that the answer to a problem is to be found between the two extremes. The latter is effectively an inverse false dilemma, discarding the two extremes, one of which is true or correct, rather than the middle or false extreme, neither of which is not true or correct. -- RationalWiki on the balance fallacy

Since the departure of Lyin’ Donnie (the ex-president), accumulating evidence indicates that most of America’s radical right has neither calmed down nor changed their minds about the major lies the movement is currently mostly based on. Most of them, about 66% of Republicans as of Aug. 4, 2021, still believe the 2020 election was stolen and ~4% of Americans, ~13 million, are willing to engage in violent protests to rectify the terrible injustice that Lyin’ Donnie suffered. By now it is clear that at most, very few of those deluded, manipulated minds are going to change. The moral outrage and seething anger is not going to go away.  

To a major extent, radical right outrage and anger are significantly focused on fighting against the falsehood that Democrats are evil socialist tyrants. Some, only a few I hope, also believe they are other bad things such as alien lizard people, pedophiles and/or Chinese agents. Most appear to believe that they are fighting for liberty and truth against socialist tyranny and persecution. In fact, they actually support a fascist Republican Party (FRP), which is a force that actually fights for tyranny and persecution and against liberty for outsiders and truth.

Unless one comes to have some understanding of the working of the human mind, this would see to be such a confounding state of affairs that it literally is not possible. Well, it literally is possible and it is influential right now in the minds of tens of millions of deluded Americans.

Sometimes, I get pushback here that I am too soft on people who come here and repeat what are known lies, including the stolen election whopper. Under current dire, anti-democracy circumstances, it is objectively wrong to leave blatant falsehoods insufficiently challenged. I tend to commit that logic error, called false balancing or bothsidesism, by merely leaving disagreement as something like, ‘well, we disagree on the facts’ and then walk away from it. 

However, that is in fact not a disagreement on the facts. It is a disagreement over (i) facts and true truths competing against misinformation and/or disinformation, and/or (2) sound reasoning competing against partisan motivated reasoning, which is often crackpot.

Misinformation vs disinformation: The distinction lies in the intent of the falsehood's speaker or spreader. Misinformation is false information that one spreads because they believe it to be true. Disinformation is false information that one spreads even though they know it to be false, but they are knowingly trying to deceive people. 

Motivated reasoning: Emotionally biased reasoning to produce justifications or make decisions that are most desired rather than those that accurately reflect the evidence, while still reducing cognitive dissonance. In other words, motivated reasoning is the “tendency to find arguments in favor of conclusions we want to believe to be stronger than arguments for conclusions we do not want to believe.” It can lead to forming and clinging to false beliefs despite substantial evidence to the contrary. 

I got a nudge on this yesterday after I committed a false balance mistake with a commenter who was new here: “The crucial point is that if the GOP in its current form regains the Senate, and perhaps the House, all bets are off. BigC’s status as either gullible or mendacious matters little in the big picture. I only suggest that his/her comments be held to the same epistemic standards as any others here. By that standard his or her “evidence” (if you even call it that) is severely sub-par. That's all. .... The stakes are very, very high right now. It's far less important to “understand” each passing foot-soldier of the radical Right than to repel the fast-growing movement and the spread of conspiracy theory and pure falsehoods which draw new recruits to “the cause” every single day.”

One can’t argue with that.

I did not know the new person and out of caution wanted to extend respect by according them the benefit of my belief that their mindset was grounded in (i) misinformation, not disinformation and/or (ii) sound reasoning based on false belief instead of partisan motivated reasoning. One can see my mistake in that -- it jumps right out. There is no easy way of divining the speaker’s state of mind, and maybe no at all, easy or hard.

Given the stakes, and they truly are very high[1], the benefit of such doubts are not warranted any more. Arguably, they never were warranted. For the sake of truth, rationality, democracy and respect for other people, one really should not extend such benefits in the face of blatant falsehoods, regardless of the speaker’s intent or origin (dark free speech) of false beliefs. False information and beliefs should always be respectfully but firmly rebutted.

Question: Given that most radical right adherents react badly to being corrected when they cite false information or apply motivated reasoning, is civil discourse between the radical right and everyone else possible any more?

Footnote: 

1. The criticism I got yesterday was packaged with this point about the high stakes in a May 31, 2021 article published by The Hill:

Michael Flynn, former national security adviser in the Trump administration, appeared to call for a Myanmar-like coup to take place in the U.S. during a conference in Texas attended by many supporters of the QAnon conspiracy theory.

MarketWatch reports that Flynn made the remarks while speaking at the conference in Dallas, which was called "For God & and Country Patriot Roundup." In a video shared online, someone from the audience asks Flynn, "I want to know why what happened in Myanmar can’t happen here?”

This question elicited a round of cheers from the audience.

Once the crowd quieted, Flynn responded, “No reason. I mean, it should happen here.”

Flynn is a fascist and a convicted felon that Lyin’ Donnie pardoned. Flynn openly called for a military coup and the audience loved it. That is how high the stakes are. The fascist threat to democracy, the rule of law and civil liberties could not be any clearer, short of the actual military coup that some significant minority (~30% of Republicans?) of the radical right would support. Since most Republicans believe there was corruption in the 2020 election and probably most anything Democrats want to do, many people appear to be open to a military coup right now.