Moral rot watch: Christian nationalist elites

A NYT opinion by David French opines: 

Tucker Carlson’s Dark and Malign 

Influence Over the Christian Right

On April 25, the far-right network Newsmax hosted a fascinating and revealing conversation about Tucker Carlson with Tony Perkins, president of the Family Research Council, one of America’s leading Christian conservative advocacy organizations. Perkins scorned Fox News’s decision to fire Carlson, and — incredibly — also attacked Fox’s decision to fire Bill O’Reilly. These terminations (along with the departures of Glenn Beck and Megyn Kelly) were deemed evidence that Fox was turning its back on its conservative viewers, including its Christian conservative viewers.

What was missing from the conversation? Any mention of the profound moral failings that cost O’Reilly his job, including at least six settlements — five for sexual harassment and one for verbal abuse — totaling approximately $45 million. Or any mention of Carlson’s own serious problems, including his serial dishonesty, his vile racism and his gross personal insult directed against a senior Fox executive. It’s a curious position for a Christian to take.

Similarly curious is the belief of other Christians, such as the popular evangelical “prophet” Lance Wallnau, that Carlson was a “casualty of war” with the left, and that his firing was a serious setback for Christian Republicans. To Wallnau, an author and a self-described “futurist,” Carlson was a “secular prophet,” somebody “used by God, more powerful than a lot of preachers.”

Other prominent Christian members of the American right applauded Carlson’s “courage” or declared — after The Times reported that Carlson condemned a group of Trump supporters for not fighting like “white men” after “jumping” an Antifa member — that Carlson did “nothing wrong.” Rod Dreher, editor-at-large at The American Conservative, said, “I hope Tucker Carlson runs for president,” and a “Tucker-DeSantis ticket would be the Generation X Saves The World team.”

I’m going to pause now and confess that I was once naïve. I was especially naïve about human nature. As a much younger Christian, I’d read stories of unholy violence and hatred unleashed in Jesus’ name in religious conflicts of even the recent past and think, “Thank God that’s over.” I felt comfortable in my Christian conservatism. My conservatism reflected my best effort to discern the policies that would contribute to justice and human flourishing, while my Christianity hovered over everything, hopefully (though not always, I must confess) infusing my public engagement with humility and kindness.

After all, isn’t “love your enemies” a core Christian command? The fruit of the spirit (the markers of God’s presence in our lives) are “love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control,” not Republicanism, conservatism and capitalism.

But the temptations — including the will to power and the quest for vengeance — that plagued the Christians of the past still plague the Christians of today. These temptations can plague people of any faith.

Within conservative circles it has always been surprisingly difficult to tie a decline in Christian political virtue to the rise of Donald Trump. What seems obvious from a distance (wait a minute, didn’t Christians used to place a premium on the importance of character in politicians, especially during Bill Clinton’s scandals?) was less obvious up close. In countless personal conversations with Christians who are staunch Republicans, I heard some variation on the same plaintive question, “What do you want us to do? Hand an election to Hillary Clinton? Or to Joe Biden?”

This is just another garden variety warning by Germaine that something is seriously, gravely wrong with (i) American democracy and politics generally, and (ii) the American secular and Christian radical right. 

For Christians who ignore the undeniable moral rot of the leaders they support and want to follow, there is almost zero chance of them ever voting for any Democrat for president. That is how poisoned those minds are. For Christians with that mindset, it just does not matter who the Dems run for president. They will be hated, vilified, slandered and despised in self-righteous, God-sanctioned outrage.

What is Biden's new policy on asylum?

 Anticipating a potential surge of migrants at the southern border, the Biden administration on Feb. 21, 2023, announced a crackdown on those seeking asylum after unlawfully entering the U.S.

This week the policy is set to go into effect. The following article appeared both in The Conversation and Government Executive in late February and early March respectively. It was written by Karen Musalo an expert on refugee law at the University of California College of the Law, San Francisco, to explain what the new rule entails, what its impact will be and why it is so controversial. At the bottom of the page I have provided links to more supportive articles on the policy, both from the Council of Foreign Relations.

What is the new policy?

The Biden administration’s new rule – which is set to come into force on May 11 – will bar from asylum all non-Mexican migrants who arrive at the southern U.S. border without having first sought and been denied asylum in at least one of the countries they passed through on their journey.

The only migrants exempted from this rule are those who use a U.S. government app, CBP One, to make an appointment to apply for asylum at an official port of entry. All others will be subject to a presumption of ineligibility unless they can demonstrate “exceptionally compelling circumstances,” such as a medical emergency – which they will have to prove during a rapid screening process in a border holding cell.

The policy – which immigrant rights advocates, congressional leaders and faith groups are calling an “asylum ban” or “transit ban” – is almost identical to one implemented by the Trump administration in 2019. The Trump-era rule was later struck down by the courts as unlawful.

Why is the new rule being proposed now?

The Biden administration is concerned that the expiration of a pandemic-era rule will lead to greater numbers of immigrants at the southern border.

In March 2020, the Trump administration totally closed the border to asylum seekers in a policy referred to as Title 42. It justified the closure as necessary to protect public health during the COVID-19 pandemic. However, these health concerns were just a pretext; it has been well documented that high-level officials in the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention were opposed to the policy and acceded only under intense White House pressure.

Turning away all asylum seekers in this way was totally unprecedented, and inconsistent with U.S. domestic and international legal obligations.

Biden campaigned on promises to restore a humane asylum system. But on assuming the presidency he continued Title 42 and even expanded it to include individuals from additional countries.

Immigration rights advocates brought successful legal challenges to terminate the policy, while attorneys general of Republican-led states sued to keep it in place. Finally, in January 2023, the Biden administration announced that on May 11 it would end the coronavirus health emergency, which had provided the legal authority for the border closure.

This means Title 42 also comes to an end on May 11. Unwilling to restore access to asylum as had existed for 40 years before former President Donald Trump’s border closure, the Biden administration proposed the new rule.

Is the policy legal?

In 2019, the Trump administration proposed a rule very similar to that put forth by Biden, prohibiting asylum for migrants who did not first apply in countries of transit. The courts struck down the policy for violating the 1980 Refugee Act, which guarantees the right of all migrants who reach the United States to apply for asylum.

A bipartisan Congress passed the Refugee Act to bring the U.S. into compliance with its international obligations under the U.N.‘s 1951 Refugee Convention and its 1967 Protocol, which prohibit returning refugees to any country where their lives or freedom would be threatened.

In striking down the Trump-era rule, the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals pointed out that the Refugee Act is very specific about the circumstances under which the government can deny asylum for failure to apply in a transit country. Under the act’s “safe third country” provision, that can happen only if the transit country is safe and has both a robust asylum system and a formal treaty with the United States agreeing to safe third-country status. The court found the Trump administration lacked all three conditions for imposing such a ban.

The Biden rule is somewhat different from Trump’s. It does not apply to individuals who schedule an asylum appointment at ports of entry through the CBP One app.

But this does not make the policy lawful. The Refugee Act expressly permits asylum seekers to access protection anywhere along the border – not just at ports of entry. And it does not require appointments to be made in advance.

In addition, CBP One has been plagued with significant technical problems, preventing many from even making appointments, and has raised serious equity and privacy concerns.

And more importantly, there is no getting around the fact that most countries of transit neither are safe for migrants nor have functioning asylum systems.

Asylum seekers arriving at the U.S. southern border pass through Mexico, which is notoriously dangerous for migrants, and countries such as Nicaragua, El Salvador, Guatemala and Honduras, which are similarly unsafe and do not have anything approaching functioning asylum systems.

Costa Rica, the one transit country in the region with an admirable human rights record and an established asylum system, is currently receiving 10 times the number of asylum seekers as the United States on a per capita basis, and its system is completely overwhelmed. To expect Costa Rica to do more, and take in the refugees the U.S. turns away, is not reasonable or fair.

What will be the policy’s impact?

This rule will deny thousands of migrants fleeing persecution their right to seek asylum at the United States’ southern border. They will be returned to Mexico, where human rights organizations have documented high levels of violence and exploitation of migrants, or deported to their home countries.

Beyond the individual human impact, the implementation of this rule will send the wrong signal to other countries that have – like the United States – ratified international refugee treaties and passed laws committing to protect those fleeing persecution.

The message is that flouting legal obligations is acceptable, as is the outsourcing of refugee protection to smaller countries with far less resources. The exodus of refugees from Ukraine and U.S. efforts to encourage European countries to accept those fleeing the conflict underscore the importance of encouraging nations to take in refugees. Leading by bad example will only undermine that principle.

Karen Musalo, Professor of International Law, University of California College of the Law, San Francisco

 [I am leaving 2 links to more supportive takes on this policy from the Council of Foreign Affairs: https://www.cfr.org/in-brief/can-bidens-new-asylum-policy-help-solve-migrant-crisis  and https://www.cfr.org/article/bidens-new-southern-border-plan-might-just-work ]

What are your thoughts?

I had a feeling this was coming............

The Washington Post-ABC News survey found the president’s approval rating fell 6 percentage points between February and May, with the share of those who say they approve of the way Biden’s handling his job dropping from 42 to 36 percent. Fifty-six percent of respondents in the new poll disapprove. 

In a hypothetical Trump-Biden rematch, 44 percent say they’d lean toward the former president while 38 percent say they’d lean toward Biden. 

https://thehill.com/homenews/campaign/3992413-biden-approval-slips-to-new-low-in-wake-of-2024-campaign-launch-survey/

• 44% of U.S. adults polled said they'd definitely or probably vote for Trump vs. 38% for Biden. 12% were undecided.

• Biden's approval hit a new low — 36%, down from 42% in February.
• "Just 32% overall think Biden has the mental sharpness it takes to serve effectively as president, down steeply from 51% when he was running for president three years ago," ABC's Gary Langer notes.
• 54% think Trump has the needed mental sharpness.
• https://www.axios.com/2023/05/07/biden-trump-age-election-poll
  

Another difference looks equally problematic for Biden should Trump emerge as the Republican nominee: Americans by 54-36% say Trump did a better job handling the economy when he was president than Biden has done in his term so far.

Trump is not Biden's only challenge: Given his weaknesses, both Trump and Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis lead Biden in preference for the presidency in 2024.

https://abcnews.go.com/Politics/broad-doubts-bidens-age-acuity-spell-republican-opportunity/story?id=99109308

That said, substantial majorities of Republicans and Republican-leaning independents say they would be satisfied with either Trump (75%) or DeSantis (64%) as their party's nominee. Fewer than a quarter would be dissatisfied with either; more are undecided about DeSantis. Satisfaction with Trump was far lower -- 51% -- as he fought for the nomination in March 2016.

Compare Trump's position to Biden's in his party: Just 36% of Democrats and Democratic-leaning independents would like to see their party nominate Biden for president next year. Fifty-eight percent prefer someone other than Biden, unchanged from February.

Looking (far) ahead to November 2024, in a Biden-Trump matchup, 44% of Americans say they'd definitely or probably vote for Trump, 38% for Biden, with 12% undecided. When the undecideds are asked how they lean, it's 49-42%, Trump-Biden.

https://abcnews.go.com/Politics/broad-doubts-bidens-age-acuity-spell-republican-opportunity/story?id=99109308

When Biden announced he was running for re-election, I had a feeling this was coming......................... maybe not too late to send Biden the memo?

Thinking about the ramifications of artificial intelligence

This 1 hour, 7 minute video discusses a new generation of artificial intelligence software that has a mind of its own, sort of. dcleve brough this to my attention. It is a real eye opener. And scary.

A summary of the first ~35 munites

Rules of technology:

1. When a new technology is invented, a new class of responsibilities arises

2. If a new tech confers power, it starts a race

3. If the race is not coordinated, it ends in tragedy

The 1st context = Curation AI (the earlier generations of AI): Unintended consequences of first human contact with mass social media like Tik Tok, Twitter, etc. (~7:55):

1. Addiction to the screen, doomscrolling, info overload

2. QAnon & disinformation

3. Sexualization of children

4. Fake news

5. Shortened attention span

6. Bots and deepfakes

7. Social polarization

8. Cult factories, e.g., YouTube cults

9. Breakdown of democracy

Result: Humanity lost despite the positives of social media, e.g., connecting with friends, small-medium businesses reaching customers, forming groups

The ultimate goal for media owners is a race to the bottom for maximum human attention span, with AI used to maximize attention span and engagement by rewriting all the rules of society (9:47)

The 2nd context = Creation AI: GPT and Baird  - the current, new generation of AI (~11:10)

Benefits touted (11:45)  = people become more efficient, faster, word writing, code writing, science progress, solve climate change, lots of money to be made

Problems: AI acts biased, AI is opaque, job loss, AI increases its entanglement in society making control harder, and:

1. Reality collapses, everything can be faked

2. Trust collapses

3. AI law loopholes get exploited

4. Rampant blackmail

5. AI cyberweapons proliferate

6. Lobbying automation

The AGI apocalypse: machines kill us all, but that's not the focus of this talk (13:35)

(14:30): In 2017 a new AI engine was invented and really started influencing things in 2020: Speech recognition, computer vision, speech synthesis, advanced robotics and music and image generation (deepfakes) all merged together in a single AI platform using a single language → learning curves in different fields merged into a single curve → everything, written language, speech, computer code, images, video, music, stock market moves, fMRI data, DNA sequences, etc., all get treated as a single language 

In other words, an advance in one area of AI, amounted to an advance in all areas (17:00)

the speakers refer to this technology as GLLMM class AIs (Generative, Large Language, Multi Modal)(17:50) → an inanimate thing with emergent properties

For example, GLLMM AI uses written language and images on internet to create an image of the words "Google Soup" (19:00)

 AI looking at an fMRI brain scan estimates what the brain is seeing (20:00)

GLLMM AI can be trained to use WiFi signals to locate people in a room with laptops and their postures in two steps, first AI linked to an electronic eye that sees light and an electronic eye that sees WiFi signals learns about the room and the people in it; second, with the light-sensing electronic eye is turned off and only the WiFi sensing electronic eye is on → it shows the people and their postures in the room (22:30)

GLLMM AI can be tasked with this command (23:00): GPT, find me a security vulnerability in this computer code, then write code to exploit it.

(24:00) It takes about three seconds of listening to a voice for GLLMM AI to be able to fake the voice, thus if you speak in public and it is recorded and on the internet, a fake voice can be quickly made, and, e.g., it can be used in a phone call home to demand an immediate ransom for the owner of the voice who may not even be kidnapped, but just out of touch for a few hours or days; fake children voices can be used to trick mom and/or dad into mistakes, e.g., giving out the social security No. of the child.  

(25:30) All content secured by voice or image verification is now hackable. The capacity of GLLMM AI to get better at hacking is increasing exponentially. → decoding and synthesizing fake reality is now possible, much of what can be done is legal.

(29:30) The speakers argue that 2024 will be the last human election. After that, the candidates with the best GLLMM AI and deep fakery will have an advantage. The influence of AI in politics will become increasingly prominent and sophisticated.

(30:20) Unprogrammed emergent properties of GLLMM AI: Properties show up that were unplanned and not understood why or how they emerge, e.g., the ability of untrained GLLMM AI to do arithmetic or to answer questions in English in Persian. Prior AI software did not have such emergent properties. One emergent property is the ability of GLLMM AI to do publishable research chemistry. Untrained GLLMM AI is now even better at advanced chemistry than earlier AI that was trained on chemistry. It figured out how to make nerve gas from stuff people can buy from Home Depot. No one knows where this capacity came from.

Another fascinating emergent property is the spontaneous development of a theory of mind by GLLMM AI. As of Nov. 2022 GLLMM AI had the mental capacity almost of a nine-year old child to understand what is in another person's mind and how it can respond to that "understanding." In 2017 and 2018, it had essentially none, i.e., no theory of mind. This property of GLLMM AI was not discovered until Feb. 2023. No one knows if the Nov. 2022 data is as far as GLLMM AI can advance. Time will tell.

There is a lot we just do not know or understand about this new generation of AI, but that is not stopping capitalists and researchers from going full steam ahead come hell or high water. We could wind up getting hell and high water.

The video continues in this vein for another hour. 

Some context

For context, the ongoing writer's strike in Hollywood includes serious concern that AI will eventually be able to write screenplay, jokes and music, maybe with in the next few years. The writers fear for their jobs. The AP reports: "Not six months since the release of ChatGPT, generative artificial intelligence is already prompting widespread unease throughout Hollywood. Concern over chatbots writing or rewriting scripts is one of the leading reasons TV and film screenwriters took to picket lines earlier this week."

Analytics India Magazine writes: 

An Entire Generation is Studying for Jobs that Won’t Exist

AI is taking over a lot of jobs, now it is coming for the writers who wrote about “machines taking over the world.” 

American businessman Mark Cuban is back with another prediction. The highest paying college major in the world, computer science, will hold very little value for employers in the future. Why? Because of AI. “Twenty years from now, if you are a coder, you might be out of a job,” Cuban said in an interview on the Recode Decode podcast with Kara Swisher. “Because it’s just math, and so, whatever we’re defining the AI to do, someone’s got to know the topic.”  

There is no doubt that what he predicted back in 2017 [the year GLLMM AI was introduced] is increasingly coming true. The increasing capabilities of AI are definitely making a lot of jobs obsolete, not just the ones that require coding.

Waddabout politics?

Now, consider congress. Is it up to the task of protecting us? Congress is certainly expert at protecting the owners of technology and capital. They will be just fine as usual. Radical right Republicans are absolutely expert at hating and sabotaging secular government and elections, denying inconvenient truth and being shockingly irrational. But what about us regular people? Who is on our side?

News bits: Another DJT rape lawsuit?; Republican extremism & moral rot

DJT is the fascist tyrant wannabe that won't go away. A HuffPo opinion piece argues for not ignoring a new allegation filed in court about an alleged 1994 rape of a Jane Doe when she was a 13 year old girl. The article goes through DJT's history of credible allegations of sexual assault, including some filed in courts. Since this is a civil lawsuit, the plaintiff only has to prove rape liability by a preponderance of evidence. That is far easier to do than satisfying the criminal evidence standard of beyond a reasonable doubt. 

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In what recent evidence shows to be business as usual for fascist Republican elites, concerns for ethics and morals are non-existent. Other than unrestrained lust for more power and wealth, operating in as much secrecy as possible with as much plausible deniability as possible are core moral values. Respect for democracy, truth, transparency and honest governance are nowhere to be seen. The WaPo reports:

Judicial activist directed fees to Clarence Thomas’s wife, urged ‘no mention of Ginni’

Leonard Leo told GOP pollster Kellyanne Conway to bill nonprofit, then use money to pay spouse of Supreme Court justice

Conservative judicial activist Leonard Leo arranged for the wife of Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas to be paid tens of thousands of dollars for consulting work just over a decade ago, specifying that her name be left off billing paperwork, according to documents reviewed by The Washington Post.

In January 2012, Leo instructed the GOP pollster Kellyanne Conway to bill a nonprofit group he advises and use that money to pay Virginia “Ginni” Thomas, the documents show. The same year, the nonprofit, the Judicial Education Project, filed a brief to the Supreme Court in a landmark voting rights case.

Leo, a key figure in a network of nonprofits that has worked to support the nominations of conservative judges, told Conway that he wanted her to “give” Ginni Thomas “another $25K,” the documents show. He emphasized that the paperwork should have “No mention of Ginni, of course.”

A frustration with the MSM: As usual, the MSM (the WaPo in this case) still does not understand what it is dealing with, and/or it has been neutered by capitalism. What we are seeing among Republican Party elites is not conservatism. Republican judges are not conservatives. Most of the people involved are radical right extremist authoritarians, not principled conservatives. Nearly all of those elites are morally rotted plutocrats or theocrats, kleptocrats and tyranny supporters.   

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Another example of the MSM not getting it/being neutered: The NYT calls this rot "conservatism": 

One Family Has Spearheaded Montana’s Unflinching Conservatism

Three members of the Regier family now hold leadership positions in the Montana Legislature as the state’s conservative shift has left even some Republicans wary

During a legislative hearing in 2011 that was a prelude to Montana’s debates on abortion, State Representative Keith Regier displayed an image of a cow and made the argument that cattle were more valuable when pregnant.

The comparison drew a prompt rebuke from some women in the room, but Mr. Regier, a Republican, declined to apologize. Over the years, the former schoolteacher and sod farmer has seldom demurred from his growing brand of combative Christian-oriented politics, in which the Ten Commandments are the foundation of good law and some of the biggest battles have been with moderates in his own party.

Mr. Regier has now emerged as the patriarch of a new family political dynasty that has injected fresh conservative intensity into debates over abortion, diversity training and, this spring, transgender rights.

Moderate politicians in the Republican Party? That is dubious at best. Decades of RINO hunts have been quite successful. What is called a moderate Republican Party politician is a hard core conservative that the radical right just has not got around to kicking out of power yet.

Cows are worth more when pregnant, therefore ban abortion? What wonderful dark ages reasoning.

Qs: Is that more like conservatism than radical right extremism? More like secular democracy than bigoted, misogynist, Christian nationalist theocracy? 

Open-ended question about news reports for another Friday

Question: Of all the world news reported over the last week, which, if any, cause you to worry the most?