ABC/WP Redux-Kerry +4 in Battleground States

[angus]

Rightwingnut, I think it exploits the moralistic consciousness of the public in order to lend an air of legitimacy to persecuting one's enemies, or a group of enemies.  A way to get that last lick in after the battle is long over.

CaliforniaDreamer,  I like the paradox.  Also, maybe economic considerations are no more important in the battleground than in any other states, but the effect is magnified there, since candidates actually have to spend time and money and so the folks who see the personal attack ads (and those are concentrated in the battleground markets) have become desensitized to the process, and have achieved a higher level of pragmatism.

[angus]

Rightwingnut, I think it exploits the moralistic consciousness of the public in order to lend an air of legitimacy to persecuting one's enemies, or a group of enemies.  A way to get that last lick in after the battle is long over.

There was an interesting section in a Carl Sagan book about that.  He was saying that humans tend to lower their enemies to be subhuman before any war.  An example is the recent war in Afghanistan,  the enemy arent Human beings who reside in the mountains of Afghanistan; the enemies are the evil, corrupt, fundamentalist, taliban terrorists.

Was it Contact?

[angus]

I ask only because that's the only Sagan work I've read cover to cover, but I don't remember that part.  I have read quite a few of his non-fiction essays, including the one in the early nineties, in which he wrote that our government operates very scientifically, identifying problems (observing), taking expert testimony about the cause of the problems (trying to find a hypothesis), proposing and debating legislation (experimenting), and further redefining legislative action (concluding and re-experimenting, depending on the result).  I'll try to see if I can find the source of that particular article later, when I'm not so drunk, as I think you'd find it stimulating reading.

[angus]

Yes, well he's correct, as usual.  That's how we do it in Western Civilization, especially since the Great Experiment in Democracy has turned out to be so lucrative for its benefacors.  I'm still looking for that article, which was given to me back in my early days in grad school, around 91, by a Hungarian-born American scientist who really believed in our system.  Now I'm on a quest through boxes.  arrgh.

[angus]

rightwingnut,
 check out Carl Sagan's Baloney detection kit

[angus]

"observational selection, also called the enumeration of favourable circumstances, or as the philosopher Francis Bacon described it, counting the hits and forgetting the misses (e.g., A state boasts of the Presidents it has produced, but is silent on its serial killers);"

The opposite happens here; the state boasts OJ and Peterson, not Bush.

Of course OJ is more exciting than JEB.  But that's more a statement of the moral deterioration of our society.  Jay Leno plays this game where he goes out into the streets of New York and quizes people.  Can you name the vice president?  maybe one in seven people can.  Can you name Ross' sister on Friends?  Then you get like five in seven.  Sad but true.

[angus]

It's Monica right?

In any case, how is killing immoral?  Isn't morality defined as the basically agreed to code of conduct of a society? Therefore, isn't any uniform deviation from that code simply the evolution of that code of morality?

perfectly logical, assuming your definition of morality is correct.

But is it?