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James Goodman

What you think about evolution and human nature may be wrong | Psychology Today - 0 views

www.psychologytoday.com/...-and-human-nature-may-be-wrong

psychology evolution society sexuality hierarchy

shared by James Goodman on 22 Apr 11 - No Cached
  • a natural morality, yet EP assumes that humans are natural cheaters. In the HGSB context, everyone would have to be reliable or the group might perish from predation. HGSB members don't trust anything but eyewitness testimony. There w
  • 6. There was virtue and good citizenship, a natural morality, yet EP assumes that humans are natural cheaters. In the HGSB context, everyone would have to be reliable or the group might perish from predation. HGSB members don't trust anything but eyewitness testimony. There would not have been intentional lying about resources and if there was the individual would be shunned or expelled.
  • 7. There was more sexual freedom and mating behavior for all ages, yet EP assumes a scenario like today's of restriction and competition, and an emphasis on the timing of first sexual behavior. There was cooperative breeding and childrearing, yet EP assumes mate competition and male desire to control female reproduction to ensure genetic dominance.
James Goodman

The true cost of 9/11: Trillions and trillions wasted on wars, a fiscal catastrophe, an... - 0 views

www.slate.com/2302949

bush iraq 9_11 war crimes lies deception corruption society politics economy

shared by James Goodman on 03 Sep 11 - No Cached
  • The Sept. 11, 2001, terror attacks by al-Qaida were meant to harm the United States, and they did, but in ways that Osama Bin Laden probably never imagined. President George W. Bush's response to the attacks compromised America's basic principles, undermined its economy, and weakened its security.
  • The attack on Afghanistan that followed the 9/11 attacks was understandable, but the subsequent invasion of Iraq was entirely unconnected to al-Qaida—as much as Bush tried to establish a link. That war of choice quickly became very expensive—orders of magnitude beyond the $60 billion claimed at the beginning—as colossal incompetence met dishonest misrepresentation.
  • Indeed, when Linda Bilmes and I calculated America's war costs three years ago, the conservative tally was $3 trillion to $5 trillion. Since then, the costs have mounted further. With almost 50 percent of returning troops eligible to receive some level of disability payment, and more than 600,000 treated so far in veterans' medical facilities, we now estimate that future disability payments and health care costs will total $600 billion to $900 billion. The social costs, reflected in veteran suicides (which have topped 18 per day in recent years) and family breakups, are incalculable.AdvertisementEven if Bush could be forgiven for taking America, and much of the rest of the world, to war on false pretenses, and for misrepresenting the cost of the venture, there is no excuse for how he chose to finance it. His was the first war in history paid for entirely on credit. As America went into battle, with deficits already soaring from his 2001 tax cut, Bush decided to plunge ahead with yet another round of tax "relief" for the wealthy.
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  • Today, America is focused on unemployment and the deficit. Both threats to America's future can, in no small measure, be traced to the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq. Increased defense spending, together with the Bush tax cuts, is a key reason why America went from a fiscal surplus of 2 percent of GDP when Bush was elected to its parlous deficit and debt position today. Direct government spending on those wars so far amounts to roughly $2 trillion—$17,000 for every U.S. household—with bills yet to be received increasing this amount by more than 50 percent.Moreover, as Bilmes and I argued in our book The Three Trillion Dollar War, the wars contributed to America's macroeconomic weaknesses, which exacerbated its deficits and debt burden. Then, as now, disruption in the Middle East led to higher oil prices, forcing Americans to spend money on oil imports that they otherwise could have spent buying goods produced in the U.S. The Federal Reserve hid these weaknesses by engineering a housing bubble that led to a consumption boom. It will take years to overcome the excessive indebtedness and real-estate overhang that resulted.
  • Ironically, the wars have undermined America's (and the world's) security, again in ways that Osama Bin Laden could not have imagined. An unpopular war would have made military recruitment difficult in any circumstances. But, as Bush tried to deceive America about the wars' costs, he underfunded the troops, refusing even basic expenditures—say, for armored and mine-resistant vehicles needed to protect American lives or for adequate health care for returning veteran
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