Question: What inspired, or should I say drove, you to write Idiot America? Charles P. Pierce: The germ of the idea came as I watched the extended coverage of the death of Terri Schiavo. I wondered how so many people could ally themselves with so much foolishness despite the fact that it was doing them no perceptible good, politically or otherwise.
FDL Book Salon Welcomes Bruce Fein, American Empire Before the Fall | Book Salon - 0 views
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There's no doubting the conservative bona fides of Bruce Fein. A high-level Justice Department lawyer in the Reagan administration in the 1980s and previously a resident scholar with the Heritage Foundation, he is a long-time advocate for uncompromising right-wing political principles. Yet paradoxically, Fein has been, and remains, one of the most eloquent and incisive political voices over the last decade. He was one of the earliest and most emphatic critics of Bush and Cheney's radical abuses of executive power. Two weeks after The New York Times revealed in December, 2005, that Bush had ordered the NSA to illegally eavesdrop on Americans without the warrants required by law, Fein used his column in the right-wing Washington Times to warn that "Mr. Bush has adamantly refused to acknowledge any constitutional limitations on his power to wage war indefinitely"; to scorn as "war powers nonsense" the theories assembled "to defend Mr.
Censorship on Campus? Time to Privatize America's Universities by Onkar Ghate -- Capita... - 0 views
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So bad it's worth reading, because you're going to see this argument, again, I'm sure. The author argues that universities are, themselves, victims of censorship if they are not free to fire faculty members for expressing political viewpoints which they don't like, because they are being forced to support views they don't like. This is question begging, because it presupposes that by allowing them to stay on its payrolls, a university has allowed those faculty members to speak for it; that the very act of allowing them to stay signals support for their views. This is nonsense. They are paid to teach. Their political views are their own business. Making the point, quite unintentionally I would guess, that the last thing Libertarianism promotes is individual liberty. If you're not free to speak your views openly without fear of destitution, then just how free is speech, really?
IT'S OFFICIAL: The Whole World Thinks Republicans Are Dangerous Maniacs Threatening Eve... - 0 views
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Yes, the rest of the world is watching this embarrassing debt ceiling nonsense, and it is growing dismayed. Der Spiegel has a roundup of commentary in German newspapers about the fight, and the universal message is this: The US is holding the entire world hostage, and it's the Republicans that are playing with fire. Hard to accuse the Germans (who are no fans of fiscal profligacy) of being motivated by politics, or of having some inherent reason to attack Republicans. This is just the reality of what they're doing.
Amazon.com: Idiot America: How Stupidity Became a Virtue in the Land of the Free eBook:... - 0 views
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Question: Is there a specific turning point where, as a country, we moved away from prizing experience to trusting the gut over intellect? Charles P. Pierce: I don't know if there's one point that you can point to and say, “This is when it happened.” The conflict between intellectual expertise and reflexive emotion—often characterized as “good old common sense,” when it is neither common nor sense—has been endemic to American culture and politics since the beginning. I do think that my profession, journalism, went off the tracks when it accepted as axiomatic the notion that “Perception is reality.”
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Question: What is the most dangerous aspect of Idiot America? Charles P. Pierce: The most dangerous aspect of Idiot America is that it encourages us to abandon our birthright to be informed citizens of a self-governing republic. America cannot function on automatic pilot, and, too often, we don't notice that it has been until the damage has already been done.
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