volkris @volkris@qoto.org
I think the most pressing and fundamental problem of the day is that people lack a practically effective means of sorting out questions of fact in the larger world. We can hardly begin to discuss ways of addressing reality if we can't agree what reality even is, after all.
The institutions that have served this role in the past have dropped the ball, so the next best solution is talking to each other, particularly to those who disagree, to sort out conflicting claims.
Unfortunately, far too many actively oppose this, leaving all opposing claims untested. It's very regressive.
So that's my hobby, striving to understanding the arguments of all sides at least because it's interesting to see how mythologies are formed but also because maybe through that process we can all have our beliefs tested.
But if nothing else, social media platforms like this are chances to vent frustrations that on so many issues both sides are obviously wrong ;)
Joined Dec 2022
Oh, there have definitely been publicized cases of this over the years, even court cases, that circulated around even fairly centrist outfits.
I'd actually be a bit surprised that folks in academia HAVEN'T heard of it.
@europesays keep in mind that in the US judges don't really oversee the Executive Branch. That job is left to Congress.
Judges answer questions brought before them when the questions are within their limited authority to address.
So it's not that judges may make the administration explain what it's doing, but more that they'll invite the president to explain why they should give the answer he wants.
@vaurora hey, problem solved:
The ones frittering away 100 million dollars no longer have that to fritter away again!
Honestly, there might be something good out of this:
We've been letting Congress/congresspeople off the hook for far too long, and Trump getting all the attention has only made that worse.
A call for impeachment can be used to restore attention to Congress as it throws the ball back to their court.
I'd use this to say, OK that's nice, now over to Congress, how are you individual congresspeople going to respond? Let's give you the spotlight now.
Ah, section 230. The whole topic is a mess of misunderstandings and double negatives, so it won't end until Congress seriously looks to clarify the statute.
Unfortunately, that seriousness isn't likely to come up any time soon.
@zombywoof you're missing that democracy is directing this outcome.
No, Congress isn't abrogating their responsibility. Rather, it's doing its job in representing the constituents that each representative has.
This is what the country voted for, so they get it. Yay democracy.
A while back I heard an interesting way of viewing positions in #USPolitics:
> The left tends to make an error of sign while the right makes an error of magnitude.
That is, #Democrats might get the effects of some proposal backwards while #Republicans might think it will have far more impact than it actually will.
I see this often now that I look for it, including here in this #DOGE era where conservatives are vastly overestimating the amount of savings that they can get from the effort.
@ProPublica they keep citing the figure as they're reflecting what their supporters believe.
Mainstream right leaning media keeps repeating the figure, so the administration follows suit.
It needs to be called out forcefully that #BBC in its news breaks, If not elsewhere tonight, is flat out lying about what #Trump is saying about #Ukraine.
Trump says plenty of idiotic stuff. BBC has plenty to work with to show him as an idiot. But putting out falsehoods about what he has actually said only undermines #journalism as a whole because everyone who heard the direct quotes will know that the press is lying.
This goes beyond US politics. This is a serious problem for the whole world, and it happens way too often.
@theguardian_us_news maybe a top Democrat is not the best person to go to for reporting on what is happening inside the Trump administration?
@steter to be clear, the idea that the entire world sees Nazis is itself an illusion put in your head.
No, plenty of people aren't seeing that.
@burningbird It's really not bad. This is just how the process is set up to work, so the complaint will be on the record, but any substantial reaction will be proportionate.
Remember, we're working within procedures that have been designed to make sure things don't get really bad.
And the independence of the judiciary is a critical consideration in this complaint process.
Keep in mind that the Republican majority in the House is so slim and their party so fractured that Democrats could likely peel off just a couple of moderates and flip the House blue anytime they wanted to.
That they don't tells me we need some better Democrats because these seem to be putting fundraising over actual governance, instead of actually doing their jobs to counter Trump's efforts.
Remember, these are the same Democrats that voted with Republican hardliners last year. We need to hold them accountable for that and demand better candidates who will actually work and vote the way we want instead of just posing for the cameras and asking for money.
@realTuckFrumper I mean, we've already seen that that's not true.
@Bez_Lightyear The difference is that everybody agreed people were taking a knee over Floyd.
So many conservatives don't agree that they were Nazi salutes, and they make fun of the left for being so obsessed that they would project their obsessions like that.
@OldAintDead I don't think this attitude is going to be the successful strategy they want it to be.
With so many high profile federal tech problems seemingly every year, this messaging comes across as cocky and out of touch, and I think it's going to turn off a whole lot of people in the general public whose support they probably really want.
@F2erron honestly, if this funding delay, which has been relatively brief so far, leaves medical studies in jeopardy, those were not well managed operations.
I don't know if the Times reporters are aware, but this kind of thing happens through all administrations. Funding gets delayed, there are paperwork issues, there are budget issues, sometimes you're not sure how things are going to be worked out, but that's just how government has always operated.
Yeah it's frustrating, but it's not the crisis that a lot of these reporters are running around screaming about. Why weren't they screaming when there were much larger delays in the past? They weren't interested then.
This comes across as hysteria.
@Guillotine_Jones this is a pretty hilarious bit of grandiosity considering the high profile failures in those exact areas that we've seen over the years.
That so many of these people failed at exactly the things they're talking about here is a huge part of how we ended up in this mess in the first place.
@flaki Well it's all about balancing the value of each solution against costs, particularly the costs of effort and time.
Each person will have a different personal, subjective preference for where they'll put that balance, and for a whole lot of people the cloud option is simply good enough compared to the costs of other options, particularly learning curves.
Keep in mind that in the US the actual elections are run in a very distributed fashion with the different precincts having a whole lot of authority over their own operations.
Communities tend to basically pick their own people to run their elections, so stories about long lines being voter suppression aren't so clear without some centralized management that would be able to organize that.
It generally seems like some communities simply choose for themselves to put in charge managers who kind of suck. People choosing incompetent administrators for themselves is hardly anything rare especially in the state and local levels.
It might be that we would be better off putting all of our eggs in one basket that could be professionally managed, but that would actually open the door to the corrupt motivations like voter suppression.
I think the most pressing and fundamental problem of the day is that people lack a practically effective means of sorting out questions of fact in the larger world. We can hardly begin to discuss ways of addressing reality if we can't agree what reality even is, after all.
The institutions that have served this role in the past have dropped the ball, so the next best solution is talking to each other, particularly to those who disagree, to sort out conflicting claims.
Unfortunately, far too many actively oppose this, leaving all opposing claims untested. It's very regressive.
So that's my hobby, striving to understanding the arguments of all sides at least because it's interesting to see how mythologies are formed but also because maybe through that process we can all have our beliefs tested.
But if nothing else, social media platforms like this are chances to vent frustrations that on so many issues both sides are obviously wrong ;)
Joined Dec 2022
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