Hot, Bad & Unpopular Takes

[muon2]

My unpopular opinion is that coarseness in public discourse is the norm in American politics, with the mid 20th century being the exception. Coarseness comes in part from a fragmented news media which allows people to stay within an information bubble. This was the condition both before radio and since the rise of cable and then the web.

[muon2]

My unpopular opinion is that coarseness in public discourse is the norm in American politics, with the mid 20th century being the exception. Coarseness comes in part from a fragmented news media which allows people to stay within an information bubble. This was the condition both before radio and since the rise of cable and then the web.

Is the unpopular part of this the opinion that "coarseness" once was as common as it is today, or the opinion that the politics of the mid-twentieth century were unusually civil?

I have found that people don't want to hear that the public political civility they grew up with is not the normal state of affairs. The implication is that if my sense of cause is correct, returning to civility may be much harder than people want to believe.

[muon2]

I have found that people don't want to hear that the public political civility they grew up with is not the normal state of affairs. The implication is that if my sense of cause is correct, returning to civility may be much harder than people want to believe.

It baffles me that older Americans can look back over the past several decades and convince themselves that they lived through a time when our politics were more civil.

From WWII through the early nineties, we are talking about an era when political violence was more common than it is now. Domestic terror incidents and political assassinations were more frequent. More people were killed in riots and protests, and more property was destroyed.

I am not a political optimist. But does it make sense to say that we are more callous just because our Congressional representatives are playing fewer golf games together? I guess I would place less weight on shouting and more weight on shooting when it comes to assessing public civility.

Most of what they have lost is a comforting illusion, one that was packaged by a mass media that has now fragmented, compounded by nostalgia.

And we are talking about older Americans whose siblings and peers were the ones leading the protests at Selma, Chicago, and Kent State. The difference is that you never heard from Walter Cronkite on the CBS Evening News the language LBJ was using privately in the WH. They picture political discourse framed by Huntley and Brinkley, not by secret tapes.

[muon2]

-I don't like cars/driving
-Road trips, by extension, are terrible
-The only acceptable way of eating bacon is on a hamburger, preferably a buffalo burger with avocado, bacon, Swiss cheese, sauteed mushrooms/onions, pickles, lettuce, and tomato
-Zoning is stupid and unnecessary
-Black licorice is amazing
-Parking and highways shouldn't be free
-Disneyland/world sucks
-Resort style travel in general sucks
-Fat acceptance has been taken to an extreme

Shall I assume then you feel the best way to see the world is on the internet alone?

[muon2]

-I don't like cars/driving
-Road trips, by extension, are terrible
-The only acceptable way of eating bacon is on a hamburger, preferably a buffalo burger with avocado, bacon, Swiss cheese, sauteed mushrooms/onions, pickles, lettuce, and tomato
-Zoning is stupid and unnecessary
-Black licorice is amazing
-Parking and highways shouldn't be free
-Disneyland/world sucks
-Resort style travel in general sucks
-Fat acceptance has been taken to an extreme

Shall I assume then you feel the best way to see the world is on the internet alone?

I like flying places other than Cancun. It isn't that complex.

It might be, since I think that Cancun is not typical of resort-based travel. There are lots of comfortable resorts that provide a 1-bedroom unit with kitchen without the expensive all-inclusive fee system prevalent in Cancun. The majority of resorts offer one the choice of either using on-site amenities or seeing the sights around the area on one's own, so one isn't stuck at the resort.

[muon2]

The child tax credit is poor public policy and the deduction for charitable giving has little behavioural impact and instead serves as a large giveaway to wealthy individuals who misuse 501(c)(3)s.

I also believe that everyone should pay at least something in income taxes, not because I'm a monster (well, I am, but that's another story), but because it's persuasively theorized that a feeling of "everyone has skin in the game" makes earned government benefits less susceptible to defending (social security is a good example - everyone pays into it and attempts to alter the program have been met with vigorous defense). The stronger the link in the public consciousness between a government program's benefits and it's funding, the more likely it is to sustain long term.

Writing as someone who has been on the board of some small charities, and treasurer of one, I can say that the deduction matters to those charities. One group I was involved with went from not 501(c)(3) to getting that status. It definitely helped fundraising, and not just from the very wealthy and big corporations.