Friday links! Pressing issues edition

By Dan Brooks in Friday Links 3 Comments

It’s a dazzling Friday morning in Missoula, and I want to finish my work as quickly as possible so that I can take Stringer to the dog park. Stringer agrees with me on the importance of this issue. It’s one of the few initiatives around here that gets bipartisan support; by contrast, he sees no reason why I waste time taking a shower or putting prepared food in the refrigerator, and I don’t understand why that brown spot in the yard is so important. Everybody has his own agenda, and it is of paramount importance to exactly one person, or possibly one dog. This week’s link roundup is about the pressing issues that define our age, and also the issues treated-as-pressing that remind us what a pain in the ass consistent singular perspective can be. Then we’re going to the dog park. Soon, buddy. Just lie down or something.

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Study links conservative politics to “low-effort thinking”

By Dan Brooks in Public Discourse 5 Comments

Scientists in a lab inspect a readout from the Conservatometer

As a modern, intellectually engaged American, there’s nothing I like better than a study that shows something. Granted, some studies show better stuff than others. When studies show that certain organic compounds affect the reaction rate of ATP synthase, for example, I get extremely bored. But when studies show stuff that I kind of knew anyway—like people in sweatpants are less likely to know where their kids are, or coffee is good for you—I perk right up. Luckily for me, the Huffington Post exists. Yesterday they observed their bimonthly tradition of linking to a scientific study that suggests conservatives are dumber than progressives. The study in question is right here, and it’s worth reading to understand the methodology researchers used to correlate increasingly conservative views with “low-effort thinking.”

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Friday links! Masters and servants edition

By Dan Brooks in Friday Links 3 Comments

Apparently Friedrich Nietzsche is the guest editor this week at latfh.com. Also, I'm not sure Rikki Kramp is this young man's given name.

As anyone who has read about the United States in a book will tell you, ours is a country founded on egalitarianism. Let the tottering empires of Europe labor under the notion of a permanent ruling class; America has no king, because America needs no king. Sure, certain of the exceptionally gifted among us will rise to power and prominence, and it’s only logical that those men and women keep their positions for long, illustrious careers. But even from the lofty heights of power they see us at eye level. Ours is not a culture in which a small elect view the rest of us as braying lambs, raised to numbly trot after the herd. No—we live free, with no shepherds to herd us to safety or slaughter. Or, um, maybe that’s totally how it is. Maybe the levers of American power are set hopelessly beyond the reach of any person of average heights, and we live at the mercy of forces beyond our control. Maybe the presidency really is a fifth column with its top higher than our eyes can see, and our only defense is a conglomeration of old families and wealthy industrialists trying desperately to trick us into right action before it’s too late. Both explanations—a nation of free men, a sad school play in which frightened children mumble words they dimly understand—seem equally possible. And either explanation is, after all, self-fulfilling. This week, Combat! blog presents evidence for both sides. Is America still operated by Americans? Or have we devolved into a kleptocracy in which corporate money and political aristocracy compete to see whose views they can make our own? More than most questions, this one depends on how you look at it.

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