Just waiting for Palantir to build the West Russian govt. (formerly known as the USA) an AI-powered system to use algorithms to use everyone's email, internet, and phone activity to predictively identify "oppositionists" with a confidence score. Who knows, it could well already exist, it wouldn't surprise me.
They will do nothing. They will revise their world view. They will accept whatever Trump does or says because they idolize him. Literally.
What I find more interesting about the article is the realization that Republicans/conservatives want domination. This may be surprising to those who consider (or formerly considered) themselves Republican and/or conservative. It comes as a surprise to exactly NO ONE else. The right has always been “my way or else”….do as I do, act as I do, believe as I do, think as I do.
The lack of opposition to Trump from the right, or the GOP in general, and Congress in particular, is not because people fear for their lives if they publicly criticize (altho I am sure they do). Or because they oppose what ge does. Most probably believe him to be a vile excuse for a human being. Some may be uncomfortable with tactics, but only because of “bad optics”. But the bottom line is they all believe he is absolutely right in what he is doing or trying to achieve. There is no daylight.
“Enhanced Leads Identification & Targeting for Enforcement (ELITE) is a targeting tool designed to improve capabilities for identifying and prioritizing high-value targets through advanced analytics,” a user guide for ELITE obtained by 404 Media says. The tool aims to be nearly all encompassing when it comes to finding [GUN OWNERS], from identifying subjects in the first place, to building a list of people, to supervisors approving selections for officers to ultimately go into the field and apprehend. . . .
"Faced with the choice between changing one’s mind and proving that there is no need to do so, almost everyone gets busy on the proof."
-- John Kenneth Galbraith, Professor of Economics, Harvard University
That is where MAGA goes when they're wrong. They don't change their beliefs. They change the goalposts.
I'm increasingly of the view that all the hypocrisy and whipsawing on every issue is not about taking a position but about exercising power. That is all this is about. I am powerful, you are weak. Comply or I will attempt to crush you.
And yes. We don't talk nearly about AI and how it's likely to be used as a force multiplier to allow small people to try to dominate others. I don't think they win, but the struggle is coming to your workplace, your community, and international conflicts. AI's advantage is processing speed and it doesn't forget. It's crap for predicting something novel happening. Break your routine, break the pattern, the whole thing falls apart. It hasn't learned prediction yet.
One thing I remember from high school history was the phrase "bread and circuses" -- the function of which was to appease the populace. The phrase is attributed to the Roman poet Juvenal, and according to Wikipedia "...means to generate public approval, not by excellence in public service or public policy, but by diversion, distraction...by offering a palliative: for example food (bread) or entertainment (circuses). Juvenal originally used it to decry the "selfishness" of common people and their neglect of wider concerns...[and]implies a population's erosion or ignorance of civic duty as a priority." And this is what we have today.
But it's more than just the MAGA crowd who seem to accept what's going on in spite of what candidate Trump promised. Yes, the recent ICE actions have generated much anger, but the number of people calling their elected officials or attending a rally is still small. The takeover of the Venezuela government was decried, but also seemingly short lived. What continues to make the headlines are "affordability" and "health care."
It's obvious to me that I'm speaking from a privileged position: retired, in good health, resources that will likely (unless the country completely falls apart) last the rest of my life. So while affordability and health care concern me, I have the freedom to not worry too much. But is it asking too much for citizens to keep two thoughts in their head at the same time? Or if the administration gives you enough bread and circuses, will you accept living in a country where your rights and freedoms slowly drift away?
Trump may think the choice is obvious for "Greenland Man." Sadly, I'm not convinced at this point in time, there's much of a difference.
I hear from many people how the president and his administration are either dumb or stupid. They may be both, but they also are devious and clever at working the system, much like all those welfare and healthcare cheats they complain about. What all of them seem to have is a lack of moral and conscience.
my "prediction"... MAGA won't give a fig about massaging of the ideology. First, there's very little way they'd ever know. (i make a huge effort to be informed and just came across the info about trump creating a slush fund in Qatar!) second, they love Trump.... shoot someone on 5th Ave? become the President of Venezuela, invade Greenland? whatever!
MAGAs who are genuinely isolationist will just lie to themselves. They will lie until their heads explode and we will be in the line of fire. Also, I read Steven's book. Nice to see someone willing to admit it. It must have been about like seeing the flaws in your religion. Although I must say I saw the lies all along.
Read Ayn Rand’s “Atlas Shrugged”. They want to use Greenland as a John Galt retreat. Not that all that mineral wealth wouldn’t help with creating the biggest tech monstrosity anyone has ever seen. What they seem to forget is everything Trump touches turns to crap or chaos. I wonder if the tech bros will quietly do away with Trump sometime in the near future.
The answer to your question is : Nothing. Just like every other Republican subgroup that has had their "critical" issue overturned/igniored/violated (with, perhaps, the exception of the Epstein thing, we are still working through that).
Because it was never really about any of that stuff for the people running for and holding office. It was what they fed people to get elected. They never really followed through on anything other than cutting taxes for the rich, cutting regulation for the corporations, and slowly working their white supremacy agenda to get things working like they should be working--returning America to Greatness for white people, mostly male white people.
Very little of this has to do with ideological purity or consistency. Very little of this is much more than the satiation of emotion--about white people no longer being oppressed by those Other People, about men no longer being opressed by those uppity women (and not getting laid even though they are assholes w/o a decent job), about no longer having to worry about things like international law or what other countries think of us--about how we can now do all the things we should have done ages ago, like taking other countries stuff and telling them to STFU.
It is about answering the rage that Real Americans and Real Men have been building up since those Other people started to get more rights and all those times America hasn't jack-slapped or bombed the shit out of some country Real Americans thought deserved it.
Of course, this rage has been built and stoked and the pressure built up through several decades of GoP and then Rightist media. Starting even before Regan. This is all the actualization of all the complaints and anger I heard from the men of my parents' generation. The ones that were too young for WW2 and too old for Viet Nam and mostly missed out on Korea. The people that grew up in (effectively) the peace and prosperity of the post-WW2 era in those sweet manufacturing jobs, the post-war housing boom, the American domination of the world economy because all the other countries got trashed in WW2.
People with no real knowledge or understanding of a lot of things--like alliances, like how we continued to control the world to our benefit (if not necessarily to THEIR personal benefit). A lot of this stuff carried over to the next generation... and the next. Things got not so good. Other people got rights. The world got smaller. American narratives and unity fractured. Truth became a thing of choice rather than fact, of who you chose to listen or not listen to (moreso than at any other time in US history). People who, because of our consumer culture and its rules and pressures have become incredibly entitled and self-centered--the leadership moreso than anyone else.
Things changed--and the people at the top HATE it when things change.
I know this from both research and because I felt it, myself. The lure of the simple, pleasing answers. The lure of using force rather than persuasion. The lure of doing what you want rather than what you should.
It’s looking like kleptocrats all the way down. Fascists, Bolsheviks, and technocrats are all just methods of resource capture under a thin veneer of “here’s how great the world will with me in charge”.
Just waiting for Palantir to build the West Russian govt. (formerly known as the USA) an AI-powered system to use algorithms to use everyone's email, internet, and phone activity to predictively identify "oppositionists" with a confidence score. Who knows, it could well already exist, it wouldn't surprise me.
Great intro pic of the small hands.
They will do nothing. They will revise their world view. They will accept whatever Trump does or says because they idolize him. Literally.
What I find more interesting about the article is the realization that Republicans/conservatives want domination. This may be surprising to those who consider (or formerly considered) themselves Republican and/or conservative. It comes as a surprise to exactly NO ONE else. The right has always been “my way or else”….do as I do, act as I do, believe as I do, think as I do.
The lack of opposition to Trump from the right, or the GOP in general, and Congress in particular, is not because people fear for their lives if they publicly criticize (altho I am sure they do). Or because they oppose what ge does. Most probably believe him to be a vile excuse for a human being. Some may be uncomfortable with tactics, but only because of “bad optics”. But the bottom line is they all believe he is absolutely right in what he is doing or trying to achieve. There is no daylight.
Edited for effect.
“Enhanced Leads Identification & Targeting for Enforcement (ELITE) is a targeting tool designed to improve capabilities for identifying and prioritizing high-value targets through advanced analytics,” a user guide for ELITE obtained by 404 Media says. The tool aims to be nearly all encompassing when it comes to finding [GUN OWNERS], from identifying subjects in the first place, to building a list of people, to supervisors approving selections for officers to ultimately go into the field and apprehend. . . .
"Faced with the choice between changing one’s mind and proving that there is no need to do so, almost everyone gets busy on the proof."
-- John Kenneth Galbraith, Professor of Economics, Harvard University
That is where MAGA goes when they're wrong. They don't change their beliefs. They change the goalposts.
I'm increasingly of the view that all the hypocrisy and whipsawing on every issue is not about taking a position but about exercising power. That is all this is about. I am powerful, you are weak. Comply or I will attempt to crush you.
And yes. We don't talk nearly about AI and how it's likely to be used as a force multiplier to allow small people to try to dominate others. I don't think they win, but the struggle is coming to your workplace, your community, and international conflicts. AI's advantage is processing speed and it doesn't forget. It's crap for predicting something novel happening. Break your routine, break the pattern, the whole thing falls apart. It hasn't learned prediction yet.
One thing I remember from high school history was the phrase "bread and circuses" -- the function of which was to appease the populace. The phrase is attributed to the Roman poet Juvenal, and according to Wikipedia "...means to generate public approval, not by excellence in public service or public policy, but by diversion, distraction...by offering a palliative: for example food (bread) or entertainment (circuses). Juvenal originally used it to decry the "selfishness" of common people and their neglect of wider concerns...[and]implies a population's erosion or ignorance of civic duty as a priority." And this is what we have today.
But it's more than just the MAGA crowd who seem to accept what's going on in spite of what candidate Trump promised. Yes, the recent ICE actions have generated much anger, but the number of people calling their elected officials or attending a rally is still small. The takeover of the Venezuela government was decried, but also seemingly short lived. What continues to make the headlines are "affordability" and "health care."
It's obvious to me that I'm speaking from a privileged position: retired, in good health, resources that will likely (unless the country completely falls apart) last the rest of my life. So while affordability and health care concern me, I have the freedom to not worry too much. But is it asking too much for citizens to keep two thoughts in their head at the same time? Or if the administration gives you enough bread and circuses, will you accept living in a country where your rights and freedoms slowly drift away?
Trump may think the choice is obvious for "Greenland Man." Sadly, I'm not convinced at this point in time, there's much of a difference.
I hear from many people how the president and his administration are either dumb or stupid. They may be both, but they also are devious and clever at working the system, much like all those welfare and healthcare cheats they complain about. What all of them seem to have is a lack of moral and conscience.
my "prediction"... MAGA won't give a fig about massaging of the ideology. First, there's very little way they'd ever know. (i make a huge effort to be informed and just came across the info about trump creating a slush fund in Qatar!) second, they love Trump.... shoot someone on 5th Ave? become the President of Venezuela, invade Greenland? whatever!
A
#3 makes me want to throw up.
MAGAs who are genuinely isolationist will just lie to themselves. They will lie until their heads explode and we will be in the line of fire. Also, I read Steven's book. Nice to see someone willing to admit it. It must have been about like seeing the flaws in your religion. Although I must say I saw the lies all along.
Now these Christian Nationalists have their own revenue stream? How will we ever get our constitutional democracy back?
#2: They might be too high to notice
That's insane!
How can he get away with those deposits in Qatar? OMG, is this legal? Killing the Constitution one amendment at a time...fuck
Why does Peter Thiel want Greenland? I thought it was a gift to Putin to destroy NATO. Perhaps it’s a twofer?
Read Ayn Rand’s “Atlas Shrugged”. They want to use Greenland as a John Galt retreat. Not that all that mineral wealth wouldn’t help with creating the biggest tech monstrosity anyone has ever seen. What they seem to forget is everything Trump touches turns to crap or chaos. I wonder if the tech bros will quietly do away with Trump sometime in the near future.
The answer to your question is : Nothing. Just like every other Republican subgroup that has had their "critical" issue overturned/igniored/violated (with, perhaps, the exception of the Epstein thing, we are still working through that).
Because it was never really about any of that stuff for the people running for and holding office. It was what they fed people to get elected. They never really followed through on anything other than cutting taxes for the rich, cutting regulation for the corporations, and slowly working their white supremacy agenda to get things working like they should be working--returning America to Greatness for white people, mostly male white people.
Very little of this has to do with ideological purity or consistency. Very little of this is much more than the satiation of emotion--about white people no longer being oppressed by those Other People, about men no longer being opressed by those uppity women (and not getting laid even though they are assholes w/o a decent job), about no longer having to worry about things like international law or what other countries think of us--about how we can now do all the things we should have done ages ago, like taking other countries stuff and telling them to STFU.
It is about answering the rage that Real Americans and Real Men have been building up since those Other people started to get more rights and all those times America hasn't jack-slapped or bombed the shit out of some country Real Americans thought deserved it.
Of course, this rage has been built and stoked and the pressure built up through several decades of GoP and then Rightist media. Starting even before Regan. This is all the actualization of all the complaints and anger I heard from the men of my parents' generation. The ones that were too young for WW2 and too old for Viet Nam and mostly missed out on Korea. The people that grew up in (effectively) the peace and prosperity of the post-WW2 era in those sweet manufacturing jobs, the post-war housing boom, the American domination of the world economy because all the other countries got trashed in WW2.
People with no real knowledge or understanding of a lot of things--like alliances, like how we continued to control the world to our benefit (if not necessarily to THEIR personal benefit). A lot of this stuff carried over to the next generation... and the next. Things got not so good. Other people got rights. The world got smaller. American narratives and unity fractured. Truth became a thing of choice rather than fact, of who you chose to listen or not listen to (moreso than at any other time in US history). People who, because of our consumer culture and its rules and pressures have become incredibly entitled and self-centered--the leadership moreso than anyone else.
Things changed--and the people at the top HATE it when things change.
I know this from both research and because I felt it, myself. The lure of the simple, pleasing answers. The lure of using force rather than persuasion. The lure of doing what you want rather than what you should.
We are in serious trouble.
It’s looking like kleptocrats all the way down. Fascists, Bolsheviks, and technocrats are all just methods of resource capture under a thin veneer of “here’s how great the world will with me in charge”.