- The White House press secretary, addressing the firing of the head of the Library of Congress, is either ignorant, stupid, or lying;
- How the natalist movement, perhaps led by Elon Musk, relies on endless growth, which is not plausible;
- Interviews with MAGA NRA supporters suggest that religious freedom means you can be any kind of Christian you want;
- Roger Stone would execute anyone who questions Trump;
- How Trump pleads ignorance about so many things;
- and more (will finish tomorrow)
It’s impossible to summarize a substantial book in half an hour, which is why my Bronowski summary yesterday and today leaves me with less than usual time for today’s news items.
From Facebook.
Others have made similar points. The Library of Congress collects *every* book published. That’s its mission. It’s not a lending library. For anyone, let alone kids. She’s stupid, lying, or both.
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I’m perplexed by the notion that global population has to keep expanding, apparently the main rational being that we need more kids to take care of the oldsters. (See Elon Musk and the Natalist movement.) This can’t go on forever. Perhaps we need to find another, a sustainable, economy, that does not depend on endless (cancerous once might say) capitalistic growth.
Vox, Kelsey Piper, 10 May 2025: Progressives should care that the global population is set to fall, subtitled “Don’t let polarization distract you from one of the most important issues the world faces.”
The key here is that our economics are structured on endless growth.
You might wonder: What’s the big deal? Wouldn’t fewer people mean fewer demands on resources, more space and opportunity for everyone else?
But the economics of population don’t work this way. An aging and shrinking population means a massive decrease in expected quality of life in the future. It means a smaller working population will be supporting a larger elderly population. It means there will be fewer people to do all of the things that don’t technically need to be done, but that make life richer and more interesting. And a shrinking population doesn’t represent a one-time adjustment, but a dimming state of affairs that will continue to degrade until something reverses it.
This is the kind of quandary science fiction should try to solve. And it probably has.
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Boing Boing, Grant St. Clair, 8 May 2025: Watch MAGA supporters struggle to explain religious freedom at NRA convention
I watched some but not all of the video. I’m noting this for the end of the commentary, especially the last line.
My favorite part of any Good Liars video is the moment the interviewee realizes they’ve been backed into a corner and silently walks away, and this one delivers in spades. An all-timer TGL moment comes from one attendee explaining his views on freedom of religion: he believes you can be whatever kind of Christian you want.
These people will always be with us.
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Stone Age mentality.
JMG, from Daily Beast, 9 May 2025: Roger Stone: Execute Sen. Mark Kelly For Treason
Why? For “Questioning Trump’s crypto connections.”
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Isn’t it odd that Trump pleads ignorance about so many things his administration is doing?
Washington Post, Aaron Blake, 10 May 2025: The many big things Trump ‘didn’t know’ about, subtitled “Repeatedly in his second term, Trump has pleaded ignorance about major events and suggested he’s not involved in major decisions.”
The first line of this piece:
One of the major themes of President Donald Trump’s 2024 campaign was the idea that Joe Biden had no idea what was happening around him.
And repeatedly he’s claimed no knowledge about all sorts of things, from Project 2025, to Casey Means.
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Once again, a simplistic word search approach goes wrong.
The New Republic, Greg Sargent, 10 May 2025: Angry Trump Kills “Woke” Program—and Accidentally Screws MAGA Voters, subtitled “It’s called the Digital Equity Act. That word—’equity’—caught the White House’s attention. So now Trump is moving to nix funding—but it could cut off millions destined for red America.
The theme tag on this article is “Clown Show.”
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And some examination of this unqualified surgeon general nominee.
Slate, Shannon Palus, 10 May 2025: Let Them Eat Flackers, subtitled “Trump’s surgeon general nominee is a disaster in many ways. It begins with her favorite cracker.”
First about those crackers:
The specific brand of noncracker crackers that she recommends frequently are made of flax seeds, and are called, unfortunately, Flackers.
I tried the Flackers after listening to Means talk about them. … They look like a bunch of flax seeds glued together and taste like dense particleboard squares dipped in apple cider vinegar. Crumbled onto a salad, they are actually not bad. I’d eat them again, I think, if they were there. They do not, and I cannot stress this enough, come close to being an adequate substitute for chips. I cannot imagine seeing them on a cheese board at a public event, let alone topping one with a dollop of brie.
To hear Means tell it, though, the alternative is the devil.
Everything about modern nutrition and health care is bad. Near the end of the piece:
As with Robert F. Kennedy Jr., her critiques of our food systems and treatment of the environment can, if you just catch them on TV for a second, make sense. But what that translates to in practice seems to be that you personally need to figure out how to solve that for yourself, including by looking farmers in the eyes and being responsible for your child’s vaccine schedule rather than trusting the recommendations of many, many, many, many doctors, researchers, and scientists.
Again, this seems to me to be a retreat into tribalism, into trusting only people you can look in the eye, and rejecting everything that might make humanity a global species. We are limited by our human nature.
