Author Archives: Mark R. Kelly

True Colors

Posted on Saturday 5 July 2025 by Mark R. Kelly

More conservative racism: Everyone is *not* welcome; Laura Loomer would boycott brands that don’t use white actors in their TV commercials; MTG thinks evildoers are using weather control to create the deadly floods in Texas; Meanwhile, people who know real … Continue reading →

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So Many People to Hate!

Posted on Friday 4 July 2025 by Mark R. Kelly

ICE now has a budget bigger than all but 15 countries’ military budgets; Why has funding for ICE has ballooned, compared to previous presidents?; Trump says he wants to deport bad people born in the US, too; Trump wants to … Continue reading →

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How It Works. How They Work.

Posted on Thursday 3 July 2025 by Mark R. Kelly

How it works: Republican megadonors get megacontracts to run ICE concentration camps; How they work: Republicans are even less pluralistic than they’ve ever been; Robert Reich on the familiar reasons authoritarians suppress education, and what “conservative ideas” might possibly be; … Continue reading →

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Now It’s Concentration Camps

Posted on Wednesday 2 July 2025 by Mark R. Kelly

Concentration Camps, and Republican salivation to send 65 million immigrants to the alligators; Trump thinks brain scans measure IQ; American science’s brain drain; How societies maintain national myths to survive. – – – What’s next? Dungeons and shackles? Do Trump … Continue reading →

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Implications

Posted on Tuesday 1 July 2025 by Mark R. Kelly

Do justices not foresee consequences? Heather Cox Richardson on the big beautiful bill; How JD Vance reveals the administration’s true motivations; cruelty is the thing; Jonathan Chait on Republicans’ “incomprehensibly reckless plan”; Robert Reich on conservatives’ animosity to empathy (never … Continue reading →

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Octavia E. Butler, PARABLE OF THE SOWER

Posted on Tuesday 1 July 2025 by Mark R. Kelly

(Four Walls Eight Windows, October 1993, 299pp) In June I focused on reading classic science fiction novels, partly to see how many I could get through in one month, considering other obligations (answer: 6 and a bit), and partly to … Continue reading →

Posted in Book Notes, Reviews, science fiction | Comments Off on Octavia E. Butler, PARABLE OF THE SOWER

Stories, Archetypes, Morality

Posted on Monday 30 June 2025 by Mark R. Kelly

Does anyone take Jung or Freud seriously any more? OnlySky’s Bruce Ledewitz on the contemporary idea of “evil”; Robert Reich on “the worst bill in history” and fact-checking claims about tax cuts; How local communities fight back against ICE; Republicans … Continue reading →

Posted in Music, Philosophy, Politics, Psychology | Comments Off on Stories, Archetypes, Morality

Can You Hear Me?

Posted on Sunday 29 June 2025 by Mark R. Kelly

Robert Reich reminds us of the three branches of American government, and how, in plain site, Trump is attacking two of them; How Donald Trump doesn’t align with William McKinley so much as William Jennings Bryan. Bruce Springsteen’s “Outlaw Pete”. … Continue reading →

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Morality Is Relative; Reality Is Not

Posted on Saturday 28 June 2025 by Mark R. Kelly

An undistorted map of the world; Jesse Being on “commonsense”; How morality is circumstantial, e.g. in Margaret Atwood’s THE HANDMAID’S TALE, which I just reread this week; Website matters involving drop-down menu bars, here and on sfadb.com; Short items about … Continue reading →

Posted in Morality, Politics, Psychology, reality, Website Issues | Comments Off on Morality Is Relative; Reality Is Not

Progress, and the Forces Against It

Posted on Friday 27 June 2025 by Mark R. Kelly

We have been here before: comparing 1940 to 2025; Steven Novella assesses whether skepticism has made any progress in recent decades; The irony of MAGA being outraged by a Muslim candidate for New York City’s mayor; Conservative presumption and arrogance … Continue reading →

Posted in conservatives, History, Politics, Psychology | Comments Off on Progress, and the Forces Against It