Author Archives: Mark R. Kelly

Feudalism, Suicide, Ignorance, Disease, Conservative DEI

Posted on Tuesday 3 June 2025 by Mark R. Kelly

Quite a round of doom and gloom essays today. This is where we are. The drive toward privatization will lead to feudalism; Max Boot on the suicide of a superpower; Paul Krugman on how we’re no longer a serious country, … Continue reading →

Posted in History, Human Nature, Politics | Comments Off on Feudalism, Suicide, Ignorance, Disease, Conservative DEI

MAGA Stereotypes, Whataboutism, Monarchy

Posted on Monday 2 June 2025 by Mark R. Kelly

Paul Krugman on MAGA hate on New York, and the reality; Beware “whataboutism,” which is easy and wrong; Long New Yorker piece about a reactionary blogger’s call for an American monarchy. – – – Let’s see…. is it fair to … Continue reading →

Posted in conservatives, longtermism, Politics | Comments Off on MAGA Stereotypes, Whataboutism, Monarchy

Rubber-Stamps, Clones, Conformity, and Fate

Posted on Sunday 1 June 2025 by Mark R. Kelly

How Republicans loyal to Trump want Congress to rubber-stamp his every proposal, never mind America’s system of government; Trump thinks Biden was executed in 2020 and was replaced by a robotic clone; Trump has great ambitions to carve up the … Continue reading →

Posted in conservatives, Politics, Religion | Comments Off on Rubber-Stamps, Clones, Conformity, and Fate

Fareed Zakaria, Peter Wehner, Brian Tyler Cohen, and Anton Bruckner

Posted on Saturday 31 May 2025 by Mark R. Kelly

Fareed Zakaria on Trump vs. Harvard; Peter Wehner on how Republican principles gave way to Trump; And so now there is justice for Trump supporters, and justice for others; “Happy Memorial Day” Brian Tyler Cohen about Trump’s confusion about “asylum”; … Continue reading →

Posted in Lunacy, Music, Politics | Comments Off on Fareed Zakaria, Peter Wehner, Brian Tyler Cohen, and Anton Bruckner

MAGA and human nature; How Trump thinks everything is about loyalty to him

Posted on Friday 30 May 2025 by Mark R. Kelly

Reconsidering the definition of MAGA, and how it relates to base human nature; Recalling the David Brooks essay from yesterday; Trump thinks an honest economic forecast is “unpatriotic”; A Christian boy band preaches to public school students, and denies it; … Continue reading →

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Four Years; and Primitive, Atavistic Tendencies

Posted on Thursday 29 May 2025 by Mark R. Kelly

Four years since my heart transplant; David Brooks on loyalty to home vs loyalty to abstractions; human nature; and how Trumpism is an attempt “to reduce us to our most primitive, atavistic tendencies.”; Thus: Trump fired the historians whose job … Continue reading →

Posted in Human Nature, Personal history | Comments Off on Four Years; and Primitive, Atavistic Tendencies

Self-destruction, Mafia Politics, TACO, What Aligns the Right, Bread and Circuses

Posted on Wednesday 28 May 2025 by Mark R. Kelly

Paul Krugman on the economic damage of America’s withdrawal from the world; You can get away with anything if you donate enough to Trump; TACO: Trump Always Chickens Out; Zack Beauchamp on how the right isn’t driven by materialism, but … Continue reading →

Posted in conservatives, Culture, Economics, Lunacy, Politics | Comments Off on Self-destruction, Mafia Politics, TACO, What Aligns the Right, Bread and Circuses

America, increasingly anti-science and anti-intellectual, was founded by religious fanatics, as perhaps most Americans do not realize

Posted on Tuesday 27 May 2025 by Mark R. Kelly

How America is becoming anti-science and anti-intellectual, with a comment by David Brin; Adam Serwer on Trump’s attack on knowledge itself, with my comments about how most people won’t notice, but the world and history will; How Americans venerate ancestors … Continue reading →

Posted in Human Progress, Lunacy, Religion | Comments Off on America, increasingly anti-science and anti-intellectual, was founded by religious fanatics, as perhaps most Americans do not realize

Education, Religion, Policies that Don’t Work, the Revolt Against Expertise

Posted on Sunday 25 May 2025 by Mark R. Kelly

Heather Cox Richard on the history of government suppression of education, especially as inspired by religion; The GOP keeps promoting policies that history has shown don’t work; The revolt against expertise, yet again. – – – Heather Cox Richardson reviews … Continue reading →

Posted in conservatives, Human Progress, Religion, Science | Comments Off on Education, Religion, Policies that Don’t Work, the Revolt Against Expertise

Nicholas Humphrey, LEAPS OF FAITH

Posted on Saturday 24 May 2025 by Mark R. Kelly

Subtitle: “Science, Miracles, and the Search for Supernatural Consolation” (Basic Books, Jan. 1996, 244pp, including 20pp notes and index) (Chatto & Windus, 1995, as Soul Searching: Human Nature and Supernatural Belief) Here’s a book I read when it came out, … Continue reading →

Posted in Book Notes, Isaac Asimov, MInd, Religion | Comments Off on Nicholas Humphrey, LEAPS OF FAITH