Category Archives: conservatives

Everything Will Be Better in Two Weeks

Posted on Friday 6 March 2026 by Mark R. Kelly

Back to our regularly scheduled programming. No one in Washington knows what they’re doing. And conservatives are regressive. The Atlantic, Marie-Rose Sheinerman and Isabel Ruehl: Six Days of War, 10 Rationales, subtitled “The administration has laid out a buffet of … Continue reading →

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Fractured Reality

Posted on Tuesday 3 March 2026 by Mark R. Kelly

Different takes on Trump’s new war. The Critics: Trump’s plan (to subdue Iran by strikes from the air, without any ‘boots on the ground’) has no apparent precedent. PolitiFact, Louis Jacobson, 2 Mar 2026: Chris Murphy, stated on March 1, … Continue reading →

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Our New War, and Perceptions of Change

Posted on Monday 2 March 2026 by Mark R. Kelly

I’ll post just a couple items about Trump’s new Iran war. This echoes many other commentaries I’ve seen. Why now? For what reason? Didn’t the US just obliterate those facilities last year? BBC, via Doug Van Belle on FB: OK, … Continue reading →

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Fearmongering and Gratuitous Cruelty

Posted on Friday 27 February 2026 by Mark R. Kelly

E.J. Dionne Jr. on Trump’s fearmongering; Gratuitous cruelty in Kansas: canceling the driver’s licenses of transgender people, immediately and without notice; Florida cuts off HIV meds access; White House edits video of US hockey star; Thoughtful piece by Ryan Burge … Continue reading →

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The MAHA Veil, Cruelty, and What Trump Supporters are Teaching their Children

Posted on Thursday 26 February 2026 by Mark R. Kelly

MAHA isn’t about health, it’s about making money off quack cures; Matthew Rozsa thinks Trump will lose in November because of one word: cruelty; John Pavlovitz spells out what Trump supporters are teaching their children, about diversity, compassion, women, and … Continue reading →

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Competence vs. Competition

Posted on Monday 23 February 2026 by Mark R. Kelly

Olympics thoughts: zero-sum games; competence vs competition; Amanda Marcotte on the violence and propaganda from the DHS; Zack Beauchamp on how to stop a dictator: make the threat obvious; Tom Nichols on the Republican Party’s Nazi problem; Short items about … Continue reading →

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Another Take on the Left/Right Divide

Posted on Sunday 22 February 2026 by Mark R. Kelly

Kalen Dion on the right/left divide: homogeneity/diversity, and all that implies; What do historians mean that tomorrow won’t be better than today? Because human nature; The modern economy and the limits of human cognition; Conservative values: the Biblical right to … Continue reading →

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Are There Superior Civilizations?

Posted on Wednesday 18 February 2026 by Mark R. Kelly

Reactions to a speech by Marco Rubio claiming the superiority of Western Civilization over all others, by Bret Stephens, Eliot A. Cohen, Jamelle Bouie; Noting again Jared Diamond, who explained decades ago why the fact that the Enlightenment et al … Continue reading →

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How Crises Disappear

Posted on Wednesday 11 February 2026 by Mark R. Kelly

How Trump has quietly withdrawn National Guard troops from various cities; Adam-Troy Castro predicts that the ballroom, the Kennedy Center overhaul, and the arch, will never happen; John Pavlovitz on how Bad Bunny reminds MAGA that they’re losing; Amanda Marcotte … Continue reading →

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How the War on Woke Reflects the Basics of Human Nature

Posted on Sunday 8 February 2026 by Mark R. Kelly

Just one piece today, a longish piece I’m going to go through fairly carefully, since it puts current issues about MAGA and conservative regression into a broad context, broader I’d say than the 400 years stated in the title. Salon, … Continue reading →

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