Mark R. Kelly
» Founder in 1997 and site-runner for 20 years of Locus Online (Hugo Award winner in 2002). Founder in 2012 and still site-runner of sfadb.com (Science Fiction Awards Database). Retired in 2012 after 30 years as a software engineer for a certain rocket engine factory.
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- It’s Not Even About Deportation
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Meta
Category Archives: History
Heather Cox Richardson, DEMOCRACY AWAKENING, post 2
Continuing my fairly detailed summary notes of this book. The second part of this book is about the ascendance of Trump, finishing with the “Big Lie” that the 2020 election was stolen from him. The third part of the looks … Continue reading
Posted in Book Notes, conservatives, History, Human Nature
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Heather Cox Richardson, DEMOCRACY AWAKENING, post 1
Subtitled “Notes on the State of America” (Viking, Sep 2023, xvii + 286pp, including 30p of notes and index) Heather Cox Richardson is a historian who has become well-known, in addition to several earlier books, for her newsletter called Letters … Continue reading
Posted in Book Notes, Culture, History, Human Nature, Politics
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Tim Urban, Out of Left Field
About a writer I’d never heard of, Tim Urban, and his book, and their connection to Luigi Mangione; The psychological motivations of the drone alarmists. – – – NY Times, David Wallace-Wells, 18 Dec 2024: Can Anyone Make Sense of … Continue reading
Posted in History, Psychology, Social Progress
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Fear, Outrage, and Paranoia
I’ve been curious, but have never been sufficiently tempted, to watch or listen to right-wing media for any period of time. These two pieces confirm my impression that most of its content is about fear and outrage. Fear of a … Continue reading
Posted in Conservative Resistance, History, Lunacy, Politics
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Politics as Aspects of Human Nature
An early post on this blog quoted Robert Reich about how most progressives live in cities and on the coasts, and most regressives live in rural areas far removed from ports and cities. It’s a widely noted pattern. “Our problem … Continue reading
Posted in History, Politics, Psychology
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Politics, Tribalism, and the Retelling of History
Book burning and the erasure or retelling of history; Trump’s latest outrageous choice for his cabinet; And how Trump voters are now unconcerned about voter fraud, since their side won. Given that ideology, tradition, and storytelling are more common on … Continue reading
Wrecking Crews and Historical Cycles
Once again, considering current politics as the ways human nature plays out. Today’s topics: Efforts in several states to replace general education with Christian education; The reality of the “deep state,” and how they plan to survive Trump and MAGA; … Continue reading
Posted in conservatives, History, Politics
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This Much is Reality… and This Much is Fantasy
Silverberg on reality vs. fantasy; It wasn’t a landslide, thus not a mandate; OnlySky: why is fascism rising? OnlySky: how knowledge endures or disappears. Here’s a passage from a key science fiction story that addresses the nature of reality, in … Continue reading
Posted in History, science fiction
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Regression Toward the Tribal
Let’s see now. Here we are in the 21st century. In the past 500 years humankind has shown remarkable progress on two parallel fronts. Along governance: no longer was the divine right of kings (or tribal leaders) recognized; rather, principles … Continue reading
Posted in Conservative Resistance, Epistemology, History, Human Progress, Politics, Science
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Borders and the Fringe
A speculation by Adam Lee about what will happen when we give up national borders; Items from the fringe about Trump’s three rules; Musk’s preference for high status males; Christian nonsense about evolution; simply lying about the Arlington story; and … Continue reading
Posted in conservatives, Culture, Evolution, History, Lunacy
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