Jared Huffman: NO PROPHETS

Posted on Thursday 5 November 2026 by Mark R. Kelly

Subtitled: The Fight to Save Democracy from Christian Nationalism
(Norton, August 2026, 221pp, including 26pp acknowledgements, notes, and further reading)

This book came to my attention because its author, a congressman from California, was on KQED’s Forum show a few weeks ago (audio and transcript here) and Huffman is the only member of Congress to ‘come out’ as an atheist or agnostic, or as he puts it, “he does not believe in gods.” This isn’t just a coming-out story, though; it’s mostly about what he’s observed from Congress about the organizations pushing Christian nationalism, and specific members of the current administration who endorse them or actively promote them. Finding out who they are and what they “believe” is pretty scary. As I’ve said before, they strike me as un-American, putting their religion above the Constitution they swore to uphold, a Constitution they would replace if they could.

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The 2026 Blue Wave

Posted on Wednesday 4 November 2026 by Mark R. Kelly
  • Results of the election;
  • Reactions at Slate, The Atlantic, from John Scalzi, at The New Republic, from David Pakman;
  • JMG reports Midterms Sadz from various conservative voices;
  • What a change in news coverage might look like;
  • NYT contrasts blue vs red, or “Radicalism vs. Corruption,” so I looked closely to see what conservatives think is so radical about the left.
– – –

So there was a big election yesterday, with a larger-than-expected ‘blue wave’ of Democratic wins in many states. Most significant midterm election of 50 years, or something like that. I don’t need to summarize the details here, except to note that Trump blames everyone but himself, Vance blames the war, and the usual suspects think voter fraud was involved (or maybe demons).

Some just headlines.

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David Pakman: THE ECHO MACHINE

Posted on Wednesday 4 November 2026 by Mark R. Kelly

Subtitled: How Right-Wing Extremism Created a Post-Truth America
(Beacon Press, March 2025, 200pp, including 25pp of acknowledgements, notes, and index)

Pakman is a podcaster and YouTuber with frequent posts on Facebook, which is where I started following him. See The David Pakman Show. This is his first book, from early last year. He has another book, just out, called PAY ATTENTION.

Much in this book is familiar, especially the history of the right as a reaction against the era of civil rights and the resistance to science and expertise as the increasing regulatory environment against big business. Passing through critical thinking, and leading to the modern era of social media and media bubbles. It’s a good summary, familiar from Richardson and others, and more current, since Pakman is on the air every day reacting to current events, and this book is less than two years old. What’s new here include his basic defense of the left, given the progress in recent centuries, and discusses how countries that are social democracies (not socialist) are among the most prosperous in the world.

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Life Is About Uncertainty

Posted on Tuesday 3 November 2026 by Mark R. Kelly

Election Day! In recent years every election day is the most critical one in history, which is just one more piece of evidence about scale-blindness and short-term thinking. I could do more political posts today, but I think I did enough yesterday, and I’m sure there will be lots more tomorrow.

Step out to the big picture. All our politics are petty tribal disputes. There is a real world out there, that exists despite human politics, even if some tribes deny it.

Washington Post, opinion by Stuart Firestein, today: The best part of science might be what rattles you, subtitled “It’s uncertain why blood pressure medicine works. That’s no reason to reject it — or other discoveries.”

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The Trashing of America, Intellectually and Civilly, under Trump and MAGA

Posted on Monday 2 November 2026 by Mark R. Kelly
  • How Trump is dismantling the American scientific research machine;
  • And how Republicans are trashing decorum and civility;
  • How Trump is deteriorating;
  • Voting recommendations from John Scalzi: don’t vote for Republicans;
  • Max Boot on why Hegseth should go;
  • Tuck Carlson, demon hunter;
  • California’s Prop 40, and Robert Reich’s take on it;
  • From last week, a perspective on Trump’s utter failure.
– – –

Long article on today’s NYT front page.

NY Times, posted 31 Oct 2026: How Trump Is Dismantling America’s Scientific Research Machine, subtitled “The system that has driven life-altering discoveries and helped make the United States a superpower is now under intense strain.”

MAGA presumably doesn’t care. They have their Bibles. The one-time greatest nation in the world is being taken down.

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A Day’s Drive

Posted on Sunday 1 November 2026 by Mark R. Kelly

We took a ‘day off’ yesterday to get out of the house and away from our computers. (That’s the official story.) I had a plan to drive down through Scotts Valley, a part of the Bay Area, seen on TV weather maps, that we’ve never visited, or even driven through. It’s north and just a bit west of Santa Cruz, and includes neighborhoods like Ben Lomond and Bonny Doon that people we know, or have read, once lived in.

Along the way, I wanted to visit Kepler Books, one of the major bookstores in the Bay Area and one which I had never, in the 11 years we’ve lived in Oakland, visited. (It’s an hour’s drive south from us.) So we drove across the 84 bridge — which I’d never been across, another first — and into the rather lush neighborhoods of Atherton and Menlo Park, just north of Stanford.

(In the middle of this drive, my sister in Simi Valley called to tell me that she are her husband are moving to Philadelphia early next year. She has a son who settled there. And so many things she doesn’t like about California. I didn’t ask.)

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Patrick Stewart and Two Notes About Narrative

Posted on Saturday 31 October 2026 by Mark R. Kelly
  • Noting the passing of Patrick Stewart, and how the noble passages spoken by Picard (and written by unmentioned writers) are credited to the actor;
  • Mike Johnson supports Christian Nationalists (while Republicans rant and rave about Muslims and Sharia Law); and Trump claiming a moral Christian high ground;
  • And Ted Chiang’s remarks on the gap between writers’ intentions and readers’ understandings.
– – –

No wait, three notes about narrative.

Vox, Ian Millhiser, today: Patrick Stewart taught us what good men do with power, subtitled “Great leaders, and great nations, need role models like Jean-Luc Picard.”
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A Muddled Take on Religion v Atheism

Posted on Friday 30 October 2026 by Mark R. Kelly
  • Jack Symes on a third path between religion and atheism, which turns out to be about why the former is taken for granted, and why God is good and not bad;
  • Another essay on what horror films have to say about God;
  • Brief items about the GOP’s plan to make Americans hate Muslims; Christians who think non-Christians shouldn’t serve in Congress; and that guy with two wives who thinks his rationale is Christian.
– – –

This piece appeared over a week ago, but I don’t want to forget it, since it seems to take an approach I find attractive: that many of our philosophical problems exist because we frame them incorrectly. We project human protocols onto the universe at large, to domains where they don’t apply. (And how science fiction helps exercise the mental muscles needed to consider such thoughts.) Alas, now that I’ve read it, I am disappointed.

Big Think, Jack Symes, (17 Oct 2026): Beyond religion and atheism: The secret third answer to big questions, subtitled “Philosopher Jack Symes explores the space between devout religion and atheism.”

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Religion and Aliens

Posted on Thursday 29 October 2026 by Mark R. Kelly
  • Scientific American on how religions might react to the existence of aliens (while ignoring the insights of decades of science fiction writers);
  • Oakland is one of the US’s best cities…;
  • David Wallace-Wells spells out 12 reasons why the Trump era is fading.
– – –

It’s always interesting when the mainstream media takes on a subject thoroughly examined, for decades, by science fiction. Which is to say, don’t expect any new insights here.

Scientific American, Adam Kovac, today: Can the world’s religions survive the existence of aliens?, subtitled “Finding alien life could shake some people to their very souls, but different religions can take very distinct approaches to the existence of extraterrestrial life”

This echoes David Brin’s discussion of the Disclosure Cult.
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More Evenly Distributed

Posted on Wednesday 28 October 2026 by Mark R. Kelly
  • More of those videos about evolution and homosexuality;
  • Paul Krugman invokes William Gibson in his concerns about AI;
  • Brief items about Orwellian tactics, short-term selfish thinking, and the arrogance of the religious.
– – –

That video I posted yesterday about homosexuality turns out to be last in a series, from a Facebook newsgroup called AD1 Explains, described only as a “Digital Creator.” If you go look at their reels you can scroll down and see many on various topics, including this one.

I think I thought I was posting the first in this series yesterday, when somehow I posted the last in the series instead. Here’s the first, I hope.

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