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Stories like this bug me: Trump has "an idea" that he "got somewhere," that calls for counter-arguments from "experts." That's just not what's going on here. Trump has an authoritarian *impulse*. washingtonpost.com/nation/2020/04…
The accurate message to the public isn't "Trump is in the grips of a good-faith confusion about the extent of executive authority." The accurate message is, "Trump is an authoritarian who who will push for more dictatorial powers the longer he's in office."
Trump does not use language to convey information, to "say things" in the conventional sense. He uses language to DO things, to make his narcissistic fantasies into realities. The US media just seems utterly incapable of dealing with this; it has no tools.
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David Roberts
@drvox
I get so frustrated with pieces like this. It's framed as though cons analyzed these models & found flaws, as though they prefer some forms of analysis to others on considered grounds. That's not what's going on. sciencemag.org/news/2020/04/u…
Cons hate ***any investigative or empirical method that produces results they don't like***. Full stop. If these models started producing results amenable to cons, suddenly they'd like models. The results are the point; critiques of methods or models are distracting chaff.
It's about making the interests of the tribe (faction, group, whatever word you like) the primary epistemological criterion. What's good for the tribe = true, what's bad = false. I wrote a whole long post about it. vox.com/policy-and-pol…
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David Roberts
@drvox
One thing that's striking in all this is that the conservative personality type is genuinely outraged, at a gut level, at the idea that they & their tribe should sacrifice out of a sense of solidarity with [waves hands] all those other people. Even before any of the details ...
... about the virus or anything else, it's that: a gut aversion to solidarity & compassion across factional lines. They're groping around for reasons to justify it, but it is pre-reason. An ethic of mutual care, as opposed to zero-sum factional conflict, offends them.
What else could this protest in Michigan be about? The governor asked them to make personal sacrifices in the name of safety for a bunch of people they don't give a shit about -- libs, immigrants, who knows who might be helped by this! They're outraged at a brainstem level.
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David Roberts
@drvox
What should cities do to accommodate people who still need to move around, but need to maintain physical distance? It starts with turning over more public space (and streets are the most ubiquitous public space) to pedestrians & cyclists. vox.com/cities-and-urb…
If you're interested in this subject, you should read my (v. long) series about the city doing it best: Barcelona. It plans to eventually turn 70% of its streets over to local pedestrians/cyclists/scooterers. vox.com/energy-and-env…
Good to see the @RockyMtnInst branching out into the crucial subject of density & urbanism, with a piece that complements my interview 👆 from the other day. Nice work @BeninBoulder. rmi.org/coronavirus-an…
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