On this 4th of July, America is reeling under the combined threats of official ignorance and pervasive stupidity.
To be human, of course, is to be ignorant. There are all sorts of things that virtually all of us fail to understand. In my house, it tends to be most aspects of the emerging digital universe (I know AI is coming but have absolutely no idea how it works or what it portends, and my ability to understand the various devices my grandchildren grew up with is similarly limited). A depressingly significant portion of the population is ignorant of America’s legal framework and the most basic premises undergirding the Constitution and Bill of Rights. For millions of Americans, it’s ignorance of science and the significant difference between a scientific theory and the common use of the term “theory” as an unsupported guess.
Rather obviously, these knowledge gaps are not mutually exclusive….
Ignorance can be remedied. With proper motivation, most of us can fill in those empty spaces in our understanding. We can learn. Stupidity, however, isn’t amenable to similar correction. It’s defined as a lack of intelligence or understanding–an inability to reason or learn.
We are currently governed by people who exhibit both, elected by voters who–at the very least–were ignorant of both the nature of public service and the damage that predictably ensues when incompetent ideologues are placed in positions of authority.
America has a secretary of health and human services whose conspiratorial approach to reality and inability to understand science has led (among other appalling things) to a major outbreak of measles–a disease once virtually eradicated–and who has suggested that those afflicted take cod liver oil. We have an agriculture secretary whose “solution” to high egg prices is advice that we raise our own chickens. We have a secretary of defense–a dipsomaniac– who accidently included a journalist on an unsecured call in which national security matters were discussed. The list goes on…
The “Big Beautiful Bill” that contains MAGA’s policy priorities won’t just deprive millions of health care in order to line the pockets of our plutocrats– it will destroy this country’s storied educational institutions, and derail America’s scientific and technological progress.
The Trump administration’s fixation on ridding the country of immigrants–not simply those who’ve committed crimes, as candidate Trump promised, but any immigrant who lacks lily-white skin– is perhaps the best example of the profound stupidity that always accompanies racism.
Immigrants have been essential elements of American innovation and economic growth. Research conducted by the Partnership for a New American Economy in 2010 documented their importance. More than 40% of Fortune 500 companies were founded by immigrants or their children. Collectively, the companies founded by immigrants and their children employed more than 10 million people worldwide; and the revenue they generated was greater than the GDP of every country in the world except the U.S., China and Japan.
The names of those companies are familiar to most of us: Intel, EBay, Google, Tesla, Apple, You Tube, Pay Pal, Yahoo, Nordstrom, Comcast, Proctor and Gamble, Elizabeth Arden, Huffington Post. A 2012 report found that immigrants are more than twice as likely to start a business as native-born Americans. As of 2011, one in ten Americans was employed by an immigrant-run business.
As we are discovering, America’s agriculture and construction industries overwhelmingly rely on immigrants, the majority of whom are undocumented.
MAGA’s anti-immigrant hysteria is part and parcel of its equally ignorant White Christian Nationalism. There has always been a nativist streak in America– Ellis Island was first established to keep “undesirables” from entering the country. “Give me your tired, your poor, your masses yearning to breathe free” was Emma Lazarus’ response to the Chinese Exclusion Act. The Know-Nothing Party was formed largely by people who feared that Irish Catholic immigrants would take jobs from God-fearing Protestant “real Americans.”
The animus isn’t new, but it rests on widespread ignorance. As David Brooks (no bleeding heart liberal) has observed, when you wade into the evidence you find that the case for restricting immigration is pathetically weak. “The only people who have less actual data on their side are the people who deny climate change.”
Trump’s fixation on immigration has consistently been both stupid and ignorant, as well as inhumane. Remember his first term promise to build a “beautiful wall” on our southern border? The vast majority of people who are in the country illegally flew in and overstayed their visas—something a wall would neither address or prevent. (It would, however, focus on those Brown people…)
MAGA’s slogan ought to be: “Owning the libs by cutting off our noses to spite our faces.” Unfortunately, we “libs” live here too…
We focus upon the Stupidity of others at our own Peril. Fear- is a powerful Weapon that Trump plays on effectively as Fascism builds. Mainstream Dems- buy into the Lies of the Danger of Iran getting Nuclear Warheads- meanwhile we make it Necessary for Iran – see N Korea who no longer is Targeted. We don’t learn – yet alone recognize our “American Exceptionalism “ began with – Native People moved into Enslaving Black People- now Latina/o People- look down on Black People- while some of their own relatives are Expelled from their own country- We idolize Wealth and Patriarchy- as Women/ Girls are threatened with Death increasingly- Abortion – hasn’t been a Defining Issue for Voting- and Why Presume we will even have 2026 Elections if MAGA- brings the Republicans facing loss of control… We need to resist now and not trust our Dem “leaders “ to do more than beg for our money.
Our lives are being controlled more and more each day by electronics which many of us do not understand. One thing I DO understand is that AI is information provided by humans who are sharing what they have researched from others and reached their own conclusions. As likely to provide “garbage in, garbage out” as all web sites on Google.
The electronic gizmos and gadgets and now to prove our identities, confirmation numbers electronically; is confusing and time consuming and more prone to errors. My most recent confirmation number was received on my cell phone as I stood before the bank teller who had my completed check for Cash, my Real ID drivers license and my PNC VISA card. I didn’t access the cell phone call during conducting banking business; found it when I got home. Evidently this is now required where I have banked for 20 years. We are facing more and more power outages which take longer to return to service and thousands of dollars of food is hauled to trash cans for pickup during these outages. A local news report last fall, reporting an ongoing power outage for more than a week, stated the report that we simply do not have enough electronic power to conduct our daily lives.
I have said for years, “PROGRESS IS NOT ALWAYS IMPROVEMENT.” Is our current day-to-day lives in the hands of ignorance or stupidity? To me it appears to be in the hands of greed and power.
Are you celebrating Independence Day on this July 4th; or are you memoralizing its loss?
Speaking of ignorance, how in the world did the Oligarchs (Plantation Owners) in the Confederacy convince a bunch of poor white men to die for their right to own slaves? The oligarchs didn’t have network news to manipulate the population back then.
If you read Mein Kampf, which Trump had sitting on his nightstand for years, according to Barbara Walters, it’s his political playbook. I asked AI to tell me about what Hitler thought of the German masses. Here is Gemini’s response:
“In Mein Kampf, Adolf Hitler expresses a deeply cynical and manipulative view of the masses, whom he consistently portrays as ignorant, easily manipulated, fickle, and lacking independent thought. He believed the masses were inherently irrational and driven by emotion, rather than reason.”
It goes on in detail, almost precisely what Trump and his surrounding ghouls are doing today with the help of Fox News. In summary, Gemini says:
“Mein Kampf outlines a strategy for political power based on exploiting what Hitler perceived as the inherent intellectual and emotional weaknesses of the general populace.”
Well, if you think the ignorant masses will wake up after their cost of living increases under this OBBTurd, you are missing Sheila and Hitler’s point. Let the scapegoating games begin…
Speaking of ‘plantations’, Smekens, Senator Budd (R-NC) boasted in his newsletter this week of his support for the Big Beautiful Bill because it specifically restored tariff advantage to protect tobacco growers in our state. What he failed to mention of course were the cuts to Medicare for the poor most vulnerable to the billions in healthcare costs attributed directly to smoking. What else do you do with tobacco? I wrote an opinion letter yesterday about the utter stupidity of his office to boast protections of the tobacco growers while slash and burn health benefits prevail in his Big Beautiful Bill. Is this stupidity or willful annihilation of the poor?
And what was the scapegoat? Or as referred to in Scripture as the Azazel goat. One goat was sacrificed, the other (Azazel goat) was released into the desert never to return carrying the sins of The Jews with it. Of course, this provision was modified, because sometimes the goats didn’t stay in the desert but came back. So they started nudging those goats off of cliffs. A little help to keep those sins outside of the boundary.
Maybe instead of the scapegoat, or Azazel goat, another goat from history would be the Judas goat. The Judas goat was used to lead flocks of sheep into the slaughterhouse. The sheep would willingly follow the Judas goat, and right before the Judas goat entered the slaughterhouse, it would veer off to the side while the sheep would trot on in. The Judas goat would then live to deceive the next flock onto the killing floor.
they believe and live,corp lackys. most of the cabinet are all corp, take profits ,or find ways,to bleed more profit back to the shareholders. the DC big buisness is how wall streets greed works. its just not news worthy in any mainstream. botted out per se. control with new AI and the lists of every aspect of every American via, musks glory to sell it back to the governement,and socialmedias silos. bought and sold, investigated,picked apart ,think thinktanked,and made into files that most likely are given to another data base,and they know who we are,before the next election. should be entertaining if ya dont fall into it. but of course,theres a buncha new interment camps and the doubling of ICE. nothing like a wake up before 11/26
Thank you, Todd, for this: “Mein Kampf outlines a strategy for political power based on exploiting what Hitler perceived as the inherent intellectual and emotional weaknesses of the general populace.” Assuming Walters’ info was correct, it fits perfectly with Trump’s old comment about the stupidity of the members of the Republican Party.
At risk of sounding redundant, we have here, both exemplars of Eric Fromm’s Big Beautiful diagnosis of Malignant Narcissism!
And it seems to be no coincidence that Trump is surrounded by a troop of people recently reported to be anti-semites. Another bit of marvelousness evident in Trump’s circle is that well known disdain for science, as also seen in Hitler’s comment to the effect that “We’ll just have to do without science for a few years,” as he had no tolerance for the likes of Einstein, et al.
I can just picture him, sitting in Mar-A-Largo, as a massive hurricane unexpectedly comes ashore nearby, saying “We don’t need no damned weather satellites!”
Because freedom, safety and comfort is all I have known, it is literally who I am. All I can say is I will die being no different than I was born in those respects.
When, how, and where, however, are still TBD.
Trump, Vance, Miller, Johnson, Roberts, the Cabinet of Clowns, and the Red-Coats are sowing the seeds of their own destruction just as surly as all of America’s enemies have.
Revolutions grow organically and ours has a mind of its own already. Leaders and organizations of and for it will show up in the right time and, though that is sure, the future has never been.
We “masses” like to think Hitler’s opinion was not true, e.g.
“He believed the masses were inherently irrational and driven by emotion, rather than reason.”
I just read that in 1965, the U.S. masses were largely in favor of advancing the Vietnam War. It was the bothersome student leftists (a vocal minority) protesting in the streets who finally convinced our leaders that the war put America in a bad light and was not worth the trouble.
Presidential candidates in 1968 began opposing the war. We finally got out… to the chagrin of those patriots who felt we could have “won” if we’d just nuked North Vietnam.
Were those masses driven by emotion, or reason?
“True ignorance is not the absence of knowledge, but the refusal to acquire it.” This meme on Facebook is attributed to Karl Popper, a twentieth century Austrian/British philosopher. It says a lot about our current dilemma.
America’s religious leaders have signed a letter in an attempt to prevent the passage of the Big Ugly Bill. Even some Catholics signed on. It’s better late than never, I guess. IMHO they all should have been with Bishop Barber when he was arrested for protesting at the Capital. Christian religious leaders need to be more vocal about what it means to be a Christian and how far off the mark the White Christian Nationalists actually are.
I wonder how Italian families feel about our current crisis. If I read history correctly, so many of their ancestors came to America without papers, that they were given a nickname that came be considered derogatory. They stayed and thrived.
I’m the granddaughter of Irish immigrants.. I know few people who can trace their ancestry to 1776. Fewer can trace it back to 1619. Fewer still can trace it back to the time when the indigenous people ruled the land. In other words, we are all immigrants.
It’s the immigrant communities that make life interesting and more comfortable for the rest of us. I love strawberries, but I don’t like picking them. I love a good hotel and clean sheets, but I don’t like constantly cleaning. I like a good roof on my house, but I don’t want to put it on myself. All those things I don’t like to do have been done by undocumented immigrants.
Happy Independence Day and AMEN!
To add a bit of levity to a grim situation, today’s commentary brings to mind the inimitable wisdom of comedian Ron White who has famously said: “You can’ fix stupid!” And in the immortal words of Forrest Gump: “ Momma always said stupid is as stupid does.” Amen.
Peggy,
You’re absolutely correct! Immigrants make a country function. It’s like when you pull stopper on your bathtub, to let out the water, the water Just doesn’t go down over the drain, the water flows from the entire tub towards the drain. Pretty soon the tub is empty. So you can’t take a group of people or peoples, and wash them down the drain and figure everything else is fine. Because it lowers the entirety of society. It sucks the ingenuity, the humanity, the creative aspects of all people, right out of that tub until it’s empty.
The begging to the world, bring us your poor, bring us your downtrodden, so that they might blossom, is, or always has been, a lie! The world is really just noticing that right now, because people just don’t seem to mesh together very well. Especially those who are obviously different, due to skin color, due to cultural practices, due to religious beliefs, and myriads of other issues. There are always enough reprobates to spoil the sugar and the sugar bowl, or drain the water out of the tub. The Romans did that, and it brought down their empire. The British did that, and it brought down there empire. Now the United States is doing it, you think they’ll be a different outcome? The British and the Romans love to reflect on their previous glory, unfortunately, that ship has sailed, not to return!
(Revelation)
“Therefore in one day shall her plagues come, death, and mourning, and famine; and she shall be utterly burned with fire; for strong is the Lord God who judged her. 9 And the kings of the earth, who committed fornication and lived wantonly with her, shall weep and wail over her, when they look upon the smoke of her burning, 10 standing afar off for the fear of her torment, saying, Woe, woe, the great city, Babylon, the strong city! for in one hour is thy judgment come.11 And the merchants of the earth weep and mourn over her, for no man buyeth their merchandise any more; 12 merchandise of gold, and silver, and precious stone, and pearls, and fine linen, and purple, and silk, and scarlet; and all thyine wood, and every vessel of ivory, and every vessel made of most precious wood, and of brass, and iron, and marble; 13 and cinnamon, and spice, and incense, and ointment, and frankincense, and wine, and oil, and fine flour, and wheat, and cattle, and sheep; and merchandise of horses and chariots and slaves; and souls of men.”
So, here is my recommendation for the Democrats going forward.
1. Study the One Big Beautiful Bill and list ALL of the disparate impacts for each State, and when the Bill will cause each of those impacts to go into effect.
2. Prepare to launch State-wide advertising campaigns (probably on billboards) specifying these disparate impacts under the headline “Brought to You By” and showing pictures of all of the States Senators and Representatives who voted YES on the OBBB.
3. Launch the campaign as part of a Voter Registration Drive, followed by a Primary get out the vote blitz with good candidates.
4. Keep it going through the General Election.
Simply put: Put faces on the people who actually recorded their votes for this monstrosity!
Put another way; Don’t let the people forget WHO voted to impose this monstrosity on them.
There’s an interesting/informative article in the current New Yorker about the effects of Al on education and the changes it’s causing. It’s titled “The End of the Essay” and looks at how many students rely on ChatGPT to assist in varying degrees with their writing. It’s worth a read.
When people are caught up in their forced beliefs communities and propaganda silos, in their busy lives’, true freedom is an uphill battle that many can’t bear. Look at the Maga congress people who voted for a bill that will increase the deficit and national debt for decades and throw millions of Americans off of their food and healthcare assistance. A result will be loss of rural hospitals (deceitfully timed to start after the midterms) and an overrunning of ERs for healthcare that will drive up cost. Many nursing homes will close and elderly and disabled will be thrown onto local communities for housing and care. The stress and hardships will increase exponentially, and Fox news will continue to blame the Libs. That’s so wrong to hold back/disguise the facts that would allow citizens to make better decisions for themselves and improve their situations realistically.
The passed ugly bill gives the executive branch over 100 billion to increase the ICE budget. Essentially, that means to build more detention (concentration camps) and have its own police force. Immigrants and political opponents will be targeted and confined. My bet is that a lot of the big bill money will end up in trump’s and Maga’s pockets.
Don’t know who you are CGH, but you are on the something. Are you the next MLK, JFK, FDR and LBJ? So far you do not resonate in the same elite crowd. But I like your plan.