Jack & Jill Politics

Excellent! Thank you for posting that link, rikyrah.

But if you look at the political fights he’s picked throughout his political career, the main theme is not any ideology. It’s that he hates stupidity

and

Most of the things Obama’s taken heat for saying this summer fall into these two familiar patterns — attempts to find a rational common ground on controversial issues and dumb-avoidance.

THERE IT IS.

I don't know the columnist other than reading this one piece, but in my assessment, she is very accurate here in how she is setting up her categories of understanding. I might not have said it quite as she does, but those are good and accurate. And, to my eyes, they are ground-up: based on attending to what Senator Obama has been saying and doing all along, rather than some top-down interpretation based on something else entirely.

Her column also shows, clearly, that it really matters what categories you use in understanding what is going on. It seems to me that many people who are now “disappointed” in Senator Obama but used to support him a whole lot more … likely never bothered to question their own lenses, likely never bothered to really attend to what he has been saying or doing as itself first, but instead saw it through their likely unexamined assumptions to start with.

I wrote a comment on dailykos earlier this week asking for transparency on how we know what we know. It's here: “How do you know what you know?”

Part of what I wrote in that comment was: When there is a clash between my expectations and actual reality of what is happening, what are the options? One option is to immediately get angry and feel betrayed that the actual reality isn't living up to what you expected and blame whatever and whoever isn't living up to the expectations.

But here's the thing — when there is a clash between what is going on and what you expect to happen, there is another part of the equation: the information and methods by which you actually came up with the expectations in the first place. While this may NOT be the source of the clash, it is always possible that it is. Part of dealing with the clash, IMO, is questioning this piece also.

So to me it is normal and necessary to ask questions like: where did my expectations come from, specifically (what information and process)? Did I lack crucial information? Did I misunderstand what is going on? Have I been interpreting in categories or with definitions that aren't really accurate to the situation? ….

… So. I want to know if the people making these claims about pandering and divergence of expectations have done any sort of critical analysis of where they themselves are coming from — and if so, if and how they have determined that their expectations don't come from a self-referential internal feedback loop of some sort.

And, from the comments section on that “Sky Didn't Fall” post (read the original post first, though):

Complexity, comment by Brendan Corcoran

It starts with this: Yes. I also wanted to add something about the phenomenon of keyboard-complaint-cum-faux-activism. The phenomenon of liberals (like many academics; liberals and academics are also very distinct as I actually see very little of what I would call progressivism in the academy) declaring this or that as a “deal-breaker” is not simply an exercise in delusions of self-importance. Rather, in my view, it involves an extraordinary failure to grasp the sheer enormity and complexity of the worlds around us and in which we live.

and goes on from there.

Bwaaa haaa haaaa haaaaa!!!!

Hehe.

I just realized I used the words “penis” and “clitoris” once in posts today.

I can die happy.
:)

Tiger is about to join the BILLIONAIRES club. Love it. Love it. Love it.

http://sports.aol.com/golf/story/_a/tiger-closi…

I can understand their position. They don't cover elections, but are making a special concession for their 93% black viewers.

Yeah, but what about the Manifest Destiny stuff he spoke in Miami? How about his far right zionist stuff? Or the fact that he was against FISA and then for it? Will BO backtracking on Iraq be a deal breaker? It certainly will for me. In fact, it'll turn me from cautious supporter to hostile opponent in a heartbeat. Heck, I may even join Jesse Jackson in the “Cut his nuts off club”!

I can understand their position. They don't cover elections, but are making a special concession for their 93% black viewers.