tagged w/ elitism
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Yes, we do have elitists in America. But elitism isn’t necessarily bad – on the contrary, depending on what sort of elitism we’re talking about, it may be a very good thing. It may be the very quality that allowed the US to become the greatest nation in the world, or it may be the quality that is eroding our greatness more and more each day.Yes, we do have elitists in America. But elitism isn’t necessarily bad –... more
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We've been conditioned by the conservative noise machine (and now even muddle-headed progressives are buying into the frame) to hear "elitist" as an epithet. Unfortunately, elitist is actually multiple things - some are very bad, but some are essential to the health of our republic. Part one in a series.We've been conditioned by the conservative noise machine (and now even... more
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We've been conditioned by the conservative noise machine (and now even muddle-headed progressives are buying into the frame) to hear "elitist" as an epithet. Unfortunately, elitist is actually multiple things - some are very bad, but some are essential to the health of our republic. Part one in a series.We've been conditioned by the conservative noise machine (and now even... more
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There is a movement afoot to stop Fox News. Michael Moore recently said that the top 1% of America's population owns more wealth than the bottom 95% combined. He questions that we live in a democracy where the few, the rich, control Congress and own everything. ACORN is an organization based on religious teaching to help the poor. Yet Fox News has an all out attack on ACORN as if it were some kind of conspiracy to undermine the wealthy who control this country.
Well they're right. Those who fight for the voice of the people do have the intention of regaining control of this country for the majority of America's as it was founded on, not for the top 1% who Fox caters to.
Do something: http://action2.bravenewfilms.org/salsa/track.jsp?key=1003867642&url_num=7&url=http%3A%2F%2Fdefoxamerica.com%3Futm_source%3DrgemailThere is a movement afoot to stop Fox News. Michael Moore recently said that the top... more
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Endless war in Afghanistan is an absolute necessity. Health care for Americans is a luxury that can wait.
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Something very unusual happened on The Washington Post Editorial Page today: they deigned to address a response from one of their readers, who "challenged [them] to explain what he sees as a contradiction in [their] editorial positions": namely, the Post demands that Obama's health care plan not be paid for with borrowed money, yet the very same Post Editors vocally support escalation in Afghanistan without specifying how it should be paid for. "Why is it okay to finance wars with debt, asks our reader, but not to pay for health care that way?"
The Post editors give two answers. They first claim that Obama will save substantial money by reducing defense spending -- by which they mean that he is merely decreasing the rate at which defense spending increases ("from 2008 to 2019, defense spending would increase only 17 percent") -- as well as withdrawing from Iraq. But so what? Even if those things really happen, we're still paying for our glorious, endless war in Afghanistan by borrowing the money from China and Japan, all of which continues to explode our crippling national debt. We have absolutely no ability to pay for our Afghan adventure other than by expanding our ignominious status as the largest and most insatiable debtor nation which history has ever known. That debt gravely bothers Beltway elites like the Post editors when it comes to providing ordinary Americans with basic services (which Post editors already enjoy), but it's totally irrelevant to them when it comes to re-fueling the vicarious joys of endless war.
more at link...Endless war in Afghanistan is an absolute necessity. Health care for Americans is a... more
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I’ve been gaming all my life. When I haven’t been plopped down in the floor or on the sofa with a controller in my grimy little hands (or at the computer desk with mouse in hand), I’ve been thinking about video games. So what, right? That doesn’t make me special. You’re absolutely right if you have been thinking that. This isn’t a piece about my history as a gamer or anything of the sort. It was only little over two years ago that it ever occurred to me that perhaps I should give writing about video games a try.
With that revelation, try I did. A lifelong affair with English, high test scores in school, and love of the written word seemed to mesh well with my favorite topic of discussion. After a series of events I was fortunate enough to reach the position I am in right now with Stephanie here at Spawn Kill, and freelance positions across the web - doing what I enjoy, usually not for pay but for the love of it. However, now that I have come so far in what I feel to be a short amount of time, I am nothing things about the industry that I do not find so savory–elitism.I’ve been gaming all my life. When I haven’t been plopped down in the... more
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Unless the GOP Steals the election, Obama's chances of victory are ONE HUNDRED PERCENT!
Professionals and university students agree with the 2008 Election Model:
http://www.geocities.com/electionmodel/2008ElectionModel.htm
Obama has a 100% probability of winning the election - not 90%, not 95%, but 100% - if ALL the votes are counted accurately and there is ZERO fraud.
Datawise Consulting
http://www.datawise-consulting.com/election.pdf
This report takes the latest poll data from each state and simulates possible outcomes of the national presidential election. The simulation takes into account the polling uncertainty and is repeated 10000 times to calculate an approximate probability of any particular outcome for the electoral college. This methodology is referred to as Monte Carlo simulation and is a well established methodology for analysing complex probabilistic problems. Below is the definition of Monte Carlo simulation from wikipedia.com.
"Monte Carlo methods are a class of computational algorithms that rely on repeated random sampling to compute their results. Monte Carlo methods are often used when simulating physical and mathematical systems. Because of their reliance on repeated computation and random or pseudo-random numbers, Monte Carlo methods are most suited to calculation by a computer. Monte Carlo methods tend to be used when it is infeasible or impossible to compute an exact result with a deterministic algorithm."
Introduction
The state by state polling data is collected from:
http://www.usaelectionpolls.com/2008/state-polls.html
For simplicity it is assumed that all the polls have a standard sampling error of +/- 4% which is fairly typical for presidential polls. The data used for the analysis is shown in Appendix A, and was downloaded from usaelectionpolls.com on Oct 25, 2008.
Results
Running a Monte Carlo simulation based on the poll data available on Oct 25, 2008 (Appendix A) results in the following probabilities:
ˆ The probability for an Obama win is 100%.
ˆ The probability for a McCain win is 0%.
ˆ The probability for a tie is 0%.
Figure 1 shows a histogram of the probability for any particular electoral college outcome. The mode (the most likely result) is for Obama to get 378 electoral votes and for McCain to get 160 electoral votes. The probability for this outcome is 6.4%.
DeSart and Holbrook
http://research.uvsc.edu/DeSart/forecasting
The latest run (Oct. 16) predicts that Barack Obama will win the election with 52.85%* of the national 2-party popular vote to to John McCain's 47.15%. The model also predicts that Obama will win the presidency with 354 electoral votes to McCain's 184. Based on these results, they calculate a 99.99% probability that Barack Obama will win the election.
University of Illinois
http://election08.cs.uiuc.edu/
This web site has been developed by computer science and political science students. It determined a 100% Obama win probability.
Other electoral vote forecasting models
http://www.google.com/search?num=100&hl=en&rls=GGLD,GGLD:2003-52,GGLD:en&q=electoral+vote+forecasting+models
270towin
An interactive site which runs 1000 Monte Carlo election trials. It also calculates a 100% Obama win probability.
http://www.270towin.com/simulation/
Franklin & Marshall College
Brian Adams, a mathematics and computer science professor, reports that there's a 99.98% chance that Sen. Barack Obama will win the presidential election on Tuesday. But his 50 million election trials were overkill. Only 5000 are necessary.
http://www.270towin.com/simulation
See the complete post at:
http://www.progressiveindependent.com/dc/dcboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=120&topic_id=4016&mesg_id=4016Unless the GOP Steals the election, Obama's chances of victory are ONE HUNDRED... more
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The 'L-curve' helps one imagine the degree to which wealth in the United States in inequitably distributed by policy and by design. The US population is represented 'stretched across a football field in order of income, from poorest, on the left, to richest. Imagine a stack of $100 bills 'representing each person's income.' For example: a stack one inch high represents a stack of one hundred dollars bills, i.e, $25,000. The red line on the graph represents the height of that stack compared to an American football field.
"The red line in the first picture is the beginning of the U. S. income distribution. On the scale of the football field the line slopes gradually from zero on the left to less than 2-inches high at the 50-yard line ($39,000), to about 4-inches high at the 95-yard line ($132,000). On this scale the entire graph is less than one pixel high, up to this point. It is not until you are well past the 99-yard line that you hit the $1 million mark: a stack of $100 bills 40-inches high. There were over 144,000 people who turned in IRS returns in 1997 with adjusted gross incomes of $1 million or more." [See: Houston Independent Media Center, Wealth Distribution in the US http://houston.indymedia.org/news/2003/07/14100.php ]
Although the US economy produces tremendous wealth, it is always accompanied in GOP regimes by tremendous poverty. The US, for example, was most egalitarian in the years immediately following WWII. During GOP regimes, income inequality increased and is, in fact, measured with the GINI index. Higher Ginis indicate greater levels of income inequality. These indices have been significantly greater in every GOP regime since World War II.
Certainly --there is enough wealth to go around. Instead, wealth flows upward ---not down, as the propagandists of 'supply side' i.e. 'trickle down theory' would have you believe. The problem is systemic --the result of identifiable, right wing policies that can be identified.
The primary culprits are GOP tax cuts by Mssrs Ronald Reagan and Bush; the effect of those cuts have been the deliberate transfer of wealth first to the upper quintile and, most recently, to an increasingly tiny elite of about one percent of the total population [See: Dr. Daniel Weinberger, US Census Bureau Briefings; Also see: The Quarterly Journal of Economics: Income Inequality in the United States at the following URL: http://elsa.berkeley.edu/~saez/pikettyqje.pdf]. It's a PDF and cites academic and official, original sources of data.
As wealth is transferred to the very top with tax cuts for only the very, very wealthy and practitioners of 'corporate socialism', the masses are left to fight over the crumbs. There is no poverty in America that could not be addressed by simply addressing GOP tax policies --give aways -- which deliberately make the rich richer, the working class significantly poorer.
If you are in the middle class now, don't kid yourself. Unless you stand to inherit a fortune of several billions from a rich and long lost Uncle, the chances are almost exponentially high against you. Chances are --you will NOT progress upward in this society. Moreover, this aspect of American society is the work of one party primarily: the GOP! The GOP is the party of a rich elites who have learned how to 'sell' a fairy tale: supply side economics, or, derisively --"trickle down theory". To sum it all up: wealth has never, does not, will not 'trickle down'. The 'L-curve' helps one imagine the degree to which wealth in the United... more
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Sam Harris, a noted provocateur rips Sarah Palin—and defends elitism:
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Let me confess that I was genuinely unnerved by Sarah Palin's performance at the Republican convention. Given her audience and the needs of the moment, I believe Governor Palin's speech was the most effective political communication I have ever witnessed. Here, finally, was a performer who—being maternal, wounded, righteous and sexy—could stride past the frontal cortex of every American and plant a three-inch heel directly on that limbic circuit that ceaselessly intones "God and country." If anyone could make Christian theocracy smell like apple pie, Sarah Palin could.
Then came Palin's first television interview with Charles Gibson. I was relieved to discover, as many were, that Palin's luster can be much diminished by the absence of a teleprompter. Still, the problem she poses to our political process is now much bigger than she is. Her fans seem inclined to forgive her any indiscretion short of cannibalism. However badly she may stumble during the remaining weeks of this campaign, her supporters will focus their outrage upon the journalist who caused her to break stride, upon the camera operator who happened to capture her fall, upon the television network that broadcast the good lady's misfortune—and, above all, upon the "liberal elites" with their highfalutin assumption that, in the 21st century, only a reasonably well-educated person should be given command of our nuclear arsenal.
The point to be lamented is not that Sarah Palin comes from outside Washington, or that she has glimpsed so little of the earth's surface (she didn't have a passport until last year), or that she's never met a foreign head of state. The point is that she comes to us, seeking the second most important job in the world, without any intellectual training relevant to the challenges and responsibilities that await her.
[Read on....]Sam Harris, a noted provocateur rips Sarah Palin—and defends elitism:
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Just curious about what you all think of elitism, reverse dominance hierarchy, and the governance of anarchy. Take your time... no deadline for a doctoral theses here.
Mind-mashing article by Dennis Dutton:
"Hierarchies, writes Denis Dutton, are intrinsic to human society, and resentment of elites can be traced back to prehistory | March 12, 2008
I'M here not to praise elitism but to understand it, not so much through a history of elites but by talking about elites in prehistory.
Human beings are naturally hierarchical and they like arranging themselves into hierarchies of skill, age, wealth, competence, experience, whatever. We can deny it if we want, but we all know that when the chips are down and the anarchists have formed the anarchists' association, the first thing they do is elect a governing committee.
The Pleistocene is the period from 1.6million years ago to 10,000 years ago, when cities began to be built and agriculture and writing were invented. Following it is the modern period, the Holocene. But it's in that earlier, much longer period, the Pleistocene, when the human personality and human sociality were formed; and that's what is so important for evolutionary psychology.
Based on what we know about hunter-gatherer societies from the Pleistocene to the present, we can say a little bit about how hierarchies form in human groups. It's worth considering our Pleistocene inheritance in this context because although hierarchies are conditioned for every society by local cultural conditions, the will to form hierarchies in human associations is as hard-wired as blood clotting or the liking for sweet and fat.
Some general sense of fairness is intrinsic to hunter-gatherer hierarchies. Pure self-interest or the interest of your family is not all that counts. There is also fairness in, say, food distribution: the obligation of individuals to divide, rather than keep for themselves or their family, the kill from some successful hunting expedition. As far as status and opportunity are concerned, I think we'd learn a lot by looking at how hierarchies tend to be found in typical Pleistocene hunting bands.
These bands seem to be adjusted to create maximal success in terms of mobility, flexibility, skill specialisation and stealth. They required co-operation. They were male units. Bands of brothers is perhaps going too far, but the standard hunter-gatherer societies were anywhere from 25 to 150 people in size and certainly included a lot of cousins and brothers. It's interesting to note that the size of the hunter-gatherer hunting band drawn from these societies was about 10 to 12 men, which happens to be the size of the basic platoon in the British army, the squad in the US army and the basic unit in almost every army since the Romans.
It is also close to the default size -- nine to 12 or so -- of teams in many sports and boards of directors of corporations.
This is a contingent fact about human nature. We could have evolved so that the most comfortable operating group was 50 people, or 100, or three. Then we'd have a different memory as a species for names and faces, and we'd have a different way of forming associations in societies. But as things evolved for Homo sapiens, we came to this number of 12 as a default size of these types of co-operative groups worldwide.
These bands, as well as the larger hunter-gatherer groups that they fed and protected, were involved not only in hunting but in running raiding parties and defences against other human raiding parties."
[click the link to read on]
Photo by Craig Deane - http://flickr.com/photos/craigdeane/213146316/Just curious about what you all think of elitism, reverse dominance hierarchy, and the... more
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Very interesting essay that changed my life when I first read it in 2003. After reading this article, I put out a zine entitled "The Agents Not the Spectators" encouraging artists to stop talking about art and start making art. Espinosa believes that with access to proper education and available means for creating art, anyone (and everyone) can be an artist, thus eliminating the superiority and elitism that exists between artists and "non-artists".
Very interesting essay that changed my life when I first read it in 2003. After... more
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This sounds like an Onion article, but it's based on research by a British Evolutionary theorist.This sounds like an Onion article, but it's based on research by a British... more
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a dying concept...
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saskia
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added this
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4 years ago
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