Like I stated before most of the left is full of sinisterism and deviousness...
THE DEMS AREN’T “BRIGHTS”
The Left's aggrandizement of power at the expense of individuals, states, and civil society.
March 29, 2017
Bruce Thornton
“Brights” was the term popularized by evangelical atheists Richard Dawkins and Daniel Dennett to describe people who think like them: materialist determinists who scoff at faith and traditional wisdom, and proclaim their devotion to rationalism, science, and critical thought. The label was mocked to death for its smug narcissism, but the idea behind it is still a foundational assumption of progressives. The irony is much of the superiority progressives claim based on their “respect for science” is an illusion, reflecting instead scientism and ideology.
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This mistake lies at the heart of progressive pretensions to technocratic expertise wielded by what Stalin called “technicians of the soul.” And it explains the serial failures of their policies. Between 1900-1940 “Scientific racism” and the eugenics it spawned were considered “settled science,” and “eugenic ideas were politically influential, culturally fashionable, and scientifically mainstream,” as Thomas C. Leonard writes. “The elite sprinkled their conversations with eugenic concerns to signal their au courant high-mindedness.” Eugenics, of course, was a monstrous, inhuman failure, which inspired forced sterilization and gave scientific cover to Jim Crow segregation.
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And who can leave out the lunatic “science-based” policies ruining California? Based on dubious environmental “science,” during the drought billions of gallons of Sierra snow-melt––1.6 billion every 24 hours–– were dumped into the Pacific Ocean to protect a two-inch bait-fish, and to encourage salmon to return to the San Joaquin River. Meanwhile, farms are abandoned, farmworkers thrown out of work, reservoirs that could capture this year’s unprecedented snow-melt are left unbuilt, and California has some of the highest rates of energy poverty in the nation. The same environmentalist voodoo lies behind the “high-speed rail” boondoggle. It started out costing $32 billion, but the bill has doubled to $68 billion. Work on the first stretch of track, the flattest and easiest of the whole route, is years behind schedule and will cost $10 billion, if it’s even built. Meanwhile, there’s no money for fixing California’s decaying infrastructure like Highway 99, a Road Warrior nightmare with the distinction of being the bloodiest highway in the nation. These are policies and projects an illiterate farmer in 1850 would have known are stupid.
...
As Rudyard Kipling wrote in “The Gods of the Copybook Headings,” the policy of “robbing selected Peter to pay for collective Paul” results in a world in which “all men are paid for existing and no man must pay for his sins.” In a political order that gives individuals broad freedom for their choices but doesn’t hold them accountable for the consequences, this is a recipe for bankruptcy and decline, no matter which party is in power.
The Dems Aren’t “Brights”
THE DEMS AREN’T “BRIGHTS”
The Left's aggrandizement of power at the expense of individuals, states, and civil society.
March 29, 2017
Bruce Thornton
“Brights” was the term popularized by evangelical atheists Richard Dawkins and Daniel Dennett to describe people who think like them: materialist determinists who scoff at faith and traditional wisdom, and proclaim their devotion to rationalism, science, and critical thought. The label was mocked to death for its smug narcissism, but the idea behind it is still a foundational assumption of progressives. The irony is much of the superiority progressives claim based on their “respect for science” is an illusion, reflecting instead scientism and ideology.
...
This mistake lies at the heart of progressive pretensions to technocratic expertise wielded by what Stalin called “technicians of the soul.” And it explains the serial failures of their policies. Between 1900-1940 “Scientific racism” and the eugenics it spawned were considered “settled science,” and “eugenic ideas were politically influential, culturally fashionable, and scientifically mainstream,” as Thomas C. Leonard writes. “The elite sprinkled their conversations with eugenic concerns to signal their au courant high-mindedness.” Eugenics, of course, was a monstrous, inhuman failure, which inspired forced sterilization and gave scientific cover to Jim Crow segregation.
...
And who can leave out the lunatic “science-based” policies ruining California? Based on dubious environmental “science,” during the drought billions of gallons of Sierra snow-melt––1.6 billion every 24 hours–– were dumped into the Pacific Ocean to protect a two-inch bait-fish, and to encourage salmon to return to the San Joaquin River. Meanwhile, farms are abandoned, farmworkers thrown out of work, reservoirs that could capture this year’s unprecedented snow-melt are left unbuilt, and California has some of the highest rates of energy poverty in the nation. The same environmentalist voodoo lies behind the “high-speed rail” boondoggle. It started out costing $32 billion, but the bill has doubled to $68 billion. Work on the first stretch of track, the flattest and easiest of the whole route, is years behind schedule and will cost $10 billion, if it’s even built. Meanwhile, there’s no money for fixing California’s decaying infrastructure like Highway 99, a Road Warrior nightmare with the distinction of being the bloodiest highway in the nation. These are policies and projects an illiterate farmer in 1850 would have known are stupid.
...
As Rudyard Kipling wrote in “The Gods of the Copybook Headings,” the policy of “robbing selected Peter to pay for collective Paul” results in a world in which “all men are paid for existing and no man must pay for his sins.” In a political order that gives individuals broad freedom for their choices but doesn’t hold them accountable for the consequences, this is a recipe for bankruptcy and decline, no matter which party is in power.
The Dems Aren’t “Brights”
