From a NYT article about a new anti-gay policy of the Mormon Church: It appears that the new rules were not supposed to be made public. They were issued as changes to a confidential handbook, and sent out by email …
What Religion Would Countenance a Confidential Handbook? Read more »
Mother Jones has a really interesting article on how our beliefs block new information: Pre-existing beliefs, far more than new facts, skew our thoughts. Feelings arise before conscious thoughts and color them. Confirmation bias gives more weight to facts that …
David Brooks is the token conservative on the New York Times OpEd page. He replaced the insufferable William Safire, but has still been reliably conservative. But something has happened as of late; he has been writing columns displaying empathy, such …
Here’s what the corporate state has come to: You need a college education to get a job; You have to pay for it; You can’t escape that debt (it’s high interest, and not dischargeable in bankruptcy); Therefore you have to …
The existence of elections, civil law and free speech gives the appearance of a functioning democracy, but in practice they are not acting as intended. 1. Voting is not Representative Voting is skewed in America in many ways. Districts are …
The NYTimes reports that how Supreme Court Justices vote on 1st Amendment claims depends on their political leanings. The worst liberal bias is 1.3, whereas the conservative biases range from 3 to 7. This is unsettling enough by itself, but …
Political bias measured in Supreme Court Decisions Read more »
Nice article in Salon suggesting that Republicans adopt a religious mantle to capture voters in the South for whom religion is so important that it trumps their economic interests.
The NYT has a good article on how patents enable drug companies to keep prices high – far higher than in other countries. For example, with the patent for the older oral contraceptive Loestrin 24Fe about to expire, the company …
I’ve just launched The Peace Poll, a 2-question survey on peace. Visit http://peacepoll.org/ , read about our plans, vote, and tell your friends.
Dear gun owners: I know you have many stories of how the presence of guns prevented a crime of some sort, and I in turn have stories of when their presence caused injuries or death. We’re both right. But when …