CSotD: Reality and other superstitions
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Jeff Stahler (AMS) ruins all our fun by pointing out the obvious, which is that there are a lot of theories about drones that are downright screwy and that Occam’s razor continues to rule: The simplest explanation is generally correct.
One night in the depths of winter, a group of us were on a hilltop watching the Northern Lights, and it was bitter cold so several of us were in the car, but a few stayed outside, including Gary, who began waving his arms and conducting the lights. First he’d spread his arms and the lights would expand, and then he’d draw his arms back towards the center and the lights would compact themselves.
It was pretty damned impressive until someone in the car realized Gary’s gestures were following the lights, the lights were not following Gary. Gotta admit, it was a little disappointing, but it made a whole lot more sense.
Similarly, we’ve now got some things happening in the sky and a lot of people looking up and coming up with explanations that don’t exactly follow Occam’s razor.
Given the way our politics have been unfolding, it’s not all that astonishing, but, then again, given the level of publicity we grant to foolish takes, it certainly isn’t reassuring, either.
F’rinstance, Chip Bok (Creators) feeds paranoia by assuring those who see commies under their beds and conspiracies around every corner that the government is lying to us and that we are in some kind of danger.
Granted, the few alleged drones that haven’t turned out to be regular old airplanes could potentially be spy devices. We did have those Chinese balloons floating around (under both Trump and Biden, BTW), though it’s not clear what intelligence our adversaries could have gathered that they couldn’t have obtained otherwise, in more detail and with less expense.
But they sure as heck aren’t tractor-beaming anyone or anything up, and while Bok may only be kidding about that, well, there’s a lot of insanity and paranoia out there and it’s not a good idea to feed it.
And it’s a genuinely very bad idea for Mike Beckom (Counterpoint) to encourage people to shoot at the lights, given that (A) it’s a federal offense to shoot down drones and (B) it’s also a lousy idea to shoot people in airplanes.
Some woman got arrested the other day for saying to an insurance person that “you people are next,” and while Beckom isn’t specifically suggesting that a particular person or aircraft be shot at, he’s certainly offering a suggestion to the kinds of dimwit violent nutcases we’ve got way too many of already.
Foolish I can tolerate. Irresponsible crosses a line.
Which brings us to Clay Bennett (CTFP)‘s thoughts on our latest bit of gunplay, and there’s nothing particularly new in his accusation that we’re full of thoughts and prayers and utterly bereft of action to stop children from murdering each other in our schools.
Thing is, lack of action is itself an action: By failing to offer more than thoughts and prayers, we enable the next shooting. Sure, we say “lock up your guns” and we’ve even begun to charge parents who fail to keep their children from accessing their guns.
We also say “Don’t drink and drive” and we prosecute drunk drivers after they plow head-on into a carload of innocent people, which punishes the people who drank and drove but doesn’t resurrect the victims or keep the next drunk driver from going head-on into another carload of innocent people.
I dunno about you, but Guy Parson’s cartoon reflects my response: I tuned into NPR a minute past the hour, just in time to hear that the mayor of Madison was something something about a school shooting.
But I wasn’t horrified to have missed the details and I finished what I was doing and checked it out when I got home because so what?
However, I like Andy Marlette’s suggestion. Maybe if rich grownups find themselves the targets of people with guns, they’ll prescribe something more than hiding in closets and hoping for the best.
I am not hoping more rich grownups get shot. I’m hoping that, if we’re no longer talking about second graders, we’ll start taking this stuff seriously. Which is a pretty sad state of affairs, but we need to work with whatever we’re given, and dead kids don’t seem to get anyone terribly stirred up.
Juxtaposition of the Day
Here’s a contrast between two points of view that can be resolved with an adding machine.
Varvel claims nobody can afford Christmas presents, while Mike Smith references reports that Americans plan to spend more this year than last, and while this retail report on Black Friday sales notes tight budgets, it also notes that people spent somewhat more this year.
Some people see the glass as half full, some see it as a chance to take another swipe at Biden before he leaves office.
Juxtaposition of the Day #2
Meanwhile, Mike Luckovich decries ABC’s failure to defend press freedom, the First Amendment and the case of New York Times v Sullivan, in which the Supreme Court unanimously held that public figures must prove reckless disregard for the truth and malicious intent in order to sue for libel.
For those who missed it, Trump sued ABC because George Stephanopoulos cited the judge’s summary of E. Jean Carroll’s case instead of the specific findings of the jury. It was a winnable case for the network, but, as Luckovich puts it, they rolled over, coughing up $15 million without a fight.
It is possible that the McConnell Court might have reversed NYTimes v Sullivan if ABC had persisted in defending the free press, but the San Francisco 49ers have suspended a player for refusing to play when the team was behind, and he’s not getting any sympathy from his teammates, who feel it was gutless and disloyal.
ABC and Stephanopoulos are getting similar responses from other journalists.
Though as Clay Jones suggests, that may be the response from real journalists, but ownership is ponying up to stay on Trump’s good side.
While Summers sees ABC’s surrender as humorous, viewing suppression of disloyal-but-defensible reporting as a good thing.
Please rise for our new national anthem:
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