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[Tyrone Slothrop]

Originally Posted by sebastian_dangerfield

It's a level of control many multiples that of which exists today.

No, it's not control at all.

If you want to go for a walk on the beach, and your wife also wants to go for a walk on the beach, and you then go for a walk on the beach, you don't "control" her. If you're still unclear on how that works, I suggested you discuss it with her. You don't need to control her, because you have found something better, a happy situation where your wishes are aligned.

The point is Cronkite broke ranks when he criticized the war. It took many years before he did so. Today, the criticisms of such a war would emerge before it even started. The govt's hands are tied from the start.

There actually were criticisms of the war before Cronkite, and I think you are overestimating the extent to which our current government's hands are tied because people criticize it on the internet. Maybe Gurri has a strong argument here and you are just not quite succeeding in recapitulating it. I certainly think something has changed in the country since Vietnam, but I don't think you have your finger on it.

That certain fixes would be difficult and probably or likely impossible are not mutually exclusive points. Gurri isn't saying don't try. He's advocating pragmatic acceptance of reality: There are many big problems the govt cannot fix -- many more than the govt or the demanding "public" likes to admit.

OK.

I say Gurri says X. You say what about Y? I say Gurri addresses Y also. You then say Y and X are mutually exclusive. They aren't.

Your argument that back-and-forth election results are caused by a bunch of voters who yo-you between politicians who promise them the moon is undercut if there are other, better ways to explain back-and-forth election results.

I'm saying the public's unrealistic expectations are a cause of govt lying and further cynicism and erosion of authority deriving from those lies. Are you suggesting the govt lies for a reason other than to satisfy or deceive the public? If so, I'd ask, why? What would that risk potentially gain for the govt? The main reason the govt lies is to stay in power. To stay in power it must stay in good relations with the public that votes for it.

First, you are obfuscating the difference between the government and politicians. Politicians promise the moon to get elected. Has that not always been the case? The rest of the government doesn't lie to get elected.

It seems like you have just discovered that politicians say what people want to hear to get elected. Where have you been?

This time is different because the internet is ubiquitous, decentralized, and controlled by the public to an extent no previous medium has been previously. The printing pres, radio, and TV are not credibly analogous.

This has sped up the "spin" processes of the past such that the spin is junk. Anyone can see thru it in an instant. It took years and years of degradation of talent within institutional management/govt to expose that the power structures within a society were decayed and incompetent. Today that happens almost daily. Govt says X and within 20 minutes an analyst has dismantled X and shown its flaws. Case in point -- Biden's BBB. The deltas between Administration-projected and realistically objectively expected revenues to pay for the bill were available everywhere, with supporting formulae, within days of the announcement of its specifics.

Same with Trump's tax cuts. Its delivery of outsized benefits to the wealthy and r/e investors were on the front page of most media outlets days after its initial sketches were out.

The emperor's closet is empty before he could even hope to put on clothes.

Yes, the internet has changed the news. There is more information, good and bad, available to everyone. But what's the argument about how that has changed things? Trump got his tax cuts passed. Biden is struggling to get his agenda through because his legislative majorities are so incredibly narrow. (With all of the information on the internet, none of it seems to explain whatever Machin and Synema are doing.)

I agree with all of this. The important note Sandel adds is that one hundred years ago the losers could say they were part of a rigged system because class was still considered as important as merit. Now, he suggests, the losers can't point to systemic inequities as much because merit is viewed as the sole measuring stick.

Sure they can. See above, where you said there's all sorts of information available on the internet.

Indeed! I am flabbergasted. Your pointing to other sources of moral philosophy has Blown My Mind.

You're welcome.

Rawls was taught in my high school.

OK.

And thus we come back to the least creative fixation: Ignoring Gurri's point which is broader than politics and instead suggesting, absurdly:

If only the Democrats had total control, they'd could fix it all, or at least most of it.

Wrong. They'd at best fix it at the margins. That's Gurri's point.

Is that a little bit better? Of course. Is it what the "public" wants? Is it the fix the portion of our society chaffing under inequality desires or thinks the govt can provide? Not Even Close.

I'm OK with fixing things on the margins, and I think a lot of the public is, too. I'm not sure why you think the public (or the "public") has impossibly high expectations.

It seems to me that we have a political system that makes it very hard to get anything done legislatively. The bigger problem is not that the public expects too much, it's that it gets too little.