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Comments Posted By kesmarn

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Biden Takes on Trump: A Call to Integrity and Courage in The Wave of Two Mass Shootings

Haha… not a situation that was important enough to lose sleep over, Kalima. Just a diversion on the way back to bed from the little room.

» Posted By kesmarn On August 22, 2019 @ 6:31 am

i can’t tell you how touched I was to read this, NoManIsAnIsland. It means so much coming from a person who’s had experience in these areas as well. I’m very grateful.

» Posted By kesmarn On August 22, 2019 @ 6:19 am

AdLib, so true. Even if all anyone did was hold up a mirror to a person like this, it would be perceived as a personal attack. When you combine autism with narcissism, it creates an even more toxic brew.
To describe it in those much beloved numbers, with this mindset, most psychologists would chart that — on a scale of 1 to 100 — “the patient’s level of insight is: zero.”

» Posted By kesmarn On August 22, 2019 @ 12:57 am

LOL! And the closest you’ve ever gotten to a Fulbright is when you had to google how to spell it. People who’ve actually gotten Fulbrights don’t write “quite” when they mean “quiet,” or “not so fact” when they mean “not so fast.” Just a few of your many errors on this thread alone.
Isn’t it about time for you to take your rage addiction to some place where it will be more appreciated? I hear they’re hiring at 8chan…?
Because, frankly, we’re all getting a wee bit bored with your lack of creativity here.

» Posted By kesmarn On August 22, 2019 @ 12:48 am

Quod erat demonstrandum. Temple Grandin has had a great career and has buckets of credentials. (And, added bonus, can communicate with civility.) Oh, and I’m practicing with a license, dear.

» Posted By kesmarn On August 22, 2019 @ 12:16 am

Absolutely! As the common saying goes: “If we didn’t laugh, we’d cry.” Between Alzheimer’s and Asperger’s, there’s an endless challenge to our patience, no? But these days, I’m finding that the more I learn about both conditions, the easier it is to find some compassion for people with either one. I think if they could choose to act differently, they certainly would.

» Posted By kesmarn On August 21, 2019 @ 9:43 pm

Please feel free to bet. Betting is so comforting because it involves so many numbers, doesn’t it? Kind of like train schedules, sports statistics, and actuarial tables. Warm. Cuddly.

» Posted By kesmarn On August 21, 2019 @ 9:30 pm

Yes, AdLib, My sense is that in their own minds they can rest in the comfort and the clarity of their entirely “quantified” world. A world where everything has a set of numbers attached to it. (Hence, frequent references to how much money they’ve made to demonstrate how successful they are as human beings, etc.)
In my better moments, I feel sad for the way in which the world of human interactions and relationships must seem to them like an impenetrable forest full of potholes and landmines, and which they can’t seem to learn to navigate. A world with rules and cues seemingly known to others but mystifying to them.
They inflict emotional damage, but can’t seem to be brought to a realization of that fact. One moment that poignantly (and humorously — although not at the time) demonstrated this was when our “Family Aspie” was getting louder and more shrill trying to make her point at a gathering. Finally someone told her to stop yelling at everyone. To which she responded at the top of her lungs: “I’M. NOT. YELLING!!!”

I think she actually believed that.

» Posted By kesmarn On August 21, 2019 @ 9:17 pm

NoManIsAnIsland, you may have put your oar in a little late, but your boat’s course is steady and true. I appreciated every word of this comment! I believe there’s a reason Trump keeps saying that the person he really wants to run against is “Sleepy Joe.” Trump may be a mad man, but he knows who is and who isn’t going to be “easy pickin’s” in 2020.

» Posted By kesmarn On August 21, 2019 @ 8:37 pm

I am critiquing a style of argument which most psychologists would consider counter-productive. And its possible neurological basis. Period. Nothing personal, just science.

» Posted By kesmarn On August 21, 2019 @ 8:24 pm

Your words are much appreciated, AdLib. Unfortunately, the knowledge I have about this topic comes from both clinical experience and years of dealing with a family member with Asperger’s syndrome. In other words, awareness that came from learning the hard way what makes these people tick. They can be quite bright. And often are able to support themselves in careers that involve charts, graphs, grids, actuarial tables, etc.
Where they get into trouble is in their inability of recognize the cues of ordinary social interactions. Once they launch one of their “crusades,” they lock in with laser focus and simply cannot let go. Rather than seeing the other person as a human engaging in a give-and-take conversation, they see him as an “enemy” who must be “annihilated.” They’ll keep at it for years, given the opportunity. They tend to give people two options: either agree with everything they say or have no contact whatsoever with them. Agreeing to disagree is not in their tool kit. They tend to have few close friends, since their tendency to be deliberately provocative, their sarcasm and arrogance — which they inevitably will deny — eventually drive people away. But the internet is rife with them. Interestingly, some of the much maligned “Bernie Bros” would have fallen into this weaponized autism category. Maybe that’s why there’s so much projection of the “red faced Bernie supporter” image onto others. We sometimes tend to accuse others of what we fear in ourselves.

» Posted By kesmarn On August 21, 2019 @ 7:55 pm

I rest my case.

» Posted By kesmarn On August 21, 2019 @ 4:28 pm

Excuse the bluntly clinical language, but my friends in the education profession refer to your (Jake’s) style of argument as “weaponized autism.” Now before the fainting spells begin, I am not saying that you are autistic. But trolls, autists and rage addicts tend to use the tools of weaponized autism. Namely, extreme persistence (e.g., five years from now this debate would still be worth pursuing, in the interest of the “eventual win” even if Biden were dead), repetition (ya think?), and preoccupation with numerical patterns outside of meaningful context. While neurotypicals would eventually get bored, these folks don’t. As to why that is the case, I leave to the medical science of the future.

» Posted By kesmarn On August 21, 2019 @ 10:24 am

“Let Biden be Biden…”

» Posted By kesmarn On August 20, 2019 @ 5:41 pm

Yes, some of politics is intuitive (as much as numbers people hate to hear that… and the same goes for economics) and what they used to call “The Big Mo” (momentum) seems to be shifting now.

» Posted By kesmarn On August 20, 2019 @ 5:37 pm

I’m so glad you mentioned rally turnout as a factor for prediction, AdLib. My son — who has an advanced degree in math (including statistics) — was one of the few people who predicted a Trump victory in 2016. Nate Silver — the “Numbers Guy” — of course, totally blew it.
One of the main criteria my son used in his analysis was rally turnout. (Which would have indicated that Sanders should have been the candidate in 2016, if it hadn’t been for the odious super-delegate situation.)
To quote him: “I knew something was up when I saw those consistently enormous rallies in state after state. There was something much more grassroots going on there than the highly flawed polling systems were indicating.” His sense was that declining usage of landlines and flawed polling techniques (including subjects deliberately lying to pollsters) made virtually all the polls at that point irrelevant and inaccurate. So it was time to look at other indicators.

» Posted By kesmarn On August 20, 2019 @ 3:00 pm

Well said! Do we want a candidate who echoes Trump: “You may love me or hate me, but you have to vote for me! You have no choice!” Wow…that’s inspiring!
Regardless of what anyone might think of all of Obama’s policies, I think it’s commonly agreed that he was/is a brilliant politician. He knows a problem-in-the-making when he sees one. To cling stubbornly to Biden regardless can put a fanboy (or girl) into the dreaded “Bro” club. So many of Biden’s backers despised “Bernie Bros.” But fail to see that it’s totally possible to be a Biden Bro without noticing that slippery slope they’ve just rolled down.

» Posted By kesmarn On August 20, 2019 @ 2:26 pm

And now the NYT is indicating that Obama himself has never encouraged Biden (quite the opposite) to run — neither in 2016 nor now — for president. “You don’t have to do this, Joe” were his words.
https://www.businessinsider.com/obama-told-biden-advisers-not-let-him-damage-legacy-2020-2019-8

» Posted By kesmarn On August 20, 2019 @ 1:32 pm

Many thanks, Kalima. Especially for pointing out the very consistent double-standard evidenced in this exchange. As in implying: “When I use very direct language, I’m just ‘keeping it real.'” When you do it, it’s “making it personal” complete with promises of retaliation. When I word things strongly, it’s ‘just being honest.’ When you do it, it’s ‘being snarky.'” Etc., etc., etc. When the consistent message is: “I’m always the victim. The powers that be here hate me,” and so on, it gets quite tedious. Puh-leeze, who has time for ‘hate’ here? It’s boring for starters. And — even worse — it makes the purported object of the ‘hatred’ feel so very grandiose and important. Something we all can do without if we want genuine dialog.

» Posted By kesmarn On August 13, 2019 @ 1:41 pm

Hahaha!
“My post was not aimed at you…” you say.
Murph said: “I can’t figure out who you are replying to here…”
You replied:”Kesmarn who posted some snarky comment aimed at me…”

For future reference: Gaslighting doesn’t work when the words you typed are right there for all to read.

» Posted By kesmarn On August 12, 2019 @ 4:04 pm

I don’t think anybody is the “RIGHT ON” kind in 2019. That mentality went out with bell bottoms and good riddance. But people are fed up with milquetoast responses to serious levels of racism, cruelty, wealth inequality and injustice. I normally haven’t bought into the “nice guys finish last” mentality, but I think that just may be the fate that awaits Biden. And no big bad Russian asset on facebook brainwashed my poor widdle college-educated mind into being concerned about that possibility. It’s simply obvious enough that this evening even the highly unrevolutionary BBC World News announced that Biden had pretty much managed to blow up his entire weekend in Iowa by way of a number of unforced errors… with no help whatsoever from the Kremlin.

» Posted By kesmarn On August 12, 2019 @ 3:46 pm

Murph, I would say that they’re drawn to Sanders partly because his agenda was often so far ahead of his colleagues (anti-Iraq War, $15 minimum wage, Medicare for all) that he had little support from old school Dems. Young people had a different take on those issues, though, and — lo and behold — after the DNC establishment had its pants scared off in 2016 by the level of grass-roots support for Sanders, a lot of formerly timid souls suddenly found his earlier (socialist) positions quite palatable after all. Warren they support for many of the same reasons you do. And Buttigieg they see as a very acceptable presidential candidate, but more likely as a capable veep at this point in time.

» Posted By kesmarn On August 12, 2019 @ 3:31 pm

Exactly, nehalem. And they are in the ascendant now. Their lives have been severely damaged by politicians who have managed to tank the economy in 2008, make college unaffordable for them, send them off to stupid wars, deny them health care, keep their wages low and utterly fail them on gun control. They do NOT want somnolent old “Unkie Joe.” They view him as one of the sleepwalkers who allowed things to get to the state in which they are now. They are not going to vote for him.

» Posted By kesmarn On August 12, 2019 @ 3:22 pm

“It’s a primary! That’s how it works!” Thank you, AdLib! And yes, what about 2024? And the blood-chilling possibility of a President Ivanka (with Jared joined at the hip)? Sometimes it’s possible for old school conventional Dems to “pragmatize” with such tunnel vision that genuinely workable options slip away right in front of their noses.

» Posted By kesmarn On August 11, 2019 @ 4:12 pm

Well, my post was by way of an experiment. (Besides being an accurate expression of my thoughts.) I was curious as to whether a comment posted in the exact same language as yours (using your post as a template) but expressing a differing point of view would be considered by you as an acceptable use of ordinary free speech rights. Or — would words that were presumably perfectly fine when used to express your opinion suddenly become “snarky” when they expressed someone else’s? I got my answer. Thanks.

» Posted By kesmarn On August 11, 2019 @ 4:04 pm

My fear is a lot of those who support Biden will fall for all the negative crap (about more progressive candidates), in addition to their own, and out of spite become a megaphone for the Endless War Machine and their Goldman Sachs buddies. Just like the DNC did in 2016 which really helped give us Trump as Prez.

» Posted By kesmarn On August 10, 2019 @ 6:41 am

The Fave just turned 18. (Yay! She can vote.) She quoted this Biden gaffe while we were at dinner tonight. She and her age cohort wouldn’t even consider voting for Biden. As she said: “He may be ‘well-intentioned’ (she was using her air quotes), but who would say something like that? He’s not the man for the job.” Her current favorites: Sanders, Warren and Buttigieg.

» Posted By kesmarn On August 9, 2019 @ 6:51 pm

I’ve heard Biden referred to as the Democratic Party’s Romney. And I have to say that resonated. Nice guy. Trump fodder.

Yes, I know. The polls.

The polls showed a substantial lead for Hillary too in 2016. Until I came home from having worked the (other) polls that November evening to find the NYT’s Hillary Meter “Probability for Victory” dial plunging rapidly toward the zero mark.

“If we keep on doing what we’ve always done, we’ll keep on getting what we’ve always had.”

It isn’t even so much the age thing. Elderly Dr. Spock was a major (and beloved) figure in the 1960s anti-war movement. Bernie spoke to arenas full of 20,000-25,000 screaming young voters throughout the 2016 primary season. Howard Zinn still commands respect among younger political thinkers.

The problem is running Hillary 2.0. Biden was fine with letting banks off the hook after the 2008 Crash. Biden was okay with Dubya’s Iraq war. Biden — for better or worse — has been a go-along-and-get-along politician even when it meant shaking hands with the devil on occasion.

But I’m wondering whether there aren’t an awful lot of voters (including old school Republicans and Independents) who have reached a point of no return. A point at which half measures are no long good enough. A point at which they want to wash the stench of devil sweat off the palms of their hands once and for all.

» Posted By kesmarn On August 8, 2019 @ 4:35 pm

A Racist By Any Other Name Is Still A Racist

twilson117, thanks so much for a thought-provoking and fascinating article. It’s such a pleasure to welcome you to the Planet.

Trump was so utterly brazen and crude when he made that “elevator descent” speech announcing his candidacy, that I (foolishly) thought that he must simply be an idiot who was cynically using dog-whistle language to promote his brand. It was hard to believe any adult could actually be that bigoted in this era. I naively thought he had almost no chance at that point of ever becoming the GOP nominee. How i underestimated the depths of the racism that still hung on in 21st century America, even after Barack Obama’s two terms! What an eye-opening last few years it has been. Not that I ever expected him to be a functional president… But he’s turned out to be so much worse than many could have anticipated. To state the obvious: he has absolutely zero respect for anyone who is not a white, male, wealthy person of northern European ancestry — and probably for relatively few of them when it comes down to it, since as a narcissist, he only genuinely admires one person — himself.

At the moment, the only small consolation I have is that time and demographics are working against him and his ilk. My son-in-law is Hispanic. My daughter-in-law is Chinese. And just about two weeks ago, I became the proud aunt of the first Black boy to be born in our family. Our family is looking more and more like what America really is. We don’t need or want people like Trump setting the tone for our future. Racism needs to go the way of the swastika and the Confederate flag. Banished, period.

» Posted By kesmarn On August 13, 2019 @ 12:45 pm

Dead Wrong: Good Guys with Guns do not Stop Mass Shootings

Awww… many thanks! But the balance is tipped very much in your direction when it comes to who has been more supportive of whom!

You have been through so much over the last few years, Kalima, and have given the Planet your all through the whole time. True strength.

» Posted By kesmarn On August 13, 2019 @ 2:32 pm