Whose accusations would you have me read, that I haven’t already tried to defend myself from? Are you now accusing me of something awful?
~Max
Not that there isn’t a nugget of truth here, but this sort of quasi-equivocation is the sort of things that leads to the media sane-washing of Trump’s utterly insane blather.
So, I guess I’ve come around partially based on this. Trying to find the least thing defensible or sane in indefensible and insane people must be something almost naturally hardwired into us.
I don’t understand why so many of you are still allowing for that possibility. He’s only intelligent to the extent that intelligence and sociopathy are often (wrongly) correlated in popular (factionalized) media, a la Hannibal Lecter.
[shrug] What can I say? My engagement with Max has mostly been in P&E threads about things like Senate rules and other political processes. He can make a truly bewildering, excruciatingly detailed argument based on his interpretation of whatever set of rules he has decided should apply in a situation. But it’s all very, “How many angels can dance on the head of a pin?” It’s just not relevant to how things actually work.
I think you’re slightly misunderstanding my point.
Let’s try again. I don’t -care- if he is, or isn’t intelligent. I acknowledge his stated lack of empathy/evil, and arbitrary way of determining what is or is not right/legal based on his mood and argument. As such, I disregard his posts on anything which has anything other than an entirely verifiable, factual piece of information. Which is practically impossible to find on any subject worthy of much ongoing discussion here of course.
See the first paragraph of my quoted section right above the piece you quoted.
He’s evil, he’s hypocritical, and both of those faaaaar outweigh any intelligence or lack thereof. Getting caught up in if he’s an idiot, a genius, or even a troll is secondary to the utter lack of character and how his posts cannot, and should not, be trusted.
Respectfully disagree. As a utilitarian, I feel it’s important to emphasize just how stupid evil can be. Utilitarianism gets a bad rap because people see “evil” and think “oh, well, that’s just utilitarianism: intelligent, sure, but devoid of empathy.” As if utility cannot account for empathy. As if the Nazis or various Confederate generals were fucking genius warrior poets because they were genocidaires, eugenicists, and/or slaveholders. As if such crimes against humanity would have been perfectly fine endeavors if only a bunch of people hadn’t gotten sad over them and spoiled everything. Never mind how utterly stupid and counterproductive the Holocaust was, the extent to which eugenics is underpinned by pseudoscientific garbage, or how much human progress was hobbled by relegating large swathes of the population to manual labor without the opportunity for education.
It matters that evil walks hand in hand with stupidity. People need to stop giving evil grudging respect under the flawed assumption that it is a sign or symptom of advanced intelligence.
I think he is. You don’t drop shit like “Trump won that debate” or “I would turn in Jews” or lynching apologia into a thread unknowingly.
Well, except we don’t have rules about being evil. Trolling, on the other hand…
I know this doesn’t scan well but let’s pretend that’s a metaphor for the right torturing reason into a shape that vaguely supports their bigotry, and not because I’m bad at songwriting.
I was drunk the day I lost my job to an immigrant
So I went to get my check from George Soros
But before I could get to the clinic for my sex change
My dog got eaten by a danged ole Haitian
That earns you a thumbs up from a MAGA hat, shit eating grin wearing DJT!