Geoff > Status Update

Oh my god Zizek as Breitbart propaganda... I kinda feel sick. No joke - I feel literally like we've stepped through the looking glass - this might actually be what it feels like on the eve of the end of the world.

... I mean when the magnetic field of the earth fails and our atoms begin to separate.

Geoff wrote: "Oh my god Zizek as Breitbart propaganda... I kinda feel sick. No joke - I feel literally like we've stepped through the looking glass - this might actually be what it feels like on the eve of the end of the world"

As I was saying the other day on this thread, the Copernican principle can be used to argue that there's a 95% chance we'll be around for at least another 5000 years. But for some reason I feel kind of sick too.

I mean, what's next? Hamburgers eating people? Shoes wearing feet??

Da Cubs winning the World Series? Oh wait....

Simon wrote: "Da Cubs winning the World Series? Oh wait...."
Ha!

I had always thought Zizek was admired partly for being mischievous and contrarian, so I am surprised to see people dumping hom when he is just doing more of his usual schtick. (Especially as I thought I was one of the more politically fussy people here re friending etc, and because among writers I tend to like those whose views don't sit neatly in one place on the political spectrum, and have original reasons for liking stuff.) I am not a big fan of Zizek anyway, but if someone I liked provided grokkable-to-me reasons for possibly voting Trump (so far one person on the whole internet has managed that, and I don't expect that number to grow) it wouldn't be a reason to ignore everything else about them even if I thought it misguided.

Some people are just essentially less anxious and assume they will be okay and also have grounds for doing that (e.g. they are white and do not have an expensive to manage disability) and they don't tend to dwell on the point that people usually get hurt in revolutions.

I've not looked at any news today and don't intend to now until the polls close because it was just too much of an addictive timesink stopping me getting other stuff done, so apologies if I've missed anything new and relevant.

Just seen Arthur Graham's blog post - thanks Manny - and this is the primary reason why I think the various left leaning and weird counterculture types advocating or seriously considering Trump are misguided:

"Because, even though I will likely find myself amongst the undesirables rounded up if not shot outright, I am willing to make this sacrifice in order to help ensure our forward progress, as both a people and a nation."

Maybe not literally, given I'm the one who's being boringly serious here, but they are the types that neighbourhood yobs, or whatever you call them over there - oh yeah, "militias", highly organised yobs with at least 5 guns each, fuck - would likely feel emboldened to make life difficult for under a Trump victory. Especially given what we've seen with Brexit.
Some of the anxiety here in this thread feels a bit excessive, but on the other hand, some other people (mostly not in this thread) could do with being a touch more paranoid.

Oh I'm not dumping Zizek - I'm reading Trouble In Paradise as we speak - he's still my man

Geoff wrote: "Oh I'm not dumping Zizek - I'm reading Trouble In Paradise as we speak - he's still my man"

In an objective sense, one would almost have to say that I'm dumping Zizek.* I didn't even pre=order his latest! Nor his last nor his next!

Hey and check this out! I always knew he was a Leninist!!! --> in his own words :: Lenin 2017.



* now begin the twitter headlines :: "NR dumps Zizek!!"

I am.

Being white and able-bodied (?) is no excuse. Ought to know better. I used to look up to the guy. #Notamused

David wrote: "Being white and able-bodied (?) is no excuse.

And not-a-citizen?

It's probably a sign of a healthy left to occasionally give in to ferocious Oedipal urges. Look at poor Adorno in his last years at the institute. Unfortunately i think one has to side with the students.

Seriously though, it's a fine line between critiquing the establishment and cheering on violence as a good in itself, but I think Zizek has now emphatically fallen on the wrong side of it. He's said before that anti-semitism is the ideology with which it is not possible to have any dialogue or compromise whatsoever. Well, right now when googling his name Breitbart news is the top hit. What happened in the '90s in the former Yugoslavia was also a disruption of the status quo. In that case Zizek was not in favor of racist buffoons coming to power. In fact he even supported the NATO intervention (so his opposition to the Clinton consensus is really not so total). I feel like he's now flirting with Peter Handke-level vileness.

Anyway, I pretty much already had dumped him in favor of Perry Anderson. Hip to be square, you know?

Excuse the rant above. Love to everyone this weekend, xoxo

Do any of you guys mentally rehearse what it would be like seeing that Trump has won? I did a little re. Brexit (TBH most of it was reading a book about Shakespeare and noticing the similarities of nationalism and xenophobia following the Henrician Reformation - aka first Brexit) but I wished I had done more, and also got more stuff done in advance of price rises etc. I actually cried about 5am once it was clear - don't think I'd ever cried about an election result in my life before, couldn't do anything useful for a few days, even on top of what I'm usually like when sleep deprived, and was dazed for ages, it was like a breakup; I heard possibly the most stoic person I know describe himself as 'upset'. Plenty of people seemed to have taken longer to accept that it's happened, haven't yet, though I'm like "still?!" when I see those people now.

Antonomasia wrote: "Do any of you guys mentally rehearse what it would be like seeing that Trump has won?"

We did it back in 2000. The Dems had Nader to blame ; the rest of us had the lame=ass Dems to blame.

I cried in 2004, when I was still a month and half too young to vote. After that I stopped caring about presidential elections... until now.

David wrote: "Anyway, I pretty much already had dumped him in favor of Perry Anderson. Hip to be square, you know?

Excuse the rant above. Love to everyone this weekend, xoxo"

A healthier alternative? Not familiar with him.

Sort of a more staid alternative, more of a historian than a philosopher (although he knows everything). He plays a similar role as an intellectual left-wing critic of liberal consensus.

Eccentric in his own way, but less inclined to provocative statements for their own sake, and without all the pop culture references.

American Foreign Policy and Its Thinkers

I read a report in Guardian that cites a female Trump voter who came up with the theory that there was "no racism" before Obama came to power, but now things are going out of control. She basically blamed Obama presidency for the rise in racial tensions on the streets of America.

About three years ago I came up with a wild conspiracy theory that the increase in police brutality against the black people might have a solid but unverifiable link with a black man coming to power in America against all odds. It was an outcome that was accepted but not easily digested. I took my share of flak for saying it but it seems a lot of people have arrived at the same conclusion.

Police or law enforcement reflect a society's violence in its purest form and, anecdotally speaking, one way to assess violence (and its victims) in a society is to measure it up against how the law enforcement operates.

Come next elections and we have a phenomenon called Trump. Some see it as a reaction to Obama's race and what it may entail. According to Junot Díaz:

"There’s a long-term tradition of white supremacy in this country. Trump isn’t something entirely new. But then there is the crisis for white supremacy in this country now where you have people of color standing up for themselves in ways that they’ve never stood up for themselves or at least standing up for themselves in a generational, novel way.

Trump is explained with the intersection of a number of things: our economic crisis, the way it’s easier to blame immigrants, with the happenstance that he discovered that by bashing Latino immigrants and characterizing them as “rapists” and “murderers” and “scumbags,” suddenly he’s got this groundswell of support from a group of people who were raised on this vocabulary.

Part of it is eight years of a black president, and white America still lost their [minds] about that."

http://lithub.com/22-famous-writers-o...

One of my first thoughts today was to think of the election and hope HC wins. And then I thought there's no reason America should not fall prey to the nationalistic, brain-diminishing idiocy that seems to be spreading all over the world right now (it certainly did reach my country). But I keep my fingers crossed for you and the rest of us, because what happens might be globally disastrous.

And coming back to your question - this looks like a good place to seek shelter in, should the worst come to the worst:

http://www.openculture.com/2016/10/di...

Bloodorange wrote: "One of my first thoughts today was to think of the election and hope HC wins. And then I thought there's no reason America should not fall prey to the nationalistic, brain-diminishing idiocy that s..."

Oh hell yes to that bunker film archives

This is what happens when millions of voters are disenfranchised by two psychopaths. Tuesday, less discerning Americans will choose either Charles Manson or Bonnie and Clyde as their next Dear Leader.

Why Nate? WHY?

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/n...

Chance wrote: "Why Nate? WHY?

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/n..."

I have been following fivethirtyeight closely over the last few months, and I didn't think the article was fair. This is about subtle differences in statistical methodology, not "putting your thumb on the scale".

My strong impression is that Silver, who got burned in the primaries through relying too much on his gut feeling, is now just trying to interpret the numbers as accurately as he can. That's all there is to it. I find it almost impossible to believe that he has a pro-Trump bias, the articles simply don't read that way.

Manny wrote: "Chance wrote: "Why Nate? WHY?

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/n..."

I have been following fivethirtyeight closely over the last few months..."


I doubt he enjoyed being wrong in the Republican primary. Over-compensation?

I think he's just trying to learn from his mistakes, which in this case means looking dispassionately at the numbers. He obviously doesn't like Trump, and he's doing his best not to let his feelings influence the analysis this time round.

FYI -- I'm an American. Who hates Trump. But as an FYI, most statisticians give Trump only a 20% chance of winning. Some, like a political sciences groups at Yale. only give him a 1% chance.

But like you, I'm scratching my head, wondering how like 45% of American voters could vote for the clown. Almost makes me want to move to Canada.

As fivethirtyeight have pointed out several times, their predictions tend to be in line with the betting odds.

I would really like the numbers to be better. I'm sure Nate Silver would too. I think it would be very foolish for anyone on the Dem side to get complacent at this point.

Manny wrote: "I think he's just trying to learn from his mistakes, which in this case means looking dispassionately at the numbers. He obviously doesn't like Trump, and he's doing his best not to let his feeling..."

Too bad this approach couldn't be tested on something a little less critical. Seems he changed mid-stream. Up to a week or so ago, he had numbers that jived with everyone else. Trump was close to 10%. Then again, maybe he was afraid that Dems were indeed becoming complacent.

I hate to admit it, but since the FBI threw their wrench, I don't trust anything.

Unfortunately, I think he's just honestly reporting a change in the polling that resulted from Comey's (probably illegal) announcement. He has not changed his methodology. He's been using this approach all along.

Note that his figures are in broad agreement with the ones on RealClearPolitics, which is the other site I've been following closely.

Manny wrote: "Unfortunately, I think he's just honestly reporting a change in the polling that resulted from Comey's (probably illegal) announcement. He has not changed his methodology. He's been using this appr..."

Why RealClearPolitics? They're run by conservatives who predicted Mitt Romney would end up with more electoral votes than Obama, even when Romney was far from 270. Romney himself believed them, and was quite surprised when he lost so badly.

Nate did the same thing RCP did--assumed the poll numbers were wrong and tweaked a few things for a "more accurate count."

Well, fivethirtyeight slants left and RCP right, so I figured I could split the difference...

I would love to think that Hillary was 90% to win, but unfortunately I just don't believe it. If you think that's accurate, are you willing to back her at 9-1? I'll take those odds.

Manny wrote: "I would love to think that Hillary was 90% to win, but unfortunately I just don't believe it. If you think that's accurate, are you willing to back her at 9-1? I'll take those odds."

I think she'll win, but it'll be a nail-biter. This election campaign has shown how troubled this country is.

Then we are in complete agreement...

Nate Silver has always been more catious. When he was with the New York Times his discussions of the last presidential race were full of caveats. Sam Wang at the Princeton Election Consortium has it in the high 90s for HRC. I'm more likely to believe 538 because there are a lot of unaffiliated voters in early voting that we aren't certain of, and the polls include a lot of undecideds. It would be different if HRC was polling near 50 in the upper Midwest. It seems like there will be a high turnout and I don't think that favors Trump in general. Latinos are kiling him and a big proportion of early voters are women. It will be interesting when they flash up the early voting numbers for Florida and North Carolina. it could be an earlier night than we think.

Yup, if she can just win Florida she has it in the bag. 538 has it on a knife-edge, but Nate Silver says their model doesn't factor in early voting or the Dems' better ground game. So really it should be in their favor... but still very far from a done deal.

Democrats were only up 7,000 in early voting in Florida. It'll be interesting to see where voters with No Party Affiliation and women go. I think there are going to be a lot more shy Hillary voters than shy Trump voters, but I could be wrong. I know a lot of Trump voters who are outwardly reasonable people, but party polarization will keep them with him no matter what. I just know i want this election to end so I can get my life back. I've been obsessing for a year now.

FiveThirtyEight had her in the eighties before the latest email bombshell - now she's in the mid-sixties. Still, Nate Silver says that she has slightly better chance than the Donald.

The crucial factor is the high number of undecideds. They can tilt the election like Brexit.

This recent update from Nevada looks encouraging for the Dems. Maybe 538's model really is missing important data through not taking early voting into account.

How come no-one's compared Zizek-Trump to Heidegger-Hitler or Plato at Syracuse or Dylan going electric yet? Guess we're waiting for Trump to win for that. Gee the biographers are gonna have a field day with this.

Dems now up 32k in Florida with today being the last day of early flying. Critical souls to the polls day. https://twitter.com/ElectProject/stat...

howl of minerva wrote: "How come no-one's compared Zizek-Trump to Heidegger-Hitler or Plato at Syracuse or Dylan going electric yet? Guess we're waiting for Trump to win for that. Gee the biographers are gonna have a fiel..."

Guess you missed Nathan's update?

Most recent update from NC made it sound like that state is staying republican. Key Senate race with Ross/Burr there too.

howl of minerva wrote: "How come no-one's compared Zizek-Trump to Heidegger-Hitler"

Which of course brings the course full=circle since Z started out as an Heideggarian. Here's hoping the trumpster's got a job waiting for him ; I dunno, maybe overseeing the continued privatization of higher education.

And since gr is asking If you could nominate a fictional book character as president, who would you pick? I'll have to say I'd nominate William Frederick Kohler. The man even brings his own party.

Fun question! Is there another thread about it?

I don't think I even read much fiction about characters who'd be good at the job. I always have to scroll through shelves to remind myself what I've read for anyquestion like this, and proving the previous sentence, from this year's crop the best I've found is the narrator from the Neapolitan Quartet :/

the gr=blog thread is :
https://www.goodreads.com/blog/show/7...
But it's predictably depressing.