No, but I will acknowledge it is insane and idiotic for me to spend time educating people who use Billy Madison memes to accuse others of lowing the quality of discourse.

How was the meaning of this word altered so dramatically in the United States? During the First World War, some of the leading Progressive writers began to use the word liberalism as a substitute for progressivism, which had become tarnished by its association with their fallen hero, Theodore Roosevelt, who had run and lost on a Progressive third party ticket. Traditional liberals were not happy to see their label transformed. In the 1920s, The New York Times criticized "the expropriation of the time-honored word ‘liberal’ " and argued that “the Radical-Red school of thought … hand back the word ‘liberal’ to its original owners.” During the early 1930s, Herbert Hoover and Franklin Roosevelt duked it out as to who was the true liberal. Roosevelt won, adopting the term to ward off accusations of being left-wing. He could declare that liberalism was “plain English for a changed concept of the duty and responsibility of government toward economic life.” And since the New Deal, liberalism in the United States has been identified with an expansion of government’s role in the economy.

– Daniel Yergin, The Commanding Heights

The use of the term ‘liberals’ by the Intercept is not meant to be synonymous with ‘the left’ – its meaning in this context is the political mainstream of the Democratic Party and the left wing of the Republican Party. The term comes from the philosophy of ‘economic liberalism’ and adjacent to terms like ‘neoliberal’ and ‘capitalist’ but inclusive of people who engage in politics consistent with those ideologies without explicitly self-identifying as ideologues.

Respect.

Pew research reports 128/day in 2024. That number includes suicides, which account for ~60% of gun-related fatalities.

The rate of people living on the streets is not a constant across even all capitalist societies, ‘homeless’ describes a state without implying a cause. ‘Unhoused’ properly implies that people could have shelter, but the society they live in has failed to make houses available to them.

You think these are pictures of the shooter walking to the overlook where he has stored a gun previously? Yes, that would be possible. It would still be strange that they were able to isolate pictures of the shooter arriving, but not leaving.

If their lead about a deer rifle in the woods is accurate, then it would be strange if these were pictures of the suspect given he is not carrying a rifle or any means of concealing one.

I’m pretty impressed with the WSWS take:

It is politically appropriate to condemn the killing, which accomplishes nothing progressive and actually aids the efforts of the Trump White House to attack democratic rights and erect a police state. But that is no reason to glorify the victim or cover up the bloodthirsty, bigoted character of his political perspective.

The Times editors claim, “Such violence is antithetical to America.” On the contrary, such violence is the stock in trade of the American ruling class, whether directed at striking workers, racial minorities, immigrants, or political figures deemed to be dangerous or merely inconvenient. It is barely a week since the president of the United States ordered the incineration of 11 people in a Venezuelan fishing boat, claiming, without offering any evidence, that they were drug smugglers and terrorists.

Matt Dowd was fired from MSNBC for much less.

Alright. What did you mean by “ignorance should not have a safe space there”?

Last week, a student at Texas A&M objected to the professor teaching about “transgenderism” in the classroom. The teacher was doing their job, teaching the scientific consensus. Instead of challenging the teacher’s ideas, the student challenged the legality of teaching science. The student was ignorant. Instead of admitting ignorance, or even assuming their own competence and trying to argue their ideas, the student took the third route: threats of political violence. The student warned the teacher that police could come and force the teacher from teaching the truth.

Campuses should be very intolerant to ignorance like this student displayed. But instead the teacher, department head, and dean were all penalized for standing up against an enemy of free thought. That is the goal of this administration - to force indoctrination on American children, and shut down all the spaces where having discussions like this one we’re having right now might open their eyes up to the lies they’ve been taught.

In a school, it should be safe to admit your ignorance.

I didn’t write very much, and I clearly didn’t write that you shouldn’t be able to admit ignorance at school. If you actually care about reading and understanding what I’m saying, then this is your opportunity to demonstrate you can roll it back, tone it down, and read what I wrote again. If some of it is ambiguous to you, you can ask me questions.

It seems like you’re looking for a leftist punching bag, and that will just make you look like another hateful violent right-wing brute. Are you afraid to talk about your beliefs? Are you afraid to talk about them anonymously and online?

Left-wing streamer Kyle Kulinski says Charlie Kirk was feuding with nazis to his political right before he was killed.

Right-wing pundit Clayton Morris shares rumor that Charlie Kirk was concerned Israel was going to kill him, and that he was wearing body armor when he was shot.

I mean, Kirk was on Gavin Newsom’s podcast in March and Newsom talked about how his kids loved Kirk. How his 13-year-old son refused to go to school because he wanted to stay home and meet Charlie. And if that doesn’t tell you how wide Kirk’s appeal is among young people I don’t know what would.

And look. A lot of people on the left also discount or ignore how young conservatives feel discriminated against in higher education. Rightly or wrongly, I’m talking about their beliefs, not the validity of those beliefs. Kids who come from red states with conservative Christian beliefs about sex, about gender, about what it means to be a man, they’re proud to go to college so they can earn a better living and do better for their future children than their parents did for them. And then they hit the culture shock of college and both students and teachers are telling them “everything you believe is wrong, you’re a bad person for believing it, and if you even try to argue for it we will ostracize you”.

There is no ‘rightly or wrongly’ – what you’re describing is indoctrination and brainwashing. They are and should be discriminated against, but not because of where they’re from or the color of their skin, but because they have been taught wrong, and most importantly have been taught to see challenges to their beliefs as a threat. The purpose of a school is not to validate your pre-existing beliefs, but to give you a space to challenge your ideas and learn new ones. Ignorance should not have a safe space there, and people who do not come to learn should not feel welcome.

And ironically, part of the issue is a lack of empathy on the left. Instead of asking why conservatives believe these things and trying to understand how to convince them otherwise, the American left just wants to call them fascists and deplatform them. “It’s not my job to educate you” is smug and contemptuous and one of the nicer ways the left respond to conservatives.

No wonder you delete all of your comments. That’s a pretty terrible take.

Or a jilted lover from his closeted life. Let’s not jump to conclusions.

On the forums right now, right wingers are frothing themselves up about the ‘left’ – but both attempts on Trump’s life were by people who fit much more neatly into the right-wing stereotype.

Claiming to care about the Epstein files, and then radically changing direction to protect pedophiles may have been the trigger that got him shot by one of his fans.

If he was shot in Chicago, their trauma centers may have saved his life.

The shooting occurred on the day before 9-11. I wonder if the timing had any significance in the shooter’s mind.

El Faro hosts the interview with English subtitles.

Semafor isnt American?

Bias is not the same thing as credibility. I will continue share the typically sidelined credible Arab and Muslim voices reporting on events.

You are not a skeptic if you reject information you don’t want to be true or sources you don’t like. Skeptics research things to see if they could be false.

Searching for a western source and sharing your results is an example of skeptical and constructive behavior. Please be better.

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