The photos of the "crowds" at the tank parade remind me of when Bill Hicks would come on stage in an almost-empty club, scan the room slowly, and announce "I've had more people in bed than this" ...
When the president sends a cabinet member on TV to announce "We are using the military to liberate an American city from its elected leaders," where do you go from there. What is left to say. The idea of that being anything short of a near-universal "Wait, what the fuck is going on" moment proves how far we've backslid.
This is from 2022 but it was absolutely right. The practiced buffoonery of Trump 1, all the "just kiddings" and "seriously but not literallys" absolutely succeeded in desensitizing people who are hardly paying any attention to the harder stuff they always intended to do next. ...
The basic fallacy in chasing votes by being "tough on immigration" is that the modal American's position on the issue is "Deport the Bad ones and keep the Good ones," and they alone know who is which, and that simply does not translate into workable policy. So this kind of gestapo stuff horrifies some of the same people who cheered when Trump promised to do it. There are true sociopaths who love this, but "No, I meant only the BAD immigrants! Not my coworker/friend/neighbor!" is as likely a reaction as enthusiasm. You cannot do immigration policy that satisfies these people because what they want is nonsensical.
So by the time center-left parties fully commit to chasing the far right by "getting tough" on immigration, the backlash has already begun to build and they walk right into it. "I thought you people wanted this!" No, they want something impossible and convinced themselves they'd could have it - the "eat whatever you want AND lose weight!" of immigration policies.
It is hard to grasp but large masses of Americans are both racist/xenophobic AND not racist/xenophobic enough to applaud what Trump is doing. It's goldilocks shit, they want a level of racism/xenophobia calibrated exactly to their personal preferences, and you just can't make that policy. Don't try. ...
AP: Trump extends olive branch, invites Musk to White House cellar to taste some brand new amontillado ...
fasteddie says:
Well done. Providence?
Skepticalist says:
It would fit in on the masthead of our hideous local paper.
mothra says:
Skepticalist: you live in Albuquerque?
Alan Christensen says:
I just shared this with my wife, who was a psych major. She got a kick out of it.
dan says:
You missed a biggy. Fear. All the time. Muslims. Blacks. Lesbians. Vegetarians. Toyota Prius. Although I wouldn't know it should go at the very top or the very bottom.
Emerson Dameron says:
Can't have a pyramid without a scheme or some slavery.
Mo says:
Soooooo…. take away the guns – or make ammo dissolve into useless goo – and the whole pyramid collapses?
Maybe it's time to require 24 guns to be turned in for smelting for each school voucher?
Well mostly says:
Maybe exceptionalism and divine providence go on there somewhere. Oh, and voting. Oh this is fun. The right to ignore facts and laws if those conflict with firmly held convictions. And, a pony. Gotta have a pony. Noah's ark, Jonah and the whale. And the golden book of treasured childhood fantasies.
c u n d gulag says:
Air.
Water.
Food.
Shelter.
Social interactions.
THAT"s the true human needs pyramid.
Of course, our Reich-Wingers believe that they can live on hate, fear, and bigotry.
I encourage them to try!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Davis X. Machina says:
The good thing about a Catholic education — Jesuits in this case — is you run into the fundamental depravity of man at an early age.
The F D of M is why you can run on a platform of "I can't make your life better. Well, no, actually, I could — but I won't. I can however make someone else's life worse, and let you watch. Deal?" and win election after election.
Major Kong says:
Brilliant.
Brian M says:
Davis X Machina: Isn't that what drives most "rapture ready" Christians?
Only forever.
The thought of watching the damned suffer gives them goosebumps.
Brian M says:
Also: I am spreading this because Mr. Zande needs some love.
What if the Fundamental Depravity of Man is a mere reflection…of our creator?
"Before there was light there was, after all, only darkness. Before there was light there was only what the Greek poet Hesiod called the “yawning nothingness,” and from within this perfect eclipse the uncaused First Cause moved, constructively interfering with a portion of that eternal void which existed before space and time were named with a temperature. This unending, infinite bleakness—a blackness that the authors of the Vedas collectively identified as a type of swirling chaos, a darkness concealed in darkness[1]—is the Creator’s ancestral home. It is where He resides, within what human minds can only comprehend as the deepest of detestable disorders."
https://thesuperstitiousnakedape.wordpress.com/2015/06/21/before-there-was-light-a-functional-proof-for-the-omnimalevolent-creator/
democommie says:
How can that be a hierarchy of anything without it don't got no pizza or Jaegerbombs?
ZeroInMyOnes says:
Yes.
vegymper says:
We love it some more when Ed goes graphic. Well done!
Now get an update and love me some Ken Wilber.