Trickle down Archives -

This just in: I see no reason to expect that I am either right or wrong more often than the average person. However, there are times that I wish I was wrong more often than I am; especially when it comes to this blog.

Being wrong is not really a bad thing. To discover that I’m wrong is the same as learning something new. I like to think I can change my mind and accept a perspective that I had not previously held.

Take climate change for example. I believe in it. I didn’t do any math but other have and the experts emerged from their “room of math and climate analysis” and declared, “It’s happening and we did it!”

Suppose this same group met again and reviewed their math and then emerged and said, “We forgot to carry the 3! There is no climate change!”

This would make me change my mind.

Like climate change, I depend on experts to help me to take a side on an issue. Take Pi, for example. It’s an irrational number in that it’s digits go on forever without repeating. I believe this because someone smarter than me did the math.

I said Trump’s tax breaks for the rich would not stimulate the economy. I wanted to be wrong. I want 5% growth rate and lots of well paying jobs. History, however, teaches a different lesson about tax cuts. History says there will be a brief spurt and then…nothing. That is what we are seeing now.

I want Trickle-Down-Economics to work. If the rich have more money, I want them to create high paying jobs. Alas…this is a failure as well. This Trump policy is the most disproven economic theory I know of and it is playing out just like the economic experts said it would. A flop.

I wish it was a fact that separating immigrant parents from their kids is a morally just solution. Alas…it’s not and I’m once again correct that we should be condemning it.

I wish I was wrong when I said Trump’s tariffs would start a trade war and result in a loss of jobs and higher prices here at home. Once again…I was, unfortunately correct.

I wish I was wrong when I say that racists and evangelicals are basically the same thing. But, I’m not. What’s the difference between hating Muslims and hating non-whites?

I wish Trump was super clever and was actually toying with Putin in Helsinki. I wish he truly was the “toughest ever” on Russia. However, I’m not wrong. Trump is not a smart man. He is a Putin puppet.

I wish Trump had solved the North Korea threat. But instead…he just got taken for a ride by Kim-Jong-Waterbrain.

I wish we didn’t need NATO because Trump is certainly trying to end it. But we do.

Now….what about my assertion that Trump is a money launderer? Well…I think we’ll see about that pretty soon.

Yes, over the years, I have made mistakes on my blog. The title “View From The Cheap Seats” is meant to indicate that I’m not always posting an academic White Paper but rather … I’m just telling you what I believe.

Most of my posts over the last year have been trashing Trump and the Republican Party. I don’t do this because they are on the “other team”. I do it because they are wrong; at least in my mind.

My mind…feel free to change it.

Time to save the world.

Up, up and away…

Jim

This just in: “It is difficult to get a man to understand something, when his salary depends on his not understanding it.” – Upton Sinclair

Yes, there are two sides to every story and every coin. Yes, we have differing opinions and you are certainly welcome to yours. Yes, they all do it.

However, don’t be fooled into a false equivalency. Both sides of an issue are not necessarily equal in merit.

For example, if I point at a rock and say, “That is a rock” and you point at the same rock and say, “That is the Eiffel Tower,” one of us is wrong. Just because we are equal in number and welcome to our own perspectives, we are not necessarily equal in the truth of what we say.

This, and the opening quote, are all intended to set up the following statement…

Congress and the president are offering convoluted explanations to justify their actions; explanations that fall far short of the lowest believability threshold.

My belief is not that they are stupid. My belief is that they pretend to believe certain things because their “salaries depend on it.”

Let’s take climate change. The scientific community is in one voice about this. It is real. However, Republicans and the President, who are largely funded by the fossil fuel industry, find it hard to believe in it. Big oil pays then to not believe in it.

How about “trickle down economics” which is the widely disproven idea that if you give tax breaks to the rich, they will create more jobs. The Republican Party is a huge fan of unlimited campaign contributions from the very rich. These “very rich” pay the Republicans to believe that tax cuts for the rich actually work.

The Russian funded NRA pays Republicans to believe that gun proliferation has nothing to do with the 35,000 annual gun deaths in the United States. Republicans believe this because they are paid to believe it.

Now we get to Donald Trump.

Why does Trump have a hard time saying, “I believe Russia is continuing to hack our elections.”? He has perfect information available to him. He must have an absolute certainty that this is the case; and yet, he denies it.

Why?

Trump’s job depends on his not believing that Russia is interfering in our elections.

His job depends on it because Putin told him so. Which, in turn, says that Putin has the ability to end Trump’s presidency.

I absolutely believe this. However, if you pay me enough money, I might be convinced to believe otherwise. A lot of money…

Up, up and away…

Jim

Tag Archives: Trickle down

I wish I was wrong more often

And the simplest answer is…