I think I’ll dedicate this edition of the Friday Forum to Nelson Muntz…
- Item: In at least one case already, Trump’s much maligned tariffs reboot has had the desired response. Stellantis (STLA) is making a number of US moves in response to the Trump administration’s focus on building products in America through the raising of tariffs on Canada and Mexico The company owns Ram, Jeep, Dodge, and other brands. In a letter to employees, Stellantis North America COO Antonio Filosa confirmed a number of specific actions it will take to “entail a multibillion-dollar investment in our people, great products, and innovative technology, all here in the US.” Stellantis said it would build a new midsize pickup truck at the recently shuttered Belvidere, Ill., assembly plant. Trump’s tariff threat has been the fallback argument of my Trump Deranged sister when she couldn’t come up with any rational reason to support Kamala Harris.
- Item: Speaking of irrational, this essay in the New York Times (which I missed somehow) might kill poor Nelson as it could make him laugh himself to death. Literally challenging “Family Ties,” to which I I alluded in this post yesterday, woke or Trump Deranged parents describe their “Where did we go wrong?” lament as they discovered that their offspring voted against their “values” in “When Your Son Goes MAGA.” [Gift Link!] One of the horrified parents is a Democrat in Portland, Oregon who, the Times says, “voted enthusiastically for Vice President Kamala Harris in the November election.” I can see why someone might hold her nose and vote for Harris, but voting for her “enthusiastically” is inexcusable. She says she argued about abortion, guns and immigration with her MAGA cap-wearing son, and tells him “facts don’t matter to you.” Ponder THAT for a second or two….
Despite this intro, I’ll be thrilled if commenters can find some non-political ethics issues to discuss,
Ethics Alarms 
In something of a meta-ethical analysis, is possible that it is so difficult to find ethical issues outside of politics because all the major unethical forces have metastasized into politics? Every social and cultural issue, it seems, is being fought in the political arena now, with the victory at the ballot box the most coveted prize. Instead of contesting ideas freely, it comes down to which side of the controversy can seize power and force its ideology on the masses. That’s why we’re seeing stupid overreach almost as often from Christian politicians as from Marxist ideologues. I know this is an oversimplification, but given we’ve reached a point where who we associate with is increasingly a matter of what side of the political divide we’re on, it does seem we’ve made everything political, and politics everything.
I think this is a good point. Not only that, but also things that weren’t necessarily political issues in the past have become de facto political issues because of the stances individual parties have about them.
Star Trek tackled social issues back in the 60s, but – and correct me if I’m wrong – those social issues weren’t necessarily always and only political. Now, when one criticizes the use of “Stop the Steal” signs in so-called “flashback” scenes that show unrest in the past as being too overtly political, one is told that Star Trek has “always been political”. Well? Was an interracial kiss necessarily political? Were brush wars in SE Asia (representative of that awful episode with the Coms and the Yangs) political?
Are we able to discuss the ethical issues surrounding abortion without it being political?
My explanation for the phenomenon is the left’s destruction of organized religion over the last sixty or seventy years. Without an effective church culture, morality has been moved into the political realm. Rather than having religious telling us what’s “good,” we have politicians and “pundits” scolding us non-stop. And, instead of the collection plate, which was voluntary and anonymous, we have the IRS enforcing behavior. It’s a very nasty and untenable situation. Government needs to get back to providing basic services and needs to leave morality to churches. But of course, the churches have been obliterated.
Sorry to butt in, but I just wanted to mention: I just approved an incomprehensible comment on an Open Forum from last month for te hell of it, and suddenly had a thought: I’ve even been thinking about leaving the open forums open to previously banned commenters…what do you think? It might be fun…heck, even ol’ Ablative Meatshield might drop in…Chris, Ampersand, Liberal Dan. The more I think about this idea, the better I like it. I know some of them still follow EA. Or am I being gullible about whether they would behave one a week?
Jack,
I think offering a limited amnesty, at least on this week’s open forum, could be worthwhile, so I’m all for it.
“Open Forum” does kinda imply that sort of idea, I think that’s worth trying. The problem I see is that management of comments, how do you accomplish this without grossly increasing your time to manage “banned” commenters?
Just remember, there can be unforeseen consequences to actions.
One might be an EA Presidential pardon….
I think it’s a terrible idea, but what the hell. It would be interesting to see what the paid DNC operatives are being told to say these days in order to gum up the works. As usual, I’d also urge commenters not to allow themselves to be sucked in to engaging with professional shit stirrers.
On a quasi-related front, I always think of a topic during the week and by the time Friday rolls around, I’ve forgotten what the topic was. I wonder if we could have a “Hey, what about this!” area up every day so the commentariat could toss things out unrelated to posts daily rather than weekly.
And, “Where have you gone, Still Spartan? The EA Commentariat turns its lonely eyes to you.” I guess Sparty self-banned herself.
Oh, Sparty drops by when the spirit moves her. And she is healthy, happy, and doing well….
OB, I’ve had similar issues, but I guess the main question is whether the Friday Open Forum is effective all week or only effective, say, through the weekend. I would hazard we could add onto the Open Forum at any time until the next Open Forum is up, but I don’t know if it would garner as much attention as when posting on a fresh Open Forum.
As a note, I at first thought Jack had scrubbed the posting which came to us in… Arabic? …because I didn’t see it in this Open Forum. I had to follow the link in the email to realize it had posted on an Open Forum back in December!
Ryan, it would be interesting to know how long one of Jack’s posts continues to be commented upon. Six hours? Twenty-four? Two? There must be some sort of determinable shelf life before a post no longer draws any comments.
“it would be interesting to know how long one of Jack’s posts continues to be commented upon.“
Seems a Pit Bull post from long ago still gets hits time-n-again.
PWS
That’s the record holder for sure, though it’s been pretty quiet lately.
You pine for the old days when TGT couldn’t admit he’d been fully debunked.
Heh. You vanquished tgt all right. Not your fault, but I miss him.
This is what Althouse and Glenn Reynold do, but especially in the latter case, those open forums tend to be junky.
Old Bill wrote, “I’d also urge commenters not to allow themselves to be sucked in to engaging with professional shit stirrers.”
Some of those conversations are “interesting” in their own sort of ways. Some of those conversations stimulate the brain to cement the good arguments against the “shit stirring” arguments and the end result is that the shit stirrers ultimately loose their power to troll effectively.
There is something to be said for openly debating those with opposing ideals as long as they don’t devolve into nothing but ad hominem personal insults.
Jack,
I think it’s a great idea if limited to just the Open Forum. Maybe a few of those who are still eligible for reinstatement will eventually do what is necessary to rejoin the daily ranks.
I’m relatively new here – wait, has it been 5+ years now?!? – and missed many of the greats that are now gone.
Heck, maybe even Alicia Tyler will show up. Her word salads – while from a place of far greater intelligence than VP Harris – were far more difficult to decipher than Kamala’s, but a heckuva lot more fun to read.
Heck, maybe even Alicia Tyler will show up.
Oh lord. I risk quoting you. One more mention and she’ll end up being summoned à la Beetlejuice.
She’s welcome back any time: every ethics blog needs a resident anti-Semite.
I had no idea that was her bent. I think I fully understood only one of her responses in the time she was here…and I gave myself a medal for it.
Oh yeah, big time. Holocaust denier. The whole gamut.
Alizia Tyler!
jvb
That’s right!…thanks for the correction.
approved.
-Jut
Well, this is primarily a longstanding worldwide “geo-political” issue, I suppose, but maybe Trump’s Gulf of America idea isn’t necessarily as novel or absurd as some claim.
Here’s what TwitteX‘s Grok AI has to say about it:
‘The term “Gulf of America” was humorously suggested by comedian Stephen Colbert following the Deepwater Horizon oil spill, highlighting the U.S.’s responsibility for the environmental damage.
There is a long-standing dispute over naming maritime regions, similar to the contention over the Sea of Japan, where different countries have used different names historically.
The Gulf of Mexico is bordered by the U.S., Mexico, and Cuba, with the U.S. having a larger shoreline and thus a greater claim under the Exclusive Economic Zone (EEZ) treaty, which defines maritime boundaries.’
aside: Is knowing the origin of the word “grok”a cultural literacy point, or is it too niche?
It depends on how you define niche. LLAP
In any event, I think the renaming of the Gulf is silly. Then again, I am averse to many forms of change. For example, the 1% tax we here in Indianapolis had added onto our 5% sales tax back in the day to build the Colts a new stadium after they snuck out on their Baltimore landlords is still being charged, despite the fact that the Hoosier Dome has come and gone. Nevertheless, even after it changed its name to the RCA Dome to honor its new corporate overlords, I still stubbornly clung to the name Hoosier Dome. I also never started calling Mount McKinley Denali either.
Here in D.C., there is an ongoing controversy over die-hard Redskins fans refusing to use the new politically correct (but boring) “Commanders” for the suddenly surprising NFL team. I couldn’t care less about what the gulf is called, but the renaming is a bit like “The Great War” being renamed World War 1. The Gulf was named for Mexico before there was a United States. The Gulf of California is sometimes referred to as the Sea of Cortez because the U.S. government has designated that body of water as the Gulf of California, while Mexico recognizes it as the Sea of Cortez. The AP says it will use the old name for the Gulf because that’s what is international readers know it as, which makes sense. But because it is in the US and the President can change geographical names within the country, “Denali” is out and McKinley is back as far as the Associated Press is concerned.
Isn’t the “gulf” wholly contained in the “Americas”, as in the continent(s): South, Central-, and North America? We are officially “The United States of America”. Of America. If it was renamed “The Gulf of the United States”, that would be silly.
I thought “grok” was just a funny sounding word, but no. I hear tell that “grok” means to empathize so deeply with another or others that you merge or blend into them, kinda like being assimilated. I am not sure I like that idea. Can imagine others being assimilated into me? Geez. I have enough trouble figuring out if I mailed my insurance payment yesterday and now I have to worry about others merging into or taking over my existence? Yeah, please.
jvb
Ah, you whippersnappers who don’t remember the Sixties! “Grok” was around a little later than “rad” and “Right on!” I always liked it. It’s a good name for an AI.
It has a 1961 literary origin as a neologism (not in a genre you favor, probably, although the author is well known), though it didn’t catch on in general usage until the later sixties hippie era.
Oh, I know my key Heinlein, though I didn’t read that one until after “grok” had returned via the Timothy Leary crowd.
abortion
FJB abandoned “My Body, My Choice” for the Dems
Not an ethics issue, but are others receiving new posts and comments to posts by email? About 4 to 5 months ago, WordPress stopped sending me updates on posts and comments. I tried to fix it on my end but, alas, no success. Any thoughts or advice from the Ethics Alarms commentariat would be greatly appreciated and embraced.
jvb
My late wife had the same experience. WP has quietly dropped a lot of features; for example, it used to update the number of followers on the home page, and it hasn’t for years. It used to send me a yearly stat sheet comparing traffic and comments to past years. It used to automatically post blog entries to Twitter. I should probably start thinking about moving to another platform, but I am already behind in so many other projects.
Oh. Currently my own blog doesn’t allow me to comment except as a reply to a reader comment. Nice.
I always receive emails regarding comments to my comments and new comments on entries I’ve commented on. There’s a feature when you write a comment that lets you choose to be emailed new posts and/or new comments. It may default to emailing you, but you should be able to change it.
I tried that but WordPress has me perplexed, if not vexed.
jvb
I stopped receiving notifications a long time ago.
JVB. I only get the condo of day wrap ups. I used to get updates like you when others post It is troublesome to go back to older essays when you have responded to Jack or another commenter and need to check back you need to respond again.
End of day not condo of day. Their AI function also is a problem. When you work on a small screen you don’t always see those changes before you hit post.
Considering Elon’s new role in DOGE, should we expect him to put on a more serious public demeanor, or is it better if Elon is just Elon, no mater what anyone expects? A couple of his recent TwitteX entries:
“How many flies does it take to screw in a light bulb? Two, but how did they get in there??“
“The recommendation algorithm on this platform sucks! I want to talk to the manager right now!!“
I don’t know if this embed attempt will work:
<blockquote class=”twitter-tweet”><p lang=”en” dir=”ltr”>I just can’t help it 😂 <a href=”https://t.co/0lXa68fQS4″>pic.twitter.com/0lXa68fQS4</a></p>— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) <a href=”https://twitter.com/elonmusk/status/1882729980863611120?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw”>January 24, 2025</a></blockquote> <script async src=”https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js” charset=”utf-8″></script>
Guess it didn’t
Where is Vivek?
jvb
He’s a government appointee, not an elected official, and I don’t [think] the former are as obligated to be super dignified. The fact that he’s never been that dignified to begin with is all the more reason to apply the Julie Principal at this point.
Jack, have you seen this story? It seems like something you might cover if you were aware. In any case, I’m bringing it to your attention. You’re so busy you cannot cover everything. I could have waited until tomorrow but I’m using this last open forum.
Selma ‘Bloody Sunday’ scene with ‘Make America Great Again’ inscribed featured on Montgomery Museum of Fine Arts billboards
https://1819news.com/news/item/selma-bloody-sunday-scene-with-make-america-great-again-inscribed-featured-on-montgomery-museum-of-fine-arts-billboards
Were they associating civil rights protesters with MAGA?
You know better.