The Sanders movement has become impervious to reality. Some have even called into question the nature of reality itself: “Bernie Sanders’ ‘political revolution’ is political only inasmuch as thought is political,” a self-described “metamodernist creative writer” named Seth Abramson wrote in the Huffington Post a few days ago. “By the very nature of things—we might call it perceptual entropy—the impossible, once perceived, enters a chain of causation whose natural conclusion is realization.” By this logic, Abramson reasons, Sanders is actually winning. It’s, like, the Matrix, man, or something....Just stop believing and he'll go away.
Clinton, for her part, has taken to pretending Sanders does not exist....
Sanders was introduced [in Anaheim] by a blind Filipino delegate and a gay actress who... compared Sanders to a unicorn, because “he seems too good to be true.”...Ball is pushing the Hillary theory: It can't be true. A blind lady can see that he looks like a unicorn. Why won't everyone just stop?!!
But it's not that kind of year. And that unicorn is getting in position to win California.
IN THE COMMENTS: shiloh said:
ok, Althouse just wanted another excuse to use her Hillary's in trouble tag.I said:
I made that tag to correspond to my tag for Obama: "Obama's in trouble."
That tag arose from a comic take we had at Meadhouse, which was, in longer form, "Obama's in trouble! We need to help!" I thought that was the tone of the news around Obama, and we were — I am not kidding — riffing on the old TV show "Lassie," where Lassie would bark about someone being in trouble and people would then know to spring into action and help.
But with Hillary, we don't have that instinct: If she's in trouble, then that means we need to help. She just doesn't inspire us that way. Few politicians do.
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If Clintonites think that had Sanders not entered the race she'd be in a better position today, they're dreaming. Sanders only exposed her problem--she's a poor candidate and the coronation was a terrible idea. There's just no real point to her campaign, except "she deserves it after all she's been through". But even non-Hillary haters take a close look at that and think "all she's been through is closing ranks around her husband, backing several unfortunate military actions, and making repeated questionable decisions that start to look like corruption and influence peddling." I suppose some could say "she's continuing the Obama years" and that might be a winning argument (Obama is pretty popular) but this year she's tried instead to tack left, unconvincingly, and divide and conquer in the gender wars.
We're seeing a textbook example of how not to hold a nomination, and how not to run a campaign, and how not to pick a candidate. If she wins this fall, people aren't going to learn the right lesson.
2016 is definitely the year of the magical unicorn. Things that weren't supposed to happen seem to be happening... a lot. The older you get the more you realize how much random, unpredictable, world-changing events shape things and how you can never really assume anything. It's especially rich watching the intellectual, nattering class in the media constantly struggle to explain things all while dismissing the obvious.
I guess after winning all of those primaries outright with clear victories, and looking like he might win California, losing Kentucky by 1,500 votes is called "losing steam."
Do you think these people believe what they are peddling? Standing over the Bernie supporters and pissing on their backs and calling it rain, as if they were Republicans? Or do you think that they are so cynically in the can for the power elite in the Democrat machine, that they make this up as if they were executing some kind of pick up artist type game.
I would have believed that this poll is an outlier and Clinton is still sure to win California. But June 7 is a long way off, the IG report is out there with MSM covering it, and there'll be a Sanders/Trump debate... We'll see.
Popcorn.
Hillary and Bernie tied in CA.
What if Hillary loses CA. Do the super delegates stay with her?
If Hillary is indicted, isn't Bernie the nominee?
"Metamodernist" vs. Postmodernist. Both pseudo-philosophies end up grazing amidst the unicorns, defining realities devoid of facts and that end disastrously.
Can a metamodernist ignore the Inspector General's report?
compared Sanders to a unicorn, because “he seems too good to be true.”
Unicorns are evil.
I hazard that Seth is using "entropy" in the sense of "chaos" or "disorder". The "very nature of things" is the perceiving of disorder. Once disorder is perceived it is self-fulfilling.
But I think the precise definition is useful: "the unavailability of a system's thermal energy for conversion into mechanical work".
Thus socialism. Also self-fulfilling.
Some serious shade being thrown at The Bern and his supporters. (I especially appreciated the sad image of the guy waving a handmade Bernie muppet in the air.)
But Ball makes one interesting observation: the Bernie Bros (as opposed to the women) are much more likely to vote for anyone but Hillary, seeing even Trump as a challenge to the corrupt status quo. There is a downside to Democrats shameless pandering to The Woman Vote, as Mark Udall discovered in Colorado: it drives men to vote Republican in even greater numbers than the woman gap can make up.
Trump can also appeal to a lot of blue collar union guys who are sick of the Democrats killing job producing projects like Keystone XL, mining coal, etc, etc.
Sanders and Trump supporters both tell me: "That's what you just don't get about him!" And they are all absolutely right - I don't.
Please define the Sanders revolution. What revolution?
ok, young folk are very happy to hear about free health care and college. Shocking!
They don't want wall street/super pacs/lobbyists controlling politicians. Shocking!
So comparing the "Sander's revolution" to other American revolutions, when was the last "Sander's" American revolution? And if there was one like Sander's what effect did it have on American society?
hmm, are American voters pissed of at the political process? Yes. Have they been pissed off before? Yes. Has the political process ever changed in a significant way? No.
Indeed, as nirvana and reality er human nature are polar opposites.
>
ok, Althouse just wanted another excuse to use her Hillary's in trouble tag.
Bless her little heart ...
If Hillary closes her eyes, she apparently thinks we can't see all of her lies and the corruption. It really is kind of infantile.
"It really is kind of infantile."
As opposed to Trump's lies and corruption. ok, Trump has an infantile/kindergarten potty mouth so he is a tad different. And his "conservative base" loves that difference.
Indeed, the big question is who's the biggest liar?
"Indeed, the big question is who's the biggest liar?"
No, the big question is who's going to make American great again?
And I think we know the answer to that question.
"ok, Althouse just wanted another excuse to use her Hillary's in trouble tag."
I made that tag to correspond to my tag for Obama: "Obama's in trouble."
That tag arose from a comic take we had at Meadhouse, which was, in longer form, "Obama's in trouble! We need to help!" I thought that was the tone of the news around Obama, and we were — I am not kidding — riffing on the old TV show "Lassie," where Lassie would bark about someone being in trouble and people would then know to spring into action and help.
But with Hillary, we don't have that instinct: If she's in trouble, then that means we need to help. She just doesn't inspire us that way. Few politicians do.
"No, the big question is who's going to make American great again?"
"""If""" Trump is elected, everything he proposes has to get past the Speaker of the House.
So, the big question ~ how is Paul Ryan gonna make America great again? And if the Dems take control of the senate it will be a real cluster fuck, eh.
Sort of like now ie nothing really changes regardless.
Sanders rides Obama's unicorn while Bernie bros are throwing rocks at horses.
Althouse very rarely/almost never replies to my posts so thanx for replying. Interesting you choose to reply w/an explanation of a "tag".
btw, Obama was easily elected twice so logically speaking, Hillary can't be in that much trouble.
Molly Ball mocked a Trump supporter for having yellow teeth.
".... does not mean ...."?
And speaking of logic:
Ken B said...
You cannot logically do all the following
1 blog
2 get upset at your provider for outages because you have built up a readership over years and don't want to use (lose) them
3 say bullshit I don't do a damn thing to get noticed,
10/22/14, 7:44 PM
Yes, it's always more interesting when Althouse doesn't reply to an "enigma" ...
"Obama's in trouble! We need to help!"
Liberals.
This is how a revolution ends: its idealism tested, its optimism drained, its hope turned to bitterness.
What? Over? Did you say "over"? Nothing is over until we decide it is! Was it over when the Germans bombed Pearl Harbor? Hell no! --Senator John Blutarsky
Seven years of college down the drain!
The metaphysical economists claim that socialism is a creative form of entropy..... The way Fred Astaire embodied Top Hat, White Tie, and Tails even as he sang about them, Hillary puts a human face on the difficult concept of entropy. Her voice rises and becomes more discordant even as she loses energy. Entropic thunder.
Well your logic class hours were certainly wasted. I am trying to remember who won the two previous elections. It seems like winning reelection has never guaranteed that the other party could never win in the past.
Perceptual entropy is a phrase that probably sounded really neat when written...but the more I work on it the less apt it seems.
Hillary is going to plea bargain and Trumpy is going to put a placard on the White House entrance gates saying "Welcome to the Trump Residence, Washington DC". There will be a year or perhaps eighteen months of Reality TV entertainment followed by a Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger style senescence as the country continues its slow decline. Still slow is better than the fast track Lying, Crooked, Commie Traitor Hillary would offer us.
The calls for Sanders to depart the race come from two factions not just one. The first one, of course, is the Clinton campaign and its supporters; the other faction, and the more important one, is the faction in the Democratic Party that wants neither Sanders nor Clinton as the nominee- they would prefer to install Biden as the nominee at the convention, but that gets harder the longer Sanders stays in the race. It is in defiance of that faction that Sanders fights. If Clinton were squeaky clean and the race had run the same path, Sanders would have withdrawn 2 months ago- he is staying in because he knows her delegate numbers are not what is important- what is important is that he keep himself as the alternative in case her legal problems undo her. Those problems are going to undo her, and Sanders is smart enough to see that. He needs to hit her hard between now and the 7th on just this issue. The IG report handed him the arms to destroy her, I just don't know if he has the will to use them.
shiloh said...
"Please define the Sanders revolution. What revolution?
ok, young folk are very happy to hear about free health care and college. Shocking!"
Yeah. It kinda is shocking. That people like you are so incredibly dense as to think that anything is "free". Our education system has failed you.
"What revolution?"
Well, the revolution against the crony Democrat Machine which has always been cozy with the very people they claim to their base to oppose. The revolution against a party machinery that sells out their values to billionaires like day-old bread. That revolution. Plus Millennials are now the largest generation, dwarfing Gen X and eclipsing the Baby Boomers. They will be heard. Clinton's time of graft and greed and lust for power is over.
Scroll down for graphic on generation population
There is an annoying propensity among modern writers, particularly those published online to make metaphorical use of precisely defined terms from STEM disciplines which aren't even remotely applicable to the subject at hand. A few days ago Roger Draper used granularity in reference to his long piece on Donald Trump's family life, which he lifted from information science and used to imply that his intent was to examine Trump and his family in greater detail when in fact the term implies less detail.
Now Molly Ball uses entropy to imply — jeez, I'm stumped. Maybe she just wanted to signal to the rest of us she'd encounter the word before. The tone of the piece suggests that she believes that certain people are unrealistic in their thinking. Fine, then write that. In the perpetual fantasy world of the metamodernist (and just who the hell are they?) the Sanders Revolution has already happened. That makes a bit more sense to me, but only a bit.
I am looking forward to the day the FBI invites Hillary to come talk with them and her lawyer tells her not to...:-)
I am looking forward to the day the FBI invites Hillary to come talk with them and her lawyer tells her not to...:-)
Me too. That's the short road to indictment.
In my college days a class exercise required me to create a novel philosophy, with predictions of the precepts and behaviors to be expected of its adherents. I founded Surreal Symbolism, wherein one looks at ordinary reality and comprehends it from the perspective of someone like Salvador Dali, or maybe a Dadaist.
Every clock on a wall is interpreted as a melting cheese slice, so to speak.
I had a lot of fun with the idea, even after leaving my college days long behind me.
That long explanation leads to this short summary: Bernie is an old soldier, no longer understanding that the side he fought on lost the war decades ago.
Unicorns and rainbows. Pin the tail on the Ass.
"Obama was easily elected twice so logically speaking, Hillary can't be in that much trouble."
You remind me of the old Kennedy brothers joke. The country is in trouble. Hillary is just the signal.
Grandma is chuckling again. Something about qualifications needed to be presidential. Is there any doubt that folks in your pTb's top tier, his direct reports simply would have told one of the able bureaucracies I need to do X, so make it so. If you or anyone else provably can't give me the bill and the language that needs to be in the PDD to make it so, and I'll get it signed. Have a good day. If the boss finds out you could have done this without distracting me or him, he's going to be pissed because he still doesn't understand what he gets for your existing budget, and why your work duplicates xyz's, I hope you're prepared for your budget to be cut in half or your job assigned to xyz, which he might just do anyway since you've made him focus on you just having to think about these issues. And he needs to make an example of someone just to get more adult and cooperative behaviors out of the rest of the agencies. In fact I anticipated the request as any of his direct reports would do in my situation, and I gave him the order to sign. Have a good day. You've got a week.
Obama got fewer votes the second time than the first, so "logically" the trend is down and Democrats are doomed!
So comparing the "Sander's revolution" to other American revolutions, when was the last "Sander's" American revolution?
Obama, Barack Hussein 2008
As opposed to Trump's lies and corruption. ok, Trump has an infantile/kindergarten potty mouth so he is a tad different. And his "conservative base" loves that difference.
How much confidential intel did Trump transmit illegally on a personal server that violates federal records keeping laws?
How many women did his wife rape and he stand by and not only believe her, but attack the victims?
How many times did he have the ability to award huge government benefits for people who donate to a charity his family runs?
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