Come for the politics, stay for the snark.

The GOP is a fucking disgrace.

You can’t attract Republican voters. You can only out organize them.

Not so fun when the rabbit gets the gun, is it?

A sufficient plurality of insane, greedy people can tank any democratic system ever devised, apparently.

Authoritarian republicans are opposed to freedom for the rest of us.

White supremacy is terrorism.

We are builders in a constant struggle with destroyers. let’s win this.

Only Democrats have agency, apparently.

The arc of history bends toward the same old fuckery.

Since when do we limit our critiques to things we could do better ourselves?

Our job is not to persuade republicans but to defeat them.

“Squeaker” McCarthy

Incompetence, fear, or corruption? why not all three?

Something needs to be done about our bogus SCOTUS.

Teach a man to fish, and he’ll sit in a boat all day drinking beer.

We cannot abandon the truth and remain a free nation.

The republican caucus is already covering themselves with something, and it’s not glory.

I’ve spoken to my cat about this, but it doesn’t seem to do any good.

Wow, I can’t imagine what it was like to comment in morse code.

We’ve had enough carrots to last a lifetime. break out the sticks.

This fight is for everything.

Anyone who bans teaching American history has no right to shape America’s future.

Meanwhile over at truth Social, the former president is busy confessing to crimes.

A democracy can’t function when people can’t distinguish facts from lies.

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Reader Interactions

19Comments

  2. 2.

    caleb

    Am I the only one who sees irony, or perhaps premeditation on Mr. Coles part, in linking to this site when the top post is discussing the finer points of “Reasoning”?

    ;-)

  3. 3.

    demimondian

    It’s unfortunate that the first page of the blog has a classic error. Obviously, the author hadn’t ever read Kant or Hume.

  4. 4.

    John S.

    Clean layout, though the font they are using is just a bit on the tiny side…sort of like reading a blog that consists entirely of the fine print you find at the bottom of a contract.

  5. 5.

    Emma Zahn

    Personally, I believe that all people are rational beings capable of choosing what best suits their self interest in any given moment.

    This is so sweet. S/he is so young and apparently hasn’t been reading your site lately.

  8. 8.

    Jim Caputo

    Filed under: Excellent Links |

    I wonder what John found so “excellent” (say the word in your best Montgomery Burns voice).

    Could it be this smug comment?

    Pay attention, Ms. Sheehan. Somewhere in this story you may find the answer to your question about what noble cause your son died for.

    or maybe this…

    As millions remain stranded, homeless, and jobless in Louisiana and surrounding areas, the Left is out in full force, blaming Bush for his supposedly poor response to Hurricane Katrina.

    or perhaps this…

    Call it domestic abuse, but if you havn’t noticed, conservatives are using hurricane Katrina to push their agenda. Except it’s not such a bad thing.

    I wasn’t surprised to find any of that there. Considering the tone around here, it was pretty much what I expected.

  9. 9.

    John Cole

    Since I have to explain everything to the nattering nabobs (thanks Spiro!), it is filed under excellent links because that is the catch-all category for things I link to but don’t really talk about or comment on.

    Someone emailed me, said they had started the web site and had a bunch of college students writing there, I gave it a 30 second perusal and linked it to help them get some exposure. Kinda like the kind of thing people are supposed to do, and the kind of thing established blogs did for me.

    I am sorry it did not meet your high standards, but maybe the rest of the people who come here will find it useful.

  10. 10.

    Pb

    Heh Jim, I couldn’t help but notice those comments as well. I was thinking, “Oh look, young conservative shills! How cute!”

    Then I read a bit more closely and saw that someone liked to use the word ‘Libertarian’ a whole lot.

    And then I was thinking, “Oh look, *selfish* young conservative shills!” :)

    P.S. Apologies to any actual principled (and especially any non-selfish) Libertarians out there, this obviously is not intended to apply to you. But some people who call themselves “Libertarian” are really just in it for all the tax cuts, which currently aligns quite nicely with Bush’s policies.

  12. 12.

    jobiuspublius

    Otto Man Says:

    Awesome. I love being lectured to by 19 year olds.

    It’s an opportunity to mentor a young mind.

  13. 13.

    Oh,Boy.Stupidity!

    Yeah, I liked the site. It’s refreshing to see college kids actually thinking on their own instead of regurgitating the same old tired leftist groupthink: US and capitalism are bad.

    It’s amazing how this site’s resident leftists are up in arms about how bad FEMA’s response is. Two months from now, the same lefties will be crowing about nationalizing health care, you know, for the children.

  14. 14.

    John S.

    Oh,Boy.Stupidity!

    What’s in a name?

    Yeah, I liked the site. It’s refreshing to see college kids actually thinking on their own instead of regurgitating the same old tired leftist groupthink: US and capitalism are bad.

    I guess yours pretty much says it.

  15. 15.

    p.lukasiak

    why am I not surprised that John-Boy endorses a student blog whose managing editor is a proud member of “Free Republic”.

    John would help restore at least some of what was passing for his credibility if he changes the category of this post from “excellent links” to “general stupidity”.

    (And, as someone who is familiar with Penn and its publications, this blog appears to be the antecedent of the “libertarian” “Red and Blue”—-a publication that was notorious for its undisguised racism in the name of “libertarian” principles…)

  16. 16.

    docG

    As a recovering academic, its good to see young people using their education to think a little about something that’s not on the test.

    My random thought for the morning, based on this and other comments sections:

    1. If you don’t like SOME of John Cole’s posts, pass by the ones you don’t like, new posts come frequently.
    2. If you don’t like ANY of the posts here, stop reading.
    3. If you like MOST of the posts, click the tip jar.
    4. If you comment, click the tip jar.
    5. If you just want to fight, get in a long term relationship in the real world ;-}

  17. 17.

    jobiuspublius

    Guess which form of reasonning is most popular.

    A)


    Induction     or inductive reasoning, sometimes called inductive logic, is the process of reasoning in which the premises of an argument support the conclusion, but do not ensure it. It is to ascribe properties or relations to types based on limited observations of particular tokens; or to formulate laws based on limited observations of recurring phenomenal patterns. Induction is used, for example, in using specific propositions such as:

    * The ice is cold.
    * A billiard ball moves when struck with a cue.

    to infer general propositions such as:

    * All ice is cold. or: There is no ice in the Sun.
    * For every action, there is an equal and opposite re-action.

    …

    B)

    In traditional Aristotelian logic, deductive reasoning is inference in which the conclusion is of lesser or equal generality than the premises, as opposed to inductive reasoning, where the conclusion is of greater generality than the premises. Other theories of logic define deductive reasoning as inference in which the conclusion is just as certain as the premises, as opposed to inductive reasoning, where the conclusion can have less certainty than the premises. In both approaches, the conclusion of a deductive inference is necessitated by the premises: the premises can’t be true while the conclusion is false. (In Aristotelian logic, the premises in inductive reasoning can also be related in this way to the conclusion.)
    rules of inference and replacement in deductive logic
    Enlarge
    rules of inference and replacement in deductive logic

    Examples

    Valid:

    All men are mortal.
    Socrates is a man.
    Therefore Socrates is mortal.

    The picture is above the desk.
    The desk is above the floor.
    Therefore the picture is above the floor.

    Invalid:

    Every criminal opposes the government.
    Everyone in the opposition party opposes the government.
    Therefore everyone in the opposition party is a criminal.

    This is invalid because the premises fail to establish commonality between membership in the opposition party and being a criminal. This is the famous fallacy of undistributed middle.

  18. 18.

    jobiuspublius

    Oh, I forgot. Anybody notice the differance between the “nice” link and the wiki-pedia entries? Has U. Penn. invented their own system of logic?

    Deductive Reasoning

    Duductive reasoning starts with a certain set of premises, from which you directly draw a conclusion. Below is an example of the deductive reasoning process:

    Premise 1: Michael is a man
    Premise 2: Michael is 95 years old
    Premise 3: Michael has arthritis
    Conclusion: Michael cannot run a four minute mile

    The conclusion that Michael probably can’t run a mile in four minutes is a logical conclusion to reach based upon empirical evidence. Michael would have to be irrationally talented to accomplish such a feat at his age. Any person who defies this duductive conclusion would be an exception to the rule.
    Inductive Reasoning

    Inductive reasoning starts with a conclusion, and makes inferences about the premise — working a problem inside out. Below is an example of what I’m talking about.

    Premise 1: Conservatives don’t like gun control
    Premise 2: Ann Coulter is a conservative
    Conclusion: Ann Coulter doesn’t like gun control

    While this inductive conclusion is indeed rational, it differs from deductive reason in that we don’t necessarily have to accept an inductive reason as always true. I’m sure there are some conservatives out there who actually believe in the cause of gun control. Nevertheless, according to logic it is unlikely and irrational for a conservative to support gun control.

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