Forestluv

Warren endorsed Clinton on June 9th, weeks before Bernie dropped out. Warren’s endorsement of Clinton was one of the nails in Bernie’s coffin. She did not take a “neutral” position. She endorsed Clinton at a time when it still mattered and served as leverage against Bernie. She took a calculated position. If she wanted to take a “neutral” position, she could have waited until Bernie dropped out and then endorsed Clinton. Yet she didn’t because she saw the tea leaves and wanted to benefit by endorsing Clinton when it still mattered. Currently, I could see Warren going to the sidelines and not endorsing for a while. Yet Warren fought Biden for a decade over bankruptcy reform and Biden voted for the bankruptcy bill. This goes against the heart of Warren’s fight.

Warren endorsed Clinton over Bernie in 2016. I don’t think staying neutral is tenable for Warren. If she doesn’t take a stand, she will look weak and unprincipled. @Annoynymous I think Bernie is the underdog now and something big needs to change so the media narrative changes and he expands his coalition. I don’t think he can bring in enough young people and new voters at this time. Imo, if Warren comes to Michigan and endorses Bernie - the narrative and momentum changes. Yet that is a big IF. . . And Joe will be Joe. He looks confused as he wanders and stumbles around. There is a reason his campaign has not made him very visible. Now he is in the limelight and people will seen that the Biden of 2008 is not the Biden of 2020. He is past his prime. However, a lot of people may give him a pass because he is a nice guy that they like.

@Annoynymous Warren’s spokesperson said they are “re-evaluating” their campaign today, which means she will likely drop out tomorrow. Warren has a huge bet to make in terms of her career. If she endorses Biden, she will do irreparable damage to her progressive credibility. She might even get primaried by a progressive for her Senate seat. If she endorses Bernie, she will be marginalized by centrist democrats. If Biden wins, she would lose out on a lot of opportunity. Yet, if she endorses Bernie and comes to the Midwest this week to campaign for him, she will restore her bone fides as a true progressive, fighting for progressive issues. This would also change the narrative and energize the base - enough so that I think Bernie becomes the favorite again. I live in Michigan and Bernie is having two rallies in Detroit and Grand Rapids this week. If Warren came to one of those rallies and endorsed Bernie, it would ignite enormous energy. And Warren has it in her. She is highly skilled in some areas and had been one of the leading progressive voices. She was the democratic front runner last October when she was a progressive lioness - back in her M4A and “big structural change” days. Then she hired a bunch of centrist consultants and imploded. . . Personally, I think deep down she is a progressive - yet she also believes in institutions and doesn’t want to deconstruct institutions. If she endorses Biden, she will be a puppet chasing personal ambition. If she endorses Bernie, she will be free to follow her heart and true nature. Most people are saying she goes with Biden. Yet I think she is more likely to go with Bernie. To me, Warren is very motivated to attain her goal to be president. When this is no longer an option, I think she will default back to what originally motivated her. To fight for working families getting screwed over by toxic capitalism. She spent years of thankless work researching and fighting toxic banks. And guess who is closely tied to banks and the credit card industry? Yep. Joe Biden. And Joe even tried to take credit for Warren’s success in establishing a credit protection agency. If Warren endorses Bernie in Michigan this week, it’s a game changer. And remember. . . Joe is Joe. He can barely hold things together due to his cognitive decline and now that he is the front runner, he will have a lot of attention. As well, if semi-progressives coalesce- like Tulsi, Steyer, Booker, Castro - to endorse and support Bernie - it would change momentum and the narrative. Yet Warren is the big one.

Many people will support the highest conscious person they think has a real chance at beating a lower conscious person. If I believed that Bernie had a 20% chance of beating Trump and Biden had a 60% chance of beating Trump, I would choose Biden. Electability ranks as the highest priority for democratic voters and a lot of voters are voting for the highest conscious person they think is electable, even if that means dropping down from green to orange - if this allows beating red. I would take an orange candidate over red in a heartbeat. This is why Biden won Massachusetts - one of the most progressive states in the country. Biden didn’t even campaign there and it’s Warren’s home state. Biden won Massachusetts on electability. I think Krystal makes some good points in the below video. In particular, progressive (green) policies are very popular with democratic voters - even in traditionally red states. Support for M4A has huge margins of support of +40 and +28 in Texas and North Carolina, respectively. I think some voters are getting turned off by talk of a “revolution” and “berning the system”. This makes a lot of green people unsettled. I have many solid green friends that are favoring Biden over Bernie for electability. These are people that donate and volunteer for various green issues - such as advocating for the homeless, LGBTQ rights, the environment, M4A etc. They are aligned more toward Bernie’s progressive policies, yet think he is a risk to lose in the general election. There are a lot of people with Trump PTSD that would gladly take a “safer” choice like Biden and incrementalism if it meant beating Trump. Many people will accept a lower conscious candidate, like orange-level Biden, if they believe he has the best chance to beat red/blue level Trump. Beating Trump is the #1 factor for most democrats - especially voters over 40, that vote in the highest percentages. . . . Yesterday, I was with a solid Green progressive friend who is voting for Biden. She is a poc and a social advocate for poc - she is terrified of another four years of Trump and sees Biden as a safer, return to normalcy, option. She sees Bernie as a risky option because he is an independent that wants to take over the Democratic Party and promote a “revolution” that will divide the party. For many progressive issues, the majority of people support. Progressive issues like banning assault weapons and legalizing marijuana nationally could be considered the “moderate” position in the sense that the majority of Americans support it. If someone goes to online democratic forums, there will be support for progressive policies - the criticism Bernie gets is that he is too divisive, will fracture the Democratic Party and lead to four more years of Trump. The status quo - in particular the pharmaceutical industry, fossil fuel industry, gun lobby, health insurance industry and military industrial complex - have enormous power in shaping public opinions and policy toward their self-serving agenda. There is an inter-relationship between what people want and what they are fed. . . Products are produced both by what people desire AND what producers tell people they should desire. If Bernie wants to win, I think he needs to change the media narrative quickly to address this. His coalition is not broad enough to win. He isn’t going to get enough young people to vote or convince enough older voters to “join a political revolution”.

@Mongu9719 She didn’t simply link to a video. She offered her views and a detailed summary that can be helpful to others and stimulate conversation. It’s ok to do this on the forum. I haven’t watched this video yet. Based on her summary I’m now interested in watching it.

Candidates dropping out is not rigged. From the perspective of a moderate, why should they split up their vote between four candidates and lose? Having it boil down to Bernie vs Biden is fine. Lets hope it’s a fair competition between the two.

If Bernie gets the majority of delegates, it’s game over. The question is if Bernie gets a plurality of the votes. Then, the superdelegates can jump in on the second ballot and give it to Biden or Bloomberg. Yet this would fracture the democratic party, nearly guarantee a win for Trump and cause serious damage to the democratic patty for at least a generation. It’s hard to imagine why they would destroy themselves in this scenario, yet thats what grasping to piwer and survival looks like. They know its the end of business as usual withe a president Sanders.

Klobuchar was about to lose her home state of Minnesota tomorrow - especially after BLM shut down her rally last night. Losing one’s home state is extremely embarrassing for a politician and would stick with her the rest of her political career. Bernie and Ilhan Omar are rallying in Minnesota tonight and now have the momentum to win the state. Warren faces a similar prospect in her homestate if Massachusetts. If she loses Mass. tomorrow and stays in, it becomes obvious she is playing spoiler. I think Warren has already done serious damage to her image as a progressive.

If building muscle and getting in shape is an expression of a healthy mind, body and spirit - that will be very attractive to a lot of women. Yet if an unhealthy guy gets muscular on steroids, it won't increase his attractiveness to a lot of women. Perhaps a bit at a surface level, yet he won't get too far.

Based on second choice polling, Biden and Sanders will get a 2-3% bump and the others will get a 1-2% bump. Yet importantly, for Super Tuesday this bump could help Biden reach the 15% threshold in several states. Candidates under the 15% threshold pretty much get shut out of delegates. Since Sanders is already above the 15% threshold in all the states, a 2-3% bump won't help him much. Yet a 2-3% bump would be enough to help Biden reach 15% and get him considerably more delegates.

It looks like Trump is starting to listen to the political establishment, rather than is own instincts. In the past, Trump has said Bernie would be his toughest opponent.

I should rephrase - all opinions are limited - yet some are more contracted than others. A US ambassador to China that speaks English and Chinese fluently, has 20 years experience living in China, has worked within the Chinese political, school, business systems, married a Chinese woman and has three children they are raising in China. . . will have a deeper understanding than China. Will his views on China be limited? If course. Yet they will be much deeper and expansive than an American high school student that had one class on China.

Again, this comes down to what are “qualifications” and who decides “qualifications”? Deciding what counts as a qualification is relative and needs to be discussed on a hiring committee. It’s not like there is some magical, objective list of 6 verified, objective qualifications that magically falls from the heavens. Rather, a hiring committee must decide the mission and direction of their institution before listing out qualifications. This needs to continually be updated as things evolve over time. At my institution, the qualifications for a TT position is different than it was in the 1960s. One of our newer missions is to promote underrepresented groups in STEM. To that end, we got millions in donations to promote this. Now, “qualifications” change. We’ve been recruiting underrepresented groups for students and faculty. This has changed the demographics and what counts as a “qualification”. For example, we now have a large number of students that come from poor inner-city neighborhoods. These students are undrr-prepared and many of them speak English as a second language. In our science department a *new* qualification is the ability to teach to under-prepared students - even basic things like writing proper English in science reports. This was not a “qualification” at my University in the 1960s because all the students came from affluent homes. During our last job search, one of the candidates was hispanic, spoke spanish, was a first generation immigrant, grew up in a poor hone, and has personal and professional ties to mexico and central america. Decades ago, these would not be assets for a TT science professor at my uni. It was a very different environment. There were only rich white kids. Yet environments change. We are now 38% under-represented students, many of which are minorities, first generation, ESL and poor. In this environment, these “non-science” assets of this candidate was very attractive. Noone in our department is hispanic, speaks spanish or has anything like his life history. He would be able to connect to many students like noone else i. our dept. can. Many of our inderrepresented students would see themself in this successful prof. That is a powerful dynamic. He could help our department regarding issues for disadvantaged students and how we can better help them. He could set collaborations in mexico and take students down there. . . . These were all assets we could call “qualifications” unique to individuals. As well, other candidates also had their own unique qualifications. In the end, we had “common qualifications” like a postdoc, research experience, publications and teaching experience. Yet we also had flexibility for unique characteristics that were assets to our uni - as described above.

It’s fine to have opinions on psychedelics, anyone can have an opinion. Yet some opinions are limited. For example, you could do psychedelics and realize “whoa!! My opinion was inaccurate!” Or perhaps you realize your opinion is somewhat inaccurate. Or perhaps it verifies your opinion is accurate. One would need to try psychedelics to find out. And perhaps if I were you for a day I would realize “whoa!! This mind has deep understanding of psychedelics without ever doing them!! Amazing!!”. Who knows? And each of us has limited understandings, since understanding is infinite. I have a limited understanding of what it’s like to live in China - I’ve never been there. I have a limited understanding of what scuba diving is like or what being in outer space is like. Ime, psychedelics are unlike what I could have imaged. Yet perhaps others of different imaginations and are like “yea, thats pretty much what I imagined it would be like”.

I mean equality of representation. For example in politics and hiring committees. I was on an all-male hiring committee. Guess which candidates had an advantage as being the “best person for the job?”. The male candidates of course. The men made lots of comments like “she is too motherly”, “she is too emotional”, “her skin is too thin” etc. Three men on the committee said one of the female finalists was unqualified and they didn’t even show up to her job presentation!! I’ve also been on a hiring committee that was half male and half female - that type of sexism didn't fly and there was a very different lens for who was “the best candidate” In some contexts the idea of “the best person should get the job” is highly biased toward men. Why should a committee of 10 men decide “who is best?”.

@Lento I didn’t intend to suggest psychedelics is the only path or the best path. For many, it may be counter-productive. And there are many many people that have gone to very deep and expansive areas without psychedelics. I spent 20 years on a spiritual path that was substance-free. There were a lot of benefits that I received.

As I wrote above, it depends on one’s orientation, self bias and agenda. A room full of men deciding the what the dysfunctions of those pesky feminists are will have male-biased orientation and agenda. A room of 50% female and 50% male advocates oriented toward gender equality is a very different dynamic. I have served on policy committees regarding equality policies at a large institution (including gender policies such as pay, promotions, sexual harassment etc.) . I’ve worked on committees that were about 90% male and committees about 50% male / 50% female. Both committees discussed dysfunctions at the institution, yet the dynamics were clearly completely different. The male-dominated committees were heavily skewed toward male-centric perspectives and solutions. There was only one woman who kept silent and went along with the male-dominated group. From a female perspective, it was a very intimidating environment. . . . I’m currently on a committee with equal representation of men, women and minorities that are advocates toward equal and fair workplace policies.. The dynamics are completely different. The men don’t dominate, talk over, correct and mansplain to the women. Everyone has a voice and we are able to reach consensus that is much more fair and equal than the male-dominated committee. The problem with male-dominated status quo environments is that equality appears as oppression.

I just did. JP calling out dysfunctions of LGBTQ is not beneficial to that group due to his agenda. Another example would be Bloomberg calling out dysfunctions of worker unions because he “genuinely cares” about workers and wants to help them. This is not beneficial due to structural power dynamics and his desire to maintain the status quo. As well, Bloomberg calling out dysfunctions of plutocracy and saying plutocrats will deal with it and hold themselves accountable benefits plutocrats since it serves to maintain the status quo. As an example, women are asking for equal representation in areas like corporate boards and politics in which major structural policies are decided. This seems reasonable to me and very healthy. Yet to men with a status quo mindset, equal representation looks like a power grab and unfair to men. Fir example, an advocate for equal equal gender representation may point out some things that are counter-productive toward this goal. We might help them with a more efficient path toward attaining equal representation. For example, perhaps we notice female candidates are putting 90% of their finances in TV ads. We may point out the importance of having a good ground presence. We could help them set up local offices, phonebanking and door-to-doir volunteers. This is a very different orientation than someone who wants to maintain the status wuo.

I just did. JP calling out dysfunctions of LGBTQ is not beneficial to that group due to his agenda. Another example would be Bloomberg calling out dysfunctions of worker unions because he “genuinely cares” about workers and wants to help them. This is not beneficial due to structural power dynamics and his desire to maintain the status quo. As well, Bloomberg calling out dysfunctions of plutocracy and saying plutocrats will deal with it and hold themselves accountable benefits plutocrats since it serves to maintain the status quo. A roomful of men deciding the dysfunctions of patriarchy and feminism - and what we should do about it - maintains the status quo.

It depends on one’s orientation and agenda. For example, Jordan Peterson calling out dysfunctions of LGBTQ is not beneficial due to his agenda. He is not an advocate for LGBTQ, he wants to maintain the status quo in this area.

Nope. Calling out dysfunction is not the point. It’s about structural power dynamics, who have voices at the table and who holds who accountable. Billionaires quieting dissent of society by saying “yes, there are dysfunctions of capitalism, yet we will hold ourselves accountable because we genuinely care about everyone in society” - serves to maintain the status quo. And it works to some extent.

Sneaky fox ?

Another approach would be to ask “what is not included in infinity?”

@JonasVE12 At the personal level, don’t have a problem with people using substances recreationally, to feel good or to take away pain. If an addiction starts to cause them personal suffering then I would feel empathy for them - since I have gone through that. My concerns are mostly at the social level. Addiction/dependence can cause harm in the social level with things like hospitalization, treatments and loss of potential. And with psychedelics, it only takes a few newbies overdosing at a concert, freaking out, making the news to reenforce a negative stigma of psychedelics.

@Mu_ I’ve been pretty sloppy with terms today. My mind is like soup. What you wrote reminds me od Sam Harris’ line of thinking that “I am not the author of my thoughts”. After watching this video, I started looking for the author of my thoughts and couldn’t find it. This helped reveal the fallacy of free will. For me, it was like thoughts were appearing from some mysterious place. What you are proposing would be even more tangible to a materialist: if thoughts/awareness is simply physical molecules in the brain, then “you” are simply neurons and neurotransmitters. I think most materialists would be ok with this in theory, until they realized what this means for “me” on an existential level - that “I” don’t have free will. Then perhaps open them up for some existential inquiry like “who am I?”. I hadn’t thought about that as an approach. One could call a materialist on their bluff “Yep, consciousness is simply neuronal activity in the brain. “You” are just a bunch of neurotransmitters bouncing around. There is noone in control of thoughts and actions.” I think many materialists would pause and think “Wait a minute. . . That would mean. . . “