Learning How to Be A Racist (Again)

There have been instances during the current Presidency, that I've proverbially bitten my tongue.

When a person hears and sees a man speak, or reads his written words, that person has the obligation to derive certain parsings.

"Is it true?"
"Is it honest?"
"Does it attempt to conceal the truth?"

There is a difference between truth and honesty. And I think it's worthwhile taking a moment and asking yourself, "is what you enunciate as your opinion both true and honest?" You can hold an opinion as both true and honest, but that isn't a necessary condition for both cases in fact.

It may seem sufficient for you to hold views that are both opinion and fact that are true, but what happens when your opinions are false? You truthfully hold your opinion. To you, that may elevate your opinion to fact, but it doesn't. Your opinions are simply, your opinions. Facts are tricky things. Things that may be facts, in your opinion, may fail disastrously in the world of critical thinking. Think of it this way, if A is equal to 440, then any other note cannot be A. 2 + 2 = 4. No other possibility exists. There are certain conditions, held a priori, that define conditions that are both necessary and sufficient. No other outcome is possible. This thing, this fact, cannot be any thing other, than what it is. Whether you view perception as a critical position, or the the process of deduction as a critical position, if what you both view and what you perceive intellectually a priori match, there's a good chance that you've divined something that is both objectively true, and subjectively true.

It is necessary that when you add 2 + 2 = 4, that 2 + 2 is in fact, 4. When you deal with non-rational numbers, it can be posited that the result is four, when in fact, it is some number other than four. It is sufficient that the number reported is "4", when the actual result is a non-rational number that approaches four, but cannot logically, nor mathematically, ever be four. This, in the math world, is "close enough for government work." And limit theory is a well advanced science. The limit is a demonstrable fact. We can know what a number will never be.

Learning how to discern between opinion and fact isn't easy. Why is it that 2 + 2 is always equal to 4? Before we begin to examine why, what is it we know about numbers? For one thing, a number is a purely intellectual construct. There isn't a street we walk down with numbers sharing the sidewalk with us. Maybe we'd all be better mathematicians if we lived in a world like this; sharing sidewalks and shopping carts with us. We'd get to know numbers for what they are; counting positions. One, as discreet from other whole numbers, such as, two.

Our three questions are:

"Is it true?"
"Is it honest?"
"Does it attempt to conceal the truth?"

Is One discreetly different from Two?

Yes.
Yes.
No.

There is no other case when this condition, "Is one different from two?" is falsified. It is an accurate statement of the conditions observed, and that the description fails to conceal the nature of the object being observed is true both a priori and a posteriori.(Yes, it's true, I've introduced a subjunctive case. Whatever you do, please don't Wiki.)

"Is it true?"
"Is it honest?"
"Does it attempt to conceal the truth?"

In my world, people are people.

Whether yellow, black or white. Red, young or old. Bald or hirsute. Fat kids, skinny kids, kids who climb on rocks, tough kids, sissy kids, even kids with chicken pox.

(This is, by the way, my objection to abortion. When you kill any unborn child, you may be killing the next great American. Any unborn child. YB or W.)

Why must a government take care of its citizens?


"Is it true?"
"Is it honest?"
"Does it attempt to conceal the truth?"

Huh?

Reparations for citizens. If you can't take care of yourself, then, the role of government is to take care of you, for you.

Why must a government take care of its citizens? This is an incredible shift in governance for Americans. Not for Europeans, whose governments we abandoned when we left the Old World. The New World was founded on beliefs held a priori, that all men are created equally, and endowed by their Creator with certain inalienable rights. That there are places where a government cannot intrude. Not that they could lack the force to intrude, any state with police powers has the force, either sufficient or necessary, to intrude at will. In terms of sheer force, it has to be admitted that the United States is without peer when it comes to either sufficient or necessary force. (For the moment.)

Why must a government take care of its citizens? In the United States, and the Thirteen Colonies that preceded the Articles of Confederation and our current Constitution, there were the conditions that were necessary and sufficient to observe that governments that allowed persons the freedom to choose their own beliefs, investments, employment and choices, that this system of limited governance would allow free men to choose their own ways for living their lives. Freedom was the essential God given right that made all men equal.

Outcomes?

Coldly, outcomes were dependent upon the individual. The benefit? That any man could achieve status, wealth and success dependent solely upon his own merit. No license, no benefit from any government to achieve wealth or success dependent upon the power of the State to confer benefit to any individual, company or enterprise. His life, and his choices, were the only determinants of his success.

Problem is, in the Ten Commandments. I call it "Number Ten."

"You shall not covet your neighbor’s house; you shall not covet your neighbor’s wife, nor his manservant, nor his maidservant, nor his ox, nor his donkey, nor anything that is your neighbor’s.”

Simple rule. If it isn't yours, it isn't yours. Get over it.

As far as I can see, disregard for this simple rule has cause the world more grief than any other thing. Not murder, not adultery, not theft. Maybe false witness. And God has time to wait for you to give up worshiping false idols. All the time in the world.

But coveting has a certain pretense. Looking for that which doesn't add up. When 2 + 2 doesn't seem to add up to four. The guy down the street has stuff I don't have. There's a guy at work that took the weekend off with his family and went camping in the desert. The boss has a better car than me, but I work more hours than him.



There's always a reason why we can't advance...why "I" can't advance. I have advantages in terms of who I am, and what I'm capable of doing, yet, I can't seem to gain the kind of success that I see in others. It isn't fair.

This is a chart from the FBI.

Point is, we tend to covet that which we see, not that which we don't see.

"Is it true?"
"Is it honest?"
"Does it attempt to conceal the truth?"

Is it true?  Take any idea being advanced in the media, the current debate, and ask yourself, is it true? Is so-and-so a white Hispanic? Do Republicans hate the poor? Is Congress failing to act? Is Obama concerned about the middle class?

Is it honest? When I found out, tonight, that NBC news edited the 911 call from the guy in Florida, well, shit.

“'This guy looks like he’s up to no good … he looks black,' Zimmerman told a police dispatcher.'" (Here.)



I've done some searching, well, quite a bit, and it seems the offending audio or video isn't available on the interwebs. But here's the deal; what NBC news did tonight is clearly an offense against the range of values that can be used to accommodate the variations between truth, honesty and deliberate misdirection. It was a conscious decision to mislead.

You can listen to the unedited call here.

"He looks black."

Why was this statement uttered?

Zimmerman is a "white Hispanic." NBC reported that Zimmerman said "He looks black." As if he were racist (?).

A white Hispanic. A dead black kid.

The economy is going south, our reputation in the world community is in the toilet, the shooter is a Democrat and we're being lectured on  race from the White House.

"Is it true?"
"Is it honest?"
"Does it attempt to conceal the truth?"