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Edited by Mrph1 on Nov 30th 2023 at 11:03:59 AM
Carson may or may not be crazy, but he's certainly not stupid. He's a neurosurgeon.
Though, from what I've read, a lot of politicians are actually pretty smart.
Leviticus 19:34The thing is that Carson is a different kind of crazy than several of the other major Tea Party lunatics. Because they tend to be somewhat consistent. Ted Cruz repeatedly tries the exact same tactics over and over, for example.
Carson, on the other hand, doesn't have any sort of coherent plan or position. He even flip-flops on whether or not slavery was bad. Some gibberish about it leaving an "essential dignity" to the slaves.
Well, actually, whatever, I'mma call him stupid too.
Look, stupid isn't about whether or not you can get through medical school without cheating.
(Did Carson cheet on his exams? I don't know. I'm just asking questions here-Trump's new line of questioning? I dunno, I'm just asking questions here)
It's about whether or not you're capable of acknowledging batshit insanery for what it is. It's about having simple logical processes as part of your mode of thinking. Carson doesn't have that. I don't care if he has an internalized mental database of 92561626 different epidemelogical phenomena specializing in neuroscience. That's not what makes a person not-stupid.
"Stupid is as Stupid Does."
-Abraham Lincoln.
edited 29th Oct '15 8:52:33 PM by TheyCallMeTomu
Well, the thing is you can be very very smart in one area while being extremely lacking in knowledge or understanding in another area. Carson was probably a very competent neurosurgeon while he was doing that, but as a politician I find he's lacking in both understanding and perspective. He's also quite certainly pounding pretty much the same policies on taxation and healthcare as the rest of the Republicans. It's sad because as a medical professional I'd think he'd have some experience with how terribly the health care system is quite often.
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Which is a very odd thing to say about slavery seeing as he's black and no doubt has had to deal with the problems that seems to come with. Eeesh.
edited 29th Oct '15 8:54:57 PM by AceofSpades
Sanders was an unknown to a lot of POC and other folks outside of his home turf. This campaign has gotten his name out there, made it ring out. Next time, he'll have the cred needed to win. Assuming Hillary isn't going for another turn.
But, seriously, don't believe foregone conclusions or polls; they have a history of being dead wrong.
Darkness cannot drive out darkness; only light can do that. Hate cannot drive out hate; only love can do that.The political process in the US and in many other places is very good at causing intelligent and industrious people to engage in unwise and intellectually counter-productive activities. I'm not excusing Carson, a pediatric neurosurgeon, or Cruz, a Harvard graduate. What I am saying is that the desire to take leadership positions in public office has a way of eroding one's critical thinking skills or giving one a false sense of wisdom.
Put more briefly, there's a big difference between being well-educated and being wise. I can totally see a neurosurgeon sounding and acting completely inane, and it's shouldn't be surprising at all if you think about how certain psychological processes (i.e. logical fallacies and cognitive fallacies) work. Additionally, there's sometimes a difference between being smart and being well-trained, and guys like Carson can probably operate on your brain stem pretty easily if nothing else because it's just rote memorization and not so much non-linear, adaptive thinking. Neurosurgery is hard. So is collecting trash every morning.
We also happen to live in a society where success is presumed to automatically correlate with intelligence. I don't think I need to explain the problem with this reasoning.
edited 29th Oct '15 10:39:57 PM by Aprilla
I don't mind if Hillary or Bernie win, but please don't let the Republicans win.
Unfortunately, oddschecker currently has Trump over Sanders so I would prefer Clinton get the nominee cause she's a (vastly) safer bet against Trump.
Atm, it's:
Clinton
Rubio
Trump
Sanders
(wtf happened to Bush)
Plants are aliens, and fungi are nanomachines.edited 29th Oct '15 11:07:44 PM by PotatoesRock
x4 I think at least a couple of things happened to Bush. The moderates abandoned him after the incident in May when a college student publicly accused his brother (and him, by extension) of the creation of ISIS. He has been on the defensive on this front ever since, using special pleading to excuse his brother in apparent filial piety whenever asked some variation of "would you pursue a similar foreign policy as your brother?"
An Atlantic article on that: http://tinyurl.com/o76c2e8
The other is what PotatoesRock noted.
edited 29th Oct '15 11:48:13 PM by Artificius
"I have no fear, for fear is the little death that kills me over and over. Without fear, I die but once."Jeb! has hitched his wagon to his brother, and even in their most self-deluded moments, Republicans have a hard time thinking of George W. Bush's presidency with happiness.
"It's Occam's Shuriken! If the answer is elusive, never rule out ninjas!"I think it's much simpler. Jeb! either simply doesn't want it, or he really is this bad at campaigning.
One alleged "insider" said of Jeb! that he takes a while to get into the swing of things. He lost his first bid for governor, and learned his mistakes.
So he could pull a Romney and come back swinging in 2020. If he isn't too old by then.
Or it could be that the Bush family has no business running a country and is in politics as a social status symbol to reinforce their wealth and business influence. All three members that we've seen so far have been ineffective, stupid, corrupt, or a combination of the three.
edited 30th Oct '15 6:27:12 AM by Fighteer
"It's Occam's Shuriken! If the answer is elusive, never rule out ninjas!"Euo, myself and Aprilla have mentioned it already and I will do it again
Carson being a Neurosurgeon is absolutely no qualification that makes you capable of economical, societal and political success. Would you go to a PhD in Arts for an open heart surgery?
The guy can chop up kid's brains real good (I would dare to say his line of work is particularly less risky than others, with the exceedingly high level of neuroplasticity in children's brains. But that is off topic) and you know what, good for him. But that does not mean he is a succesful economist.
It has always been the prerogative of children and half-wits to point out that the emperor has no clothes

All these Carson is an idiot jokes never really sat well with me.
The dude is ridiculously smart. He's an example of how toxic the culture is here in America.
Oh really when?