Wednesday, September 19, 2012

How the Hatred of Math Explains Everything About Politics

Good news everyone!













I've discovered the single variable the explains everything about politics, especially in this upcoming election - math.

Oh laugh if you will, but just as you can boil down economics to producers and parasites, you can boil all of politics down to math.

Allow me to explain.

Math does two things.

1.  It explains the motives and incentives of most two party systems (even the European ones where there's about 300 different parties, but still aligned on producer and parasite ideologies) and

2.  it explains the entire psychology of people who subscribe to the parasite ideology. 

First, if you look at every "two party system" (and I do include those European parliaments with 300 different parties) in general it boils down to one party trying to be mature and realistic, and another party being infantile and living in Lala Land.  One trying to dispense tough, fatherly love, and another trying to woo the children with motherly-cake-bribing love.  Understand the Lala Land party does not do so because it wishes to be infantile or doesn't know what the reality is, but because it wishes to be in power.  This necessitates the Lala Land party not only ignore reality, but spend the vast majority of its efforts in spinning events and numbers, securing and brainwashing future voters with their propaganda, concocting "crises" where there are none (but only the have the solution), and creating outright lies and falsehoods about the reality-based party in an attempt to villainize them.  They have to outdo reality and so resort to (sometimes) the most outlandish tactics (the global warming scam and "Romney killed my wife" etc.)

This results in what I like to call "The Cake and Broccoli Parties."  One party is inevitably the fatherly party pooper, telling his kids things that are FACTUAL, but kids don't like to hear.   "No, you can't sit on your ass, you need to work.  No we don't have enough money for that.  No, we aren't buying that.  No you can't have candy, you need to drink your milk and eat your broccoli."  The other party gets to be the divorce-seeking mother who vies for the favor of her children, with the added benefit of using the father's money to finance her bribery.  "Yes, you can have a Coke with your ice cream.  No you don't need to do your chores.  No you don't have to work.  No you don't have to work out.  Yes, you should have free food. Yes, you should have free health care.  Here, have some more cake, just remember you love mom and your dad hates you and he beats me and he killed my wife."

But, again, here is where math comes in and explains in large part the actions and words of the typical parasite party.

In the long run the decisions, promises and policies pursued by the left are not sustainable and inevitably do fail.  The kid will get cavities just as the economy will scare away investors and businesses.  This will not just manifest itself in people's personal lives, but numbers (with any modicum of honesty used when calculating them) will start to show it.  Unemployment, GDP growth, income, wages, deficits, etc. etc.  As this reality comes crushing down on the parasite party, it's main job is to explain it away and spin reality.  And not just do that, blame the problems on the producer/reality party, or just go for the good ole fashioned "class envy/warfare."  Their arguments to anybody with half a brain say nothing, avoid reality, and do not have numbers or any tangible plans (this is why Romney had a five point plan in his speech at the RNC while Obama just blathered on the same vomitous pablum he did 4 years ago, oh, and Romney killed some guy's wife). But again, this is not because they're stupid.  It's because they're hoping you are and you will swallow such puke and vote for them.

Regardless, what you will note is the stark absence of math (or at least non-manipulated statistics) coming out of the parasite party.  It's always going to be amorphous references to the future, attacks and villainizing the producer/father party, citings of fabricated "injustices," and again, crises made of whole cloth (the solutions of which magically always involve more taxation, other people's money and less freedom).  The father/reality party (if it was intellectually honest this entire time) has an easy job - just cite math, statistics and reality and IN THE LONG RUN you should be able to win most elections (that is assuming you even kick the left out of education and shut down their voter-farms).

While this explains most political parties' behaviors, it does not explain how such parasite parties can get such a foothold with the voting public.  Oh sure, they might have some success, and yes, with the introduction of new (and idiotic) voters from their voter mills (public schools), in the short run they might have a go at it.  But inevitably these people must wake up, grow up and realize the lies they're being told, right?

Right?

Well, there's just one problem.

Humans hate math.

It is not so much that humans hate math (some humans like math), but that humans are innately and inherently lazy.  They prefer something for nothing.  And since math takes effort I contend you can explain the entirety of human nature and tyranny based on people who do and do not like math or at least those willing to put forth the effort to learn math and those that avoid it.

Oh laugh if you will.  But allow me to point out a couple instances of people who don't like math.

Bankers - bankers are basically jocks who didn't make it to professional sports, but still wanted to make a ton of money.  Of course, they could become engineers or doctors, but that would take too much math and effort.  No, they will instead take some modicum of math via finance or accounting, and maybe not even that.  They will then claim, "I'm a big picture sort of guy" talk about "networking" and then "just get the deal done."  They will also every 25 years of so require the taxpayer bail them out and every 50 years throw economies into deep recessions.  Some will run for office.

Lawyers - see "bankers" but their origins are liberal arts grads who (obviously) didn't like math.  They still want to make money, but enter a field even less-profit-promising than bankers.  After 5 years in undergrad and 3 years in law school, do you think they're NOT going to make it pay off?  Get ready for concocted law suits that drive up the prices for everybody else.  Oh, and guess who runs for public office more than any one else?

Liberal arts students - "I'm going to follow my heart and you're all going to pay me."  Translation - "I hate math and I want other people to do math to produce the latest Apple Product while I play "Overpaid Government Baby Sitter" on the money you pay in taxes.  Thanks for majoring in engineering you sucker."

Fat Acceptance - "I don't care what the scale says.  Big is beautiful and you're shallow for not finding me attractive."  This also has the variance of "I'm on a diet, I lost 2 pounds in the past 3 months."

Joseph Stalin - "Make the exchange rate 14 rubles per US dollar." (that one you'll all have to look up ;)

People Who Don't Know the Difference between Millions, Billions and Trillions - This is a particular pet peeve of mine because I do believe if younger folk (heck, older folk) KNEW the difference between a million, a billion and a trillion, then they might realize just how screwed our finances are in this country.  However, all they hear is "illion" and think, "that's a lot of money.  Well at least the GLEOC will take care of it.  Oooo!  Look, the Packers are playing Tennessee!"

Communist Dictators - do you think any of them give a damn about unemployment, GDP or economic growth or are more concerned with oppressing and keeping their citizens in the dark.  Yeah, I'm sure North Korea has the FRED database its people can look stuff up on.

Too Lazy to Look It Up - You know how your mom would say, "look it up?"  That would mean you'd have to go to the library, use the archaic Dewey decimal system, pour through a book or micro-fiche and find it after 2 hours of searching.  I could see where that would breed a distaste for looking things up.  Today kids (and adults) have the internet and it's at their fingertips. But they're still too lazy to look up basic data and statistics (my favorite is "corporate welfare" - no liberal has yet been able to cite a figure for me as to how much that is).  What kind of person is so lazy they can't look it up on the internet?  This one particularly irks me because it shows you just how truly lazy and fearing of math they are.  It also angers me because the internet should have destroyed the left everywhere.   Just shows you what a good job they did brainwashing the dolts.

Now, I could go on and on, but you get the point.  People who not just abhor math, but purposely choose to ignore it out of ignorance, laziness, or a psychotic loyalty to their ideology are not the type who are going to go out and produce the next cancer vaccine or hover cars.  Additionally, they provide more than enough fuel to keep parasite parties in power not only because the party will provide them with the socialist spoils of wealth-redistribution, but because they like being lied to.  Their egos remain intact.  You aren't poor because you had 15 kids and couldn't do basic math.  Now you're poor because "the system failed you man!"  You aren't unemployed because your chose the world's most stupid major.  No, Romney killed your wife...no...err...wait, Romney is oppressing you.  The ignorant spoiled brats of society get what they want, and a political party gets re-elected.

There is one problem though in ignoring math and reality.  And that is math and reality always win in the end.

Sure, you can eat cake instead of broccoli all day, but soon you'll be fat, have cavities and a host of other health problems.

Sure, you can yell and scream at men for being shallow and not being attracted to fat girls.  But in the end you'll still be single, your sex life will suck and you will also have a host of health problems.

And yes, you can take your right to vote and vote in a party that ignores math, tells you what you want to hear and can keep the racket up for a generation or two until the money runs out.  But in the end the economy will be destroyed, you won't have a future, and neither will your kids.

It is here that every human must ask him/herself a simple question - am I going to grow up and become an adult or not?

It's not a tricky question.  It's not a bold question. It's not a challenging question.  It's a question every human has had to face in the history of humans.

Do you grow up or not?

Because if you do, and everybody starts adhering to economic reality, then we can get this country (and all other countries today and into the future) growing and excelling again.  If you don't, well then have fun jumping off the cliff thinking gravity isn't real and that "stupid" math of 9.8 m/s squared doesn't apply to you.

Just let me know in advance so I can set up my lawn chair, light up a cigar and pour myself a Rumpie.

10 comments:

Tim said...

I've been wondering if a good and simple way to describe why I'm to the right politically is to say: "I'm on the right because I understand that things like laws have unintended consequences."

Jane the Grad Student said...

Dear Cap,

Regarding your comment on liberals who hate math, apparently it's not all of them. There is a pie chart going around which claims Romney's infamous "47%" is really more like 6% when you take out the elderly and those who pay payroll vs "income" taxes. Link is at the bottom if you want to check it out.

Although no liberal has been able to give you a number for corporate welfare, conservative commentator (Mr.) Stacy Swimp defines it as as "Any government spending program that provides unique benefits or advantages to specific companies or industries. That includes programs that provide direct grants to businesses, programs that provide research and other services for industries, and programs that provide subsidized loans or insurance to companies," and gives the figure at "over 100 billion dollars" for the 2012 fiscal year. This info from his FB page; I was not able to find it on his blog (no search box, and not unlimited time to scroll thru before posting).

I get a LOT of liberal postings from my liberal friends; I come here to get the other side of the story, so I am hoping you have some commentary, particularly on that pie chart. Thanks in advance.

Pie chart: http://www.upworthy.com/pie-charts-does-half-the-country-really-not-pay-any-taxes?c=bl3

Koop said...

Excellent summation.

Additionally, I caught a Mark Steyn interview taken one year after release of his "After America" book.

His premise? We've already fallen, we just don't fully realize it yet.

Captain Capitalism said...

Hi Jane,

The issue is one of production or work. It is somewhat misleading to say "only half of American pay taxes" without qualifying it is income taxes they're talking about. As the author of the pie chart link points out, there's a ton of taxes. Everybody pays taxes (sales taxes for example, the poorest of the poor pay that). The issue is whether people are working, earning a taxable income (versus say, old people collecting social security). So the 46% is correct in terms of working people and income taxes, but not all taxes.

This is nothing more than a case of politics and semantics, where actually both sides do have valid points.

A better ratio or number to look at would be the dependency ratio, labor force participation, or something the tells how well people in general are doing in terms of employment and are producing/participating, versus just sitting on their asses. Food stamp rate would be another one. All are going to point to Obama failing miserably and give your liberal buddies another thing to create a debunking of.

Cpt.

Unknown said...

I had a terrible math teacher in the eighth grade who was nothing but arrogant, pregnant and not helpful at all to anyone in her class and relied on computer games in the latter part of the year to "teach" her students. Before that, I had done completely fine in math and afterwards, I continued to make high Bs in my math classes but that experience sometimes still comes back to haunt me, but I'm not using that as an excuse not to learn calculus. I believe that if I find the right self-help book (Calculus Made Easy for example) and treat math as something that I can master overtime with repeated practice and criticism that I can overcome the crappy education I had in the public school setting.

Even though I've always been a talented artist, I was a lousy, amateurish cartoonist years ago but I bought Preston Blair's Animation 1 book and it took years of self study, copying the drawings from that book and studying classic cartoons and comics (Looney Tunes, Fleischer, Disney, etc) and critiquing myself constantly but the work paid off when I got a ton of professional advice in 2010 and 2011. I've never had any formal training for what I do and have learned far more on my own than any art class I've ever taken in high school. Nowadays you have all these Cal Arts graduates in the animation industry that are spending a fortune on their "education" and end up drawing just as badly as before they enrolled in the school. That's part of the reason why you have so many bad, flat style cartoons on television now which are a huge ripoff of the kinds of animation that existed in the 1950s (UPA for example) except without the solid draftsmanship. It's the era of amateurism and lack of skill everywhere and everyone wants to have it easy with no incentive to bring any productive skill to the table.

I've learned way more about politics and economics from this blog and others than any class I took in high school. My AP Government teacher would have never been able to tie math into his lessons about politics probably because he was a political science major at one point and wanted to go to law school.

Anonymous said...

Don't both republicans and democrats ignore math in their own special ways in the USA? The whole same shit, different colors slag.

Lib Arts Major Making $31k/yr at an Office Job said...

But a Professor writing for the NYT told me that I didn't need to learn algebra:

http://www.nytimes.com/2012/07/29/opinion/sunday/is-algebra-necessary.html?pagewanted=all&_moc.semityn.www

English became and is still the lingua franca. Math has been and always will be the language of science.

Ultimately it's a point on pragmatism, and the US hasn't been known for pragmatism since WW II or maybe the Moon Landing. What was pragmatism in the workplace replaced by?

A dollar if you guessed it: Credentials.

BAJ said...

The Federal Reserve denies reality continually by poofing new debt-based money out of nothing. And since they never create enough money to pay the interest on the debt, the debt is constantly increasing. Of course, if you deny the Fed's version of reality and try to use something that is real instead of their version of money, they will send uniformed guardians of the faith to convert you to their way of thinking. (Like they did to Bernard Von NotHaus.)

Karek said...

The "illions" thing drives me nuts too. I tend to explain using the following. Imagine you're counting one number per second. You count to 60 in a minute, and 3600 in an hour hour. Most people get this far. But then exaplin that you'll count to 86,400 in a day. So to count to a million will take about 12 days. But to count to a billion will take you 32 years. That seems to at least get them thinking along the right lines.

Anonymous said...

Indeed both parties ignore math. The Democrats obviously do, but so do the Republicans while hiding behind rhetoric of being fiscally responsible. All one has to do is review their spending:

http://reason.com/blog/2012/09/13/terrifying-real-per-capita-federal-spend