flamble

If you use vocab flashcards that contain an example sentence or two showing usage in context, then it is more efficient than reading a book (with regard to the language rather than the book's actual content). Personally, I read books and when I encounter an unfamiliar word, I add it to the flashcard pile, ensuring that I don't forget the new knowledge.

If you're trying to learn the content of the book, the process of converting the information into flashcards entails engaging with the material, so that isn't skipped.

> at least it would prove to work here- it's not like the US is in the exact same position as the EU

The EU and Japan, South Korea, Hong Kong, Bahrain, Brunei, Australia, and New Zealand. It works all over the world. Research on the US system accords with the overwhelming evidence from all around: it would work.

> eg, I'm not sure how they're connected ... medical research

Let's clarify. The repugnant gouging in the cost of hospital care, doctor's visits etc redounds mostly to the profit of private insurance who provide no social value in return. The exorbitant cost of medicine does indeed flow to pharmaceutical companies, but the particulars of how they would be affected depend on the details of how universal health care was implemented.

> complaints that our health care is 'too expensive' never seem to take into account that our (expensive) health care is the best in the world

I have no idea where you got that notion; the US is generally not ranked in the top 20.

https://www.who.int/healthinfo/paper30.pdf

https://healthcarechannel.co/how-australian-healthcare-ranks...

There is nothing "underhanded" about it, and it's nowhere near being "experimental": almost every country in the developed world has universal healthcare and the overwhelming preponderance of evidence demonstrates its superiority in every criterion.

If you think that the debate over healthcare has anything to do with the substantive merits of one system over another, you're viewing it through the wrong lens. It is purely a power struggle between a class of potentates who have become obscenely wealthy from selling insurance, and the vast majority of the public in whose interest universal healthcare is.

Medicare for All being a success in one state would change little by just adding more evidence to the existing mountain because, again, it is not a struggle between differing points of view, but between monied interests and the masses. The colossal propaganda apparatus wielded by corporate interests would continue to wage relentless war against any expansion of such programs.

The section of the rank and file that sabotaged him did so because they are possessed by a vile ideology that virulently opposes any concession by the powerful to the mass of the people. Being unable to befriend any of that metastatic species redounds greatly to Mr Corbyn's credit. They are not "good people".

Now Starmer may not be ideologically committed to the ruthless exploitation of the public like they are, but at the very least he harbours delusions about the possibility of compromising with a right wing, both within his party and in the media, that is implacably and rabidly opposed to any project of positive reform. They will never relent in their shameless calumny and perfidy until Labour's program has been completely neutered.

The reason for that is that Starmer is a corporate stooge who doesn't present any threat to the merciless extraction of value from the working class. Of course they have no objection to the kind of competition which would have no adverse effect on their interests if it prevailed; their praise is evidence of Starner's complete lack of merit.

The media besmirched Corbyn BECAUSE he was a decent man with the interests of the public at heart, which is unacceptable to the owners of the media apparatus.

I love the idea of benefits conceived of as a landscape. You have the slough of despond, the scorched desert, the arctic wasteland, the jagged windswept hellscape, etc.

As someone whose introduction to economics was Basic Economics, I don't think the statement reflects poorly on either the book or academia.

The book is a pithy, digestible introduction to a bunch of basic topics in economics. It is also lacking a lot of the detail and mathematical explanation of introductory university courses.

For example, I understood the basic concept of comparative advantage after listening to the book, but when I later revisited the topic using a textbook, the graphs and worked examples gave me a clearer picture and it was better related to adjacent concepts like marginal cost, the production-possibility frontier, etc.

I don't have the impression that academic economics as presented to undergraduates diverges greatly from the book, although it has been years since I heard it and my recollection is fuzzy.

> See Voat.

The retreat to Voat was highly detrimental to the fascists because it massively hindered recruitment, the most effective form of which was to have moderator control of large subreddits not explicitly about politics, but saturated with far-right memes / "ironic" jokes, to slowly normalise and inculcate those ideas in people who are originally just there out of interest in some hobby. In contrast, very few people go to Voat who aren't already true believers. It's a much greater leap than from one subreddit to another.

> learning to accept that other people disagree with you and have contrary opinions is a much more robust solution

If there are people who believe in a Jewish conspiracy to destroy the white race through miscegenation, and they advocate for violent resistance in response, then "learning to accept" that is not in any way a solution.

> Inoculating the population to fascist rhetoric by publicly winning the debate against it with reasoned argument

Two points: (a) the overwhelming majority of political content consists of arguments presented without rebuttal. In the case of far-right content, it almost entirely consists of arguments against straw men, citing pseudoscience, deceitful abuse of statistics, and grandiose appeals to emotion. You can consume countless hours of content without actually encountering a genuine debate.

(b) Have you ever watched a debate between a fascist and a non-fascist? Even in response to comprehensive dismantling of their ideas, fascists remain completely insensible to facts (they can always fall back on "fake Jewish science") or reason. Some small fraction of viewers may be convinced by the debates, but the mere fact of something having been cogently debunked does very little overall.

> I actually find the notion of "patriarchy" incredibly sexist -- were not men the canaries in the coalmine -- the original victims -- for the dehumanization of capitalism?

"Patriarchy" is intertwined with the means of production but is also distinct therefrom. Women in Victorian England were not fully legally recognized as persons and did not have the same property rights as their husbands, and this is in a period during which capitalism obtained in England. This arrangement with men as the "patriarch" of the household, exercising control over subaltern women, predates capitalism by millenia (c.f. Roman "pater familias").

This "patriarchy" doesn't only consist of formal law, but may exist in tradition and social mores. For example adultery may be technically equally penalized for men and women but carry a vastly greater stigma and punishment in practice for women, as in feudal China. As another example, women may technically have recourse to the law if they are subjected to domestic violence but be prevented from doing this by the fear of social opprobrium and further mistreatment by family and community, as was again the case in Victorian England. "Patriarchy" doesn't refer to any concerted effort or plot, but is a description of the outcome of social institutions and cultural attitudes which, AS A SYSTEM, disadvantage women.

> capitalism ... should be understood as an abstract, inhuman force

Capitalism, and patriarchy, are BOTH generally understood as being systemic: i.e. properties of human institutions. The concepts DO NOT inherently place blame on individuals, or even make judgments about the morality of the system.

Whether or not our society exhibits patriarchy is an empirical question, to be answered with reference to data. Arising from but separate from this, there is the ethical question of value-judgment about the society. But there is absolutely no basis to call the notion of patriarchy "sexist".

Even that would be unfeasible. To report on most significant events, even for a simple factual description of what happened, you have to decide which of a variety of contradictory sources is correct, which is one kind of bias, or list all of the incompatible accounts, according equal credence to each, which is another kind of bias, even when the number of competing versions is manageable.

In practice, journalists have to make judgments about what is likely to be true or relevant, and historically have been egregiously wrong about that in highly predictable ways.

This is a fascinating glimpse into far-right ideology, and I'm really curious about this idea that welfare expense increases in proportion to ethnic heterogeneity. Where does it come from, or rather, how do people try to justify it?

It's a reference to Alexander and the Terrible, Horrible, No Good, Very Bad Day.

I find the effort to make something innocuous into a confirmation of personal prejudices cute.

In both cases, you very clearly have some responsibility. In an incredibly straightforward and unambiguous way.

I'm struggling to see how this is intended as a counterexample. Is it because disapproving of homosexuality is wrong? That doesn't at all change the entailment of responsibility by the conjunction of foreknowledge of consequences with uncoerced action.

If you walk out into a public street and fire a pistol around you randomly, you are clearly responsible for any death or injuries thereby caused (given that you were aware of the likely outcomes), even if it is through negligence or indifference rather than deliberate intent.

No reasonable conception of ethics is anything but consequentialist. Do you intend the word as a criticism? Do you have some alternate, deontological, view?