This is one of the articles that is being referenced - from 1971 (sorry it’s a jpg):
Astounding as it is, it seems Tim O’Brien might turn out to be being a little bit disingenuous.
Here’s a link to his cancer article which attempts to link a persons emotional state to their vulnerability to disease (from 1969). It doesn’t seem to say that too many orgasms cause cancer (almost the opposite), but does quote studies that suggest sexual repression might leave one more at risk. His more general assertion seems to have been that human misery and repression might compound and cause physical illness. He then criticises society for only concentrating on physical outcomes and not psychological priors.
Can’t find a direct link to the naked kids stuff, but here’s the paragraph it’s from (also from 1969):
"In Vermont, at a state beach, a mother is reprimanded by Authority for allowing her 6 month old daughter to go about without her diapers on. Now, if children go around naked, they are liable to see each others sexual organs, and maybe even touch them. Terrible thing! If we [raise] children up like this it will probably ruin the whole pornography business, not to mention the large segment of the general economy which makes its money by playing on peoples sexual frustrations.”
It’s interesting to think Bernie is actually exactly 1 month older than Jesse Jackson, and many of Bernie’s policies are the same policies Jackson was running on in 1988.
A thing I’ve noticed about Bernie Sanders in his speeches and debates is that he mentions the plight of the Palestinians. Like, he does this a lot, and it’s always unprompted --no moderator is ever going to mention the Palestinian people. Even tonight when the candidates were asked a question about the location of the US embassy in Israel, I’d bet real money Sanders was the only person in the room to specifically use the word Palestinian/Palestine.
I think that speaks a lot to why people find Bernie authentic. You can’t call this pandering; there aren’t a whole lot of Palestinian-American voters out there to get. I don’t know how much Somali-American Muslims in Minnesota are invested in this issue. These aren’t critical voting blocs Bernie is pandering to. If I’m a paid campaign consultant, I tell my guy to just toe the line and talk about how we wanna work with our good ally Israel and recite whatever talking points Bloomberg or Biden said about relocating the Israeli embassy.
The impression I’m left with is that Bernie Sanders genuinely feels that the Palestinian people are getting dicked over and they should have an advocate. It’s a brand of authenticity you simply can’t buy. If I’m a working class schlub in Michigan, I just see that kind of solidarity with the little guy and it means something. I personally don’t follow what’s going on in the region very much, but I see Sanders going hard in the paint for these people and it’s hard not to respect that.
I think Bloomberg’s exact point was “slight panic, arab names, arab countries, awkwardly pronounce something muslim, try to remember what settlements are called, do not succeed, wait for applause”.
Yeah. It’s America, nobody even knows who Bibi is, let alone what an absolute scumbag he is. Nothing to gain on the surface, but authenticity is grossly undervalued by insiders (as none of them have any).
Semi-related note, but this whole kerfluffle over Castro is the same damn thing. No consultant is going to tell Sanders to double down on defending Castro’s literacy programs. Look at how Bloomberg responded to the stop-and-frisk questions, that’s what a weasely focus-grouped guy sounds like.
Say what you will about Sanders picking a weird hill to die on, this is definitely not something his corporate/consultant backers told him to say. He’s able to say “Hey, I think Castro’s literacy program worked but also Fidel was an authoritarian monster.” And sure, Mayo Pete will respond with “SO YOU LOVE COMMIE CASTRO, DO YOU?!?!”
At some point you just have to trust that regular slobs will be able to see through patent bad faith arguments when they see them.
tbqh, I think this is a big part of the reason young people support Sanders: if you’ve been weaned on the internet from birth, dealing with these bad faith ikestoyseain trolling arguments is as natural as breathing air. “Oh, so you like Castro’s literacy programs? SO YOU MUST LOVE COMMUNIST DICTATORSHIPS THEN?!?!?!?” is not something the under-35 crowd is falling for. Goddamn, there are like seven different memes parodying that dumb shit. Honestly I think a huge part of the generational gap is just due to young people knowing what a troll is.
But while discussing Palestinians on national TV is important on many levels, I honestly don’t see the upside to discuss Castro’s literacy program. I feel the two are pretty different and one is Sanders being moral against a bunch of weasels and the other is him being stubborn and giving them unnecessary cheap shots/
Dixon breaking it down.