Man Of Jackistan: Reason and Truth's Time and Place

The Fate of "Trumpism" Rant #18  ( Opinion ) March 23, 2020 The future of what reluctantly gets the label of 'Trumpism' has increasingly represented a topic of much speculation among those who spend their time thinking about politics. I have a few tentative thoughts on that, based mostly on sheer guesswork. Many have argued that after leaving office, the Republican Party will 'snap out' of its Trump-induced spell; politicians will write off their former support for him in one way or another to avoid association with that trainwreck. While that sounds like an appetizing outcome to me, that is very unlikely, in my opinion. The man has amassed too much popularity for him to just step off the stage and fade into the background. The vicious and aggressive tweeting he does will in and of itself continue to effect the public discourse and news cycles long after leaving office. If Trump loses in November, after a lengthy dispute about the integrity of the...

Bernie Burning Opponents In Polls Rant #2 ( Opinion ) Originally: February 19, 2020 Polls often fluctuate wildly and, after the upset in 2016, many question the legitimacy of polls altogether. Admittedly, the 2016 presidential election that saw Donald Trump become president shocked nearly everyone--including Trump himself, given that in the days leading up to the election he started decrying it as 'rigged.' The polling agencies have since attempted to correct these mistakes, some of which include changing their models to give more weight to non-college educated people, who don't answer surveys as frequently, among other tweaks to their methodology. So it seems like people discredit polls too much these days, given their typical accuracy. Also, there is more than just one polling agency--some do a better job than others. For example, Rasmussen Reports leans heavily toward Republicans. With all that said, acknowledging the fallibility of opinion polling, a slew of i...

The Vaccine-Autism Link...Or Lack Thereof Originally composed August 4, 2018 Editor's Note: The anti-vaxxer quandary will not go untouched, as I intend to devote a future article, possibly more, to dissecting the bizarre phenomenon. For now, this article explains the origins of the misconception and clarifies reality. All too often, many people-and smart ones, at that-speak as if factually about the link between vaccines and autism, citing a causal effect of the former on the development of the latter. In fact, 18% of Americans believe this link to exist, according to  a 2011 poll cited by  Time .  Meanwhile, virtually every major scientific organization has openly rejected this presumption. Googling "vaccine and autism" will quickly reveal this unified position among organizations ranging from: the federal government's Center for Disease Control (CDC); news outlets like  Discover Magazine , the  Washington Post , and  TIME ; online healthcare publi...