Goodby 2014: From Gruber to Ferguson, Evil is the new Good - The History of Progress begins with its absence, part 5 a,b, c & d

a) Evil is the new Good
I know what you're asking, 'Why this?' Right? I mean, we've got Ferguson exploding again, and what with all the rest of the News Cycle churning around and more, why am I continuing with this odd... sort of History-ish series of posts pursuing the nature of Progress and Regress?

Let me answer that question with another question.

Why are these situations so common, rather than uncommon?

Consider that since I first began writing this post, we've passed through several news cycles, led by Jonathan Gruber admitting that ObamaCare was a lie to fool the 'stupid people', Obama has declared his intention to issue an Executive Order to let in illegal immigration, Ebola has come and (or so we hope) gone, ISIS is still beheading fast and furiously, Houston's Mayor launched an assault on religious liberty (forgot about that one, didn't you), Gruber is back, ongoing efforts against the 2nd Amdt, or Common Core#Ferguson has exploded with rioting against against the judicial system, and now Korea closing our movies and Taliban slaughtering a school... and that was within hardly more than a month's time.

And we certainly don't need to limit our time frame to just the last couple months to see a virtual parade of more of the same. I mean, it's not as if these very same issues are really anything new, right? Ferguson/Watts? Ebola/AIDS? ISIS/Al Queda? Houston or Catholic Hospitals or forced fed healthcontrol? Marysville/Sandy Hook/Colorado? And Common Core/Race To The Top/every-educational-reform-going-back-to-1800? Don't let the seeming kaleidoscopic events snow you, instead ask yourself if there is some sense in which these very separate events are in some sense fundamentally similar?

I've questioned, answered and posted on these ever recycling news cycle issues enough times already - more than enough times. The reason why these issues are so common is because having the ability to look at these situations in a more productive way, has become so uncommon. All of these seeming changes, are the result of a long ago change that has too long remained unchanged and unchallenged, and that change is central to the reason why all of the progress made in recent centuries has been transforming into the rapid regress of today. Granted, beneath the surface of the news cycle, what has not changed is difficult to see, and while the superficial distractions of the recycling are easily mistaken for real changes - the only real changes taking place have been within us - all of which serves to mask what remains unchanged... and so... here we are.

Yes, that requires a bit of explanation.

Easier done perhaps by looking at one aspect of some of the more recent changes in us as a people, one that is very much worth noting, though maybe not for the reasons you might think. The embarrassing boastings of Jonathan Gruber, and the results of the #Ferguson Grand Jury verdict, though seemingly different on the surface, have quite a lot in common, with each other, and with the recycling of the news cycle.

I've already ranted a bit on the #Ferguson situation here and here, and even a quick hit on Gruber, but aren't Gruber's lies just politics as usual?

Nope, at least not the part that I see as being worth noting. What's easily noted is that we had a well respected MIT economics professor, Jonathan Gruber, who was a highly paid consultant to the administration precisely because of his position as a highly respected MIT economics professor (and who was previously employed by Romney, BTW, and for the same valuable 'insights' that the Obama administration payed him so handsomely for), who was caught on video - multiple times - cheerfully advocating for a policy of highly opaque administrative lies, so that they could take advantage of the 'stupidity of the American voter' - for their own good.