Citizen Writers Fighting Censorship by Helping Americans Understand Issues Affecting the Republic.
Jeffery Marshall Ed.D., BG(R) 
On the surface, this question seems almost silly. The US has a nuclear arsenal, one of the strongest economies, and outstanding military power. Yet we ran from Afghanistan with our tail between our legs in near total disgrace. We did something like that in Vietnam nearly 50 years before repeating it in Afghanistan. Are these …
In the councils of government, we must guard against the acquisition of unwarranted influence, whether sought or unsought, by the military-industrial complex.
This post looks at expectation management and how it relates to and reinforces the darker aspects of operant conditioning.
This is the last part in a four-part series. Part 1 discussed the principles of Operant Conditioning and Path Dependency. Part 2 looked at what happens when philosophy and religion are blocked or obscured in a culture and the vacuum this lack creates. This vacuum opens the way for a dark, controlling philosophy that erodes …
Source: Discovering Neptune So how do dark philosophers (see Part 2) propagate the dark gospel and create the changes they seek? On the surface, if we only look at the racial aspects, we may reach some misleading and even harmful conclusions. Are Black Lives Matter (BLM), 1619 and the whole Diversity, Inclusion, and Equity (DIE) …
We should teach and be models of virtue because it is right and good and not because we fear punishment or hope for reward
I dislike the practice of operant conditioning. It robs a person of their free will and inherently erodes virtue.
We have lost the art of constructive debate. Both sides rely on far more on opinion and biased interpretations of events. Both sides are guilty of manufacturing “facts” that support the opinions.
Standards are the Raw Materials of Virtue: He Who Controls the Standards, Controls Behavior In one sense, virtue is how a society controls and manages behavior. Some systems and societies use virtue to produce beneficent outcomes, while others use virtue, at least as the societal standards define it, to produce power and control. Religions historically …
Standards, Cultural Relativism, and Broken Windows This blog builds on the prior blogs Virtue: religion and philosophy, what does the founders’ vision embrace? and Virtue and Pandora’s Box: Effective Policy. Pandora’s Box discussed the damage some Victorian virtue policies wrought, but said the social justice movement’s “cure” may be worse than the disease it sought …
Politics, Politicians, and Demonic Possession “One of the artifices of Satan is, to induce men to believe that he does not exist: another, perhaps equally fatal, is to make them fancy that he is obliged to stand quietly by, and not to meddle with them, if they get into true silence.” 1836 book “Quakerism …
Real Reform, Part 3: The Bureaucratic Cat Burglar Greenman HouseThe cat burglar creeps quietly into his target after doing extensive surveillance and steals the planned target. If the burglar does the job well, there is no evidence of a theft and it may not be detected for weeks or even months, depending on the target. …
Real Reform, Part 2: The Allosaurus in the Room Source: mrwynd from Denver, USA/Wikimedia Commons/CC BY 2.0 “Absolute power does not corrupt absolutely, absolute power attracts the corruptible.” ― Frank Herbert This post picks up from Real Reform, Part1: Introduction. It addresses the Allosaurus in the room: Congress. The Allosaurus was a highly successful carnivore …
Real Reform, Part 1 Introduction In A New Contract With America, I included a bullet point about qualifications for congressional committee and subcommittee chairs: “Enact congressional policies to require minimum qualifications for committee and subcommittee chairperson positions. These qualifications will be like qualifications required for similar positions in the private sector or the executive branch. …
Deterrence and the Interagency Process, Part 2: Interagency “The evolution of the interagency process parallels Americas [sic] purposeful adaptation to changing global realities of the last five decades. But it is not an orderly evolution because of serious structural and cultural impediments, such as discontinuities from one administration to another and poor institutional memory.” Gabriel …
Deterrence and the Interagency Process, Part 1: Deterrence I came across an interesting article on LinkedIn on deterrence and how the military should be in control of it. I started a comment and midway through; I opened another browser tab to a quick search. When I got back to LinkedIn, my comments and the original …
Ethics, Morality, and Virtue: Relative vs. Absolute Meaning Then they said, “Come, let us build ourselves a city, with a tower that reaches to the heavens, so that we may make a name for ourselves; otherwise we will be scattered over the face of the whole earth.” Genesis 11:4 “Then the queen began to lament and to weep, …
Defending the Republic, Scenario 3: Takeover This is the third and most dangerous scenario introduced in Part 1 of Defending the Republic. While it may directly manifest from the triggers discussed below, most likely it will flow from scenario 2: Policy Domination stimulated by the trigger(s). If scenario 3 happens and is successful, the US …
The term rent-seeking is a derogatory term that implies companies and people seek to take more than they earn. It hearkens to some Marxist ideology as well. But, especially when combined with regulatory capture and bureaucratic corruption, is a valid concept. But what happens when the shoe is on the other foot and people and …
Measurement and Observation Alters the System: What Does this Mean for Social Science Research? When we read research papers or even the published results of surveys, we need to critically examine the samples, sample sizes, and statistical techniques used. We also need to understand the author/organization to understand what biases and motivations may influence the …