User:Woozle

I originally created Issuepedia as a way of dealing with the confusion (shall we say) I and a lot of other people felt after the 2004 presidential election. How could a man be so clearly dishonest and still get elected? Or were we the ones who were wrong, and he actually wasn't that bad?

Issuepedia's first project, then, was to collect information relating to George W. Bush, his past performance, his views, the views of his party, the issues upon which I and my friends are at odds with his party, and so on. If we were right, this would make it clear to his supporters just what he was supporting. If we were wrong, it would become clear as the facts accumulated. This methodology could then be used to help resolve (or at least understand) all kinds of contentious issues.

The methodology seems to work quite well; the main problem has been a lack of interest from anyone else. As such, it is still of use to me, as it serves as a filing place for facts and cross-references which I otherwise would be unable to remember, thus making it possible for me to have a reasonable grasp on the issues I've been studying. Hopefully others will soon see the value of it. I have ideas for publicity campaigns ("Issuepedia: no more sound bites"), and will get around to working on that eventually.

My central home page is on The Hypertwins Wiki. Visit early and often. ^_^

Subpages

My positions on a number of issues
/rationalist: My name is Woozle. I carry a card.
/opinionated businesses: should businesses have opinions on things, and how far can they go with them? (As I was typing this, I kinda lost enthusiasm for the whole thing... don't know why. Note: any discussion of larger business ethics should mention companies like Working Assets which make political positions part of their sales pitch.)
/Discovery Institute: proof they aren't really trying (and I hope this doesn't give them any ideas...)
/JLF: my interactions with the John Locke Foundation (mainly on the Right Angles Blog)
/annoy a liberal: answers to a popular conservative bumper-sticker
/Darwin's Dangerous Idea: eventually to be organized into critique page
/2007-07-03 chat on the subject of why atheists might avoid trying to de-theize their friends
At its best, religion seems to provide a shield against cynicism. This seems to be the real reason why any intelligent people become religious at all; they care about other people, so they want to be "good", and in their experience only religion offers any guidance on that topic. This seems worth an essay, or at least some discussion inside an existing essay.

Dated Writings

2008-05-27 /2008-05-27 response to Paul Dean
2008-05-03 /2008-05 ostrich exchange
2007-10-15 /2007-10-15 open letter to GWB: never finished. Bah. (I wanted to find more about this "list" so I could be specific.)
2007-09-30 /United Members of Civilization
2007-08-11 How to Argue with a Liberal, aka how to write like a neocon
2007-06-03 Reasons to believe in God (surprise!)
2007-05-05 Morality Without God (in progress): how it works (would "Godless Morality" be a better title?)
2007-02-13 interfaith treaty working notes
2006-12-20 political theorizing: why we never seem to learn from history, even though we actually do
2006-09-30 Head-in-the-sand Liberals (my writing is the response to an article by this title)
2005-09-06 Thoughts on the Red-Blue Divide (need to revise this)
- 2005-09-09 More Thoughts on the Divide

Dialogues

Issuepedia:Ethics channel/religion: key points from a conversation with Vee about the nature of God

Petitions I've Signed

(a partial list)

2008-06-22 /2008-06-22 webmail to David Price opposing Iran blockade
2008-06-11 /2008-06-11 email for impeachment via web form @ the American Freedom Campaign
2007-10-26 /2007-10-26 webmail in support of HR3835 -- The American Freedom Campaign's online petition in support of Ron Paul's "American Freedom Agenda Act" (HR 3835).
2007-10-18 Chris Dodd's online petition expressing support for his blockage of a bill giving the telecomm companies immunity against prosecution in connection with Bush's wiretapping: "I applaud your action of blocking the FISA bill with the telecomm amnesty tacked onto it. This may be just one finger in a dyke with a whole lot of holes, but every finger counts; we just have to hang in there until we can get soemone decent in office (assuming Bush doesn't declare martial law and suspend elections, of course). / I hadn't heard your name before in connection with the 2008 elections, but I will definitely be watching you now. ;-)"
2007-10-14 American Freedom Pledge
2007-07-07 /2007-07-07 webmail to congress
2007-05-09 post-veto request to stand firm against Bush pressure: "As your constituent, I'm asking you to stand up to President Bush and not write another blank check for endless war in Iraq. The president has vetoed funding for the troops, and he's the only one responsible for blocking the resources they need. Please stand firm – support the troops with a plan to end the war and the funding they need to do it."

Notes to Myself

Need to write: war on the extended family -- part of the war on the family, in that tightly constraining the acceptable model for a family weakens the family itself
This is bound to be related to something.
Critique Homosexual "Marriage" and Civilization (again); use this as a model for format.
Finish this
Make The Authoritarians Google Group page and add these links, possibly condensed if there is overlap:
File this somewhere: Run for President of the US
Respond to: Sermon for Matins: 'Dawkins and The God Delusion' by Dr Nicholas Sagovsky, Westminster Abbey
Need to respond to this
For transparency article: "Sunlight is said to be the best of disinfectants." -- Supreme Court Justice Louis B. Brandeis
Interesting quote from Jimmy Wales: "...one of the interesting things about Wikipedia is that people assume ... particularly on controversial topics that the big debates within the Wikipedia community would be somehow roughly the party of the left versus the party of the right. It turns out on those types of topics it's actually the party of the thoughtful and reasonable people and the party of the jerks. And those aren't left or right, they can come from all sides." [1]
Need to write a backgrounder article on how web sites always had the potential to allow cross-referencing of news articles and thus to become more like a library, how news web sites (e.g. CNN, Slashdot) fail to use this potential, and how wiki sites enable it. article arguing that wiki is superior to the e-forum model
Perhaps a page on lessons to learn from history, starting with how Hitler rose to power in a Democratic country even though his party were very much in the minority
http://www.davidbrin.com/neocons.html has a number of opinions on other issues regarding which I didn't happen to be working on pages at the time I was reading it, but which should later be mined (yes, I use a lot of Brin quotes and links on this site -- because he's one of the few really rich sources of cogent arguments I've been able to find, on either side of the political spectrum -- though I do plan to pay Orson Scott Card (and The Ornery American) a visit, when time permits.)
A KDE developer joins the US military: ~~http://funkyshizzle.com/?q=node/114~~ (dead link)
Notes for eventual essay related to affordable housing and the real estate industry:
- The real estate loan industry is basically an arms race – or a Sneetch-race, to be more light-hearted about it.
- The home buyers are the Sneetches, and the bankers are Sylvester McMonkey McBean.
- Everyone wants to buy a better house than they can afford, and Sylvester makes it possible.
- The resulting competition for a scarce resource (housing) drives up the price far past its intrinsic value, and gives developers incentives to buy up more and more undeveloped land... thus driving up value of neighboring land or land in "desirable" areas, thus driving up property taxes for the remaining undeveloped land, thus making it less and less affordable to own undeveloped land, thus making it easier for the developers to build more and more overpriced housing.
- Sylvester drives away with a load of cash, and homeowners are left in debt for the rest of their natural lives.

Morality Quiz Notes

A deadly natural disaster (hurricane, tsunami, whatever) is about to strike. A man goes swimming in the ocean, despite all warnings to leave town and especially to stay away from the water. He is arrested by the police. Is this right, or wrong? (Source: http://www.opinionjournal.com/columnists/pnoonan/?id=110007328)

Same natural disaster. A teenage boy steals a bus, picks up refugees, and drives them to safety. He is arrested. Is this right or wrong? What should the boy have done? What should the police have done?

...I wanted to have a scenario involving missionaries, but I find it difficult to phrase in a neutral-ish way since the concept of missionarying bothers me all by itself.

2007-02-25 update: Although I came up with those questions independently (in 2005 or 06), they are very similar to the questions used in the surveys described in The Authoritarians.

Links to File

In Dusty Archives, a Theory of Affluence
Off the Record: music industry crumbling?
SciAm blog: lots of interesting stuff. Add to RSS feeds?
Why the US Military Loves Ron Paul
An Inconvenient Patriot: Sibel Edmonds and others, for Corruption in the Bush administration
StopTheLie.com
Bill Maher On The Ten Commandments
links from Atheists of Utah
Jon Haidt
Software Freedom Conservancy: is this issue-related, or should it go in HTYP?
wikis and politics
a Brin cross-posting on Kos
High Cost of Low Prices: check back at some point and see if any further editing suggests itself
Chore Wars: probably should save this in the Hypertwiki; can't see the value of it if kids can play for points instead of working for them... or is that not how it works?
Rockridge Nation: didn't I already link this somewhere? Or was I trying to decide what to do with it? Maybe a page on progressivism?
vbzwiki:Prints plus posters: should this be moved to HTYP?
Might Robadt be interested in posting Issuepedia pages about some of the stuff he runs into?
History Explained: I was reading An Explanation of History and had gotten to here
the Hollywood Sign site needs to be on HTYP
Irregular Webcomic on "post-religious morals"
America's War on Science at Memepunks
Idealist.org
Web Credibility: Hard Earned, Harder To Prove
Glenn Greenwald: some interesting stuff; add to RSS feeds?
Why doesn't Tom Tomorrow have an RSS feed? Can Google provide one?
Oh, right, I did start writing an article about a US backup government, didn't I.
Could Gambling Save Science?
911 Truth NC
911 Blogger
Lieutenant General John H. Cushman, U.S. Army, Retired: "The 59-minute Army War College talk and all three articles are about the planning and early execution of the War in Iraq."
Downsize DC: several good initiatives
Graham in Australia looks like he might have some insight on what's good about Christianity