That's not even close to what "plausible deniability" is, Bob. I find myself agreeing that motivation for taking major change is below threshold, largely. I might even agree that many (how do you claim "most", did you do a survey?) have good instincts generally about how governments lie and steal. However, without concrete details on a given issue (like the war in Ukraine) these people are suckers for narratives like "China is our biggest threat." Let's be honest; neither of us knows how "the world really views Americans", yet you have your belief. And even if we knew that, a collective belief about something does not constitute evidence. So, I have to reject your dead end conclusion that plain and simple cowardice is the problem. Unless you can spell out how to propose to take that as a starting point for some meaningful change. Actually, I wrote my piece precisely because I hoped people would read it and muse some on how to start to untangle a really tight, complicated knot, as opposed to pointing the finger and accusing everyone of character weakness.
That's not even close to what "plausible deniability" is, Bob. I find myself agreeing that motivation for taking major change is below threshold, largely. I might even agree that many (how do you claim "most", did you do a survey?) have good instincts generally about how governments lie and steal. However, without concrete details on a given issue (like the war in Ukraine) these people are suckers for narratives like "China is our biggest threat." Let's be honest; neither of us knows how "the world really views Americans", yet you have your belief. And even if we knew that, a collective belief about something does not constitute evidence. So, I have to reject your dead end conclusion that plain and simple cowardice is the problem. Unless you can spell out how to propose to take that as a starting point for some meaningful change. Actually, I wrote my piece precisely because I hoped people would read it and muse some on how to start to untangle a really tight, complicated knot, as opposed to pointing the finger and accusing everyone of character weakness.