A quote from the president’s farewell speech.
“For too many of us, it’s become safer to retreat into our own bubbles, whether in our neighborhoods or college campuses or places of worship or our social media feeds, surrounded by people who look like us and share the same political outlook and never challenge our assumptions. The rise of naked partisanship, increasing economic and regional stratification, the splintering of our media into a channel for every taste – all this makes this great sorting seem natural, even inevitable. And increasingly, we become so secure in our bubbles that we accept only information, whether true or not, that fits our opinions, instead of basing our opinions on the evidence that’s out there.
… Politics is a battle of ideas; in the course of a healthy debate, we’ll prioritize different goals, and the different means of reaching them. But without some common baseline of facts; without a willingness to admit new information, and concede that your opponent is making a fair point, and that science and reason matter, we’ll keep talking past each other, making common ground and compromise impossible.”
(Emphasis mine.)
January 11th, 2017 at 12:41 am
And I’m still not going to change my mind that the people who voted for, or otherwise supported, Trump are bad people, and I neither need nor want their deplorable political ideas.
Since I am not an orator, I simply choose to not see their insane, evil plotting.
January 11th, 2017 at 11:14 am
Obama is entirely correct about the splintering of the country and the need to be re-establish a common baseline. It’s really hard to do that when the “leaders” are working hard to prevent it. I try to pay attention to the other side so I can know what’s going on and try to counteract it. Can’t remember who said it (probably Machiavelli): “keep your friends close; keep your enemies closer” but it makes sense in these days.
January 11th, 2017 at 11:20 am
Actually that quote was probably invented/written for the Godfather II movie 😉