Here's Where I Go And Get Myself Into Trouble

PZ Myers is wrong. Atrios is wrong. Everyone else who approaches politics this way is wrong wrong wrong wrong wrong. Here's why: If politics is not to be just a matter of "might makes right" then it has to be rational. It has to be something that you can sit down and talk about over a cup of coffee. I can accept that, in order to prevent general badness in the short run, its necessary to take a pragmatic approach to politics. But what about the long run? PZ says

It's a tragic mistake to think most creationists will be won over by kind and supportive conversation over a cup of coffee, too, or by any kind of smokescreen argument presented because we think it's what they want to hear.

Ok, PZ, what's your long-term solution? Are you content with things as they currently stand, do you want the constant yelling back-and-forth of both camps to be the status quo in perpetuity? Atrios, want to explain how introducing "a more combative and caustic discourse" is going to help solve things in the long run? As I've said several time before, there seems to be a growing focus on the here-and-now within progressive culture to the detriment of the long-term outcome. PZ and Atrios both claim to be proud members of the "reality-based community", and yet they seem to have given up on convincing the opposition that their positions actually correspond to some objective truth out there somewhere. Why is that? Some reasons which spring to mind:

• They've lost faith in the power of truth, such as it is. They no longer believe that ideas which correspond best to reality on the ground will eventually win out over ideas which don't.
• They don't care about the long run; they're only concerned that "their side" win in the short term.

Neither of these is particularly savory to contemplate, but the latter, if it is true, can be attributed to the character (or lack thereof) of a single individual. The former, the lack of faith in the power of truth, has a much broader implication. To believe this is to believe that some significant portion of humanity is congenitally unable to evaluate the truth of an argument. Now I happen to believe that a great number of people are as dumb as a bag of hammers, and that this condition is responsible for a great many of the ills in the world. But I also believe that this condition isn't inevitable; people aren't destined to remain dumb unto the nth generation. Feel free to tell me I'm wrong, but if you do you have to accept the consequences of such a belief. You have to round these people up and make them wards of the state, tell them that they aren't smart enough to vote, sterilize them and take away their right to self-determination, etc. etc. etc. Am I ranting? You bet your ass I'm ranting. This kind of thinking pisses me off, and I think it bodes ill for the future that its gained such widespread acceptance.