I didn't plow through all of them, but the analyses all seem reasonable and probably correct, but they were analyses, and today the facts that these analyses make clear don't seem to be palatable to the electorate.  Maybe we should concentrate on the consequence of solving wealth inequality to the typical American who thinks he has tried to save something for a rainy day.  That something is wealth, and now the government thinks it should be spread around.  If he had spent everything he earned he would have little or no wealth and would be the happy recipient of someone else's frugality.

In the end the "progressive" appeal is to envy.  But few envy the celebrity; instead, most envy the family down the street, the ones who aren't scraping by, because they've not been profligate.

We should alert the middle class to the quite real fear that the government is coming after their savings, their wealth, because that's where the money is.

Well, now we are into motives and virtue, and all you say seems correct if the purpose is simply eristic rather than argumentative.  In the end, all we say or write is subject to some level of proof or at least argument, even when we attempt to deceive.   I’ll consider your comment more carefully.

But isn’t the point of it all to communicate our ideas clearly?  And if the jargon and idioms get in the way, shouldn’t they be dismissed?

Perhaps technicians using technical jargon is part of the reason that the populace seems so woefully ignorant of technology.  Perhaps it’s a protective screen for the technicians, but it doesn’t help them or us, because their ideas will continue to be received with confusion and suspicion, no matter how well thought out.  No, for their ideas to be understood and given proper merit, they must be clearly received; and jargon is what gets in the way of that.

This will be our topic tomorrow over coffee.  My companion, a Pole, will take great pleasure in it.  His favorite author is Joseph Conrad.  Thank you for raising it.

Let me take issue with your off-hand comment at 44:40, "You know, if you're an engineering student, it doesn't matter."

Well, yes, Troy, it does matter and in the same way that it matters whether one immerses oneself in public policy while neglecting the sciences.

I was a chemistry major, but thankfully had to take a lot of liberal arts courses that along with the sciences made me somewhat educated.  But during my career it was sad to see so many scientists, for whom it had not mattered, struggle mightily but vainly to make their ideas understood, sort of like listening to a liberal arts major talk about oil production and climate change.

It matters, Troy.  It matters.

I suppose I missed something.  I thought the problem was excessive force in executing the arrest, not the alleged crime.  We seem to have conflated the two. 

Just saw this.  Let me make sure I understand.  My father was an amateur boxer, so I would be a great trainer.  How pathetic.

 My wife and I were just talking about Murray's article.  The discussion recalled our returning home from the Navy in 1972 to find that in only three-and-a-half years my family seemed to have significantly lost its moral bearings.  Cohabitation was now okay, affairs were a sign of independence, and any note to the contrary was not welcome.  For many years I was not popular with the family.  Our family in the fifties was somewhere between Belmont and Fishtown; my mother from a genteel middle class family, my father a divorcee from a lower class family.  But as Murray writes, the values, the sense of right and wrong were shared.  There was certainly a sea-change in societal values around that time, and parts of my family are poorer for it.

 My wife's convinced me that we agree, but I can't ignore the culpability of the the wealthy and well-educated in making it appear that moral relativism has no effects.  As a group they should be ashamed.  What to do?  A start might be to stop fawning over their bad behavior, the examples that the less well-equipped follow at their peril.

 Yes, candy corn is best during Halloween; jelly beans while reading or writing; and circus peanuts while remembering visits to your grandmother's.

Worst at Halloween?  Picky, picky.

Many thanks for this, Lucy.  Concentrated confirmation that he's the smartest guy, but how do we clean him up enough to be accepted into polite company?

 What's NPR?

 I don't know.  When we have to explain, ending with, "....that's probably her point" and "That's her point," then she hasn't made the point.  Michele, unfortunately, reminds me of PTA types: brassy enough to get up and speak, but saying nothing that withstands thoughtful analysis in the quiet after the meeting.

 My prediction to my wife is that Herman Cain will be on the Republican ticket.  If it's as VP, think of what a great one he would be.  Imagine a Cain-Biden debate; would Slo' Joe ever recover?