Here, right matters. Truth matters.

I’m retired, at least in the winter. So I have time. And I’ve been watching the Senate impeachment trial, off and on. I admit that I have followed the Ukraine story more closely than most, so not much has surprised me.

I was surprised, however, at how much detail the House managers used to make their case, and how complete and ironclad their argument seems to be.

To me, it’s very clear that what President Trump did was wrong. I’m not really sure at this point how anyone can argue otherwise, and I don't think the President's lawyers really will. Whether you think what he has done rises to impeachment level is, of course, a judgement call.

But, I just heard Adam Schiff give final remarks for Thursday’s session. While the last 10 minutes was spell-binding, at least to me, this part here was just so powerful. (The link is here.)

Here's what Mr. Schiff said:

Colonel Vindman said "Here right matters. Here right matters." Well let me tell you something. If right doesn't matter, if right doesn't matter, it doesn't matter how good the constitution is, it doesn't matter how brilliant the framers were, it doesn't matter how good or bad our advocacy in this trial is.  It doesn't matter how well written the oath of impartiality is. If right doesn't matter, we're lost. If the truth doesn't matter, we're lost...It's what's made us the greatest nation on earth. No constitution can protect us, if right doesn't matter anymore. And you know you can't trust this president to do what's right for this country; you can trust he will do what's right for Donald Trump. He'll do it now, he's done it before, he'll do it for the next several months, he'll do it in the election if he's allowed to. This is why, if you find him guilty, you must find that he should be removed. Because right matters. Because right matters. And the truth matters. Otherwise we are lost.

Damn!

I stayed in my lane. I shouldn't have.

I was a teacher for 35 years. And I think I was pretty good. At least I did my best.

One of the things I really tried to get across to my students was to think critically and independently. To not just accept what is easiest, or what is popular. Of course, I didn’t tell them I was doing it; I tried to be somewhat subtle about it. I taught many “life lessons” that were not necessarily related to science. Again, I didn’t call them “life lessons” but that’s what they were.

As a chemistry and physics teacher, I stuck to those subjects. Sure, my life lessons got off the subject quite a bit (which my students loved--anything was better to many of them than science!) But I was careful, always careful, to never show MY own opinions. And stay away from real controversial subjects.  I didn’t want to unfairly influence them in things where I really had no right.

And while that seemed right, looking back I'm just not sure.

I have a lot of former students who are Facebook friends now. And I sometimes don't understand what I see. It’s not that they have different opinions from me, which I have no problem with. Instead, it’s that some don’t use any critical thinking skills. They seem to accept whatever story fits what they already think. Even when I jump into a thread and give facts, data, graphs, quotes, etc., most of them just pretend I never said it and keep on commenting as they were before. Even when I’ve proved that what they’re saying is non-factual, or incorrect.

I'm not sure I should have stayed out of controversial subjects when I was teaching. But I “stayed in my lane” and didn’t venture there. And I'm not sure I was right.

Because while I tried to teach my students critical thinking, it was difficult when just dealing with scientific topics. If I had tackled things like climate change and other "political" topics more directly, I think I would have been more effective. And I'm sure I could have done it without “preaching” or standing for any “side,” other than the side of truth.

For many, if something reinforces their own assumptions, they believe it. If it doesn’t, they don’t. That bothers me. They are lacking critical thinking skills, unable to differentiate truth from fiction, fact from propaganda, good from bad. And yes, I tried to teach them this from a science perspective--if an experiment doesn’t come out as you expect it to, that doesn’t mean the experiment is wrong, but maybe you're expectations were. It means you repeat it, many times if necessary, until you KNOW what is right.

But I think I would have been more effective teaching critical thinking if I had applied it to things that really mattered in their lives, rather than just science. But for the most part, I didn’t.

And I think I should have.

Don't Get Fooled Again

I remember in 2003. It was after 9/11, and we had already invaded Afghanistan. Even for those of us who don’t like war, we could understand that. Afghanistan had been home to Al Qaeda, who was responsible for the attacks.

But then Bush wanted to attack Iraq. We all knew they had nothing to do with the attacks. But our president told us that Iraq had weapons of mass destruction. As good, patriotic Americans, most of us believed him. I know I did. And although I didn’t like war, I was all for this one. I remember thinking "The Iraqis better be scared. The USA is coming after them."

Also about that time, there were lots of protests against this upcoming possible war. I remember watching a march by a bunch of uber-liberal idiotic actors, who told us that if we got into an Iraq war, it would be a mistake, and we would be in there for a long time. And there were other protests by other idiots--hippies and libtards and pacifists and people like that.

The people I trusted told me they were all wrong. This would be a quick war; of course it would be. We had the military might of the entire USA armed forces. We’d be in and out. Quick, easy. We KNEW that.

Now, with over a half-million deaths later, we’re still there. The smart people I trusted were wrong. I was wrong. Our president had either lied, or made very grave errors, depending on who you believe.

The liberal actors and all the other libtards--they were right.

Now, 17 years later, the same “smart people” are telling us that our attacks on Iran make a lot of sense. And if Iran responds, we should bomb the crap out of them. They say “Don’t mess with the US” and “Iran should be very scared” and cool testosterone shit like that.

Nope, not this time. We have no reason to go to war. We've done too much already, let's not do more. There is such a thing as diplomacy.

I won't support a war this time. I won’t get fooled again.