Evolution?

For John, BLUF:  Admitting one is wrong is hard.  Nothing to see here; just move along.

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A Lesson in Cognitive Dissonance

Scott Adams (Dilbert) says"

Imagine you are one of the anti-Trump folks who believe we just elected a racist, sexist, homophobic, anti-semitic, science-denying dictator. Let’s say that’s the movie playing in your mind. That’s some scary stuff.

Now imagine watching the news as Trump reveals in slow-motion that he’s flexible and pragmatic on just about everything.  Thomas Friedman at the New York Times just reported that Trump is – as of yesterday anyway – open-minded about climate-change science, and Trump is no longer in favor of waterboarding terror suspects.

You also watched Trump move to the middle on his immigration policies.  And you watched as Trump said he plans to keep the good parts of Obamacare instead of jettisoning it whole.

And you saw Trump say he wasn’t interested in prosecuting Clinton.  Her supporters were worried that Trump was going to go full-dictator and jail his adversaries.  That won’t happen, apparently.

And Trump also told the New York Times that they don’t need to worry about changes in libel laws.  That means it will not become easier for people such as Trump to sue them out of business. That was one of the possibilities that scared people.

The areas in which Trump hasn’t budged in his opinion seem to be where states’ rights are involved.  Trump would leave it to the courts and to the states to decide on abortion, legal marijuana, and gay marriage.  You might not like the fact that Trump wants the federal government to stay out of those decisions, but it isn’t very dictator-like to leave big decisions to the states.

Cognitive dissonance.

Hat tip to the InstaPundit.

Regards  —  Cliff