I’m sorry in advance for a post that doesn’t really offer the chance for any substantive discussion, but I am engaged in the most futile of all tasks — trying to find again something I read on the Internet six months ago — and I need all the help I can get. So onward to the point:
Within the last 6 months I read an article. In my memory of the event I read it on LessWrong, but perhaps it was on Ovcoming Bias, or linked to from a LW post, or something. The main thesis of the piece was that American politics is covered in the press as a spectator sport, and issues that have enormous impact for millions of Americans are treated as though their only importance lies in their political ramifications. E.g., newspaper headlines say things like “Victory for Obama as Congress passes healthcare bill,” as if the only importance of the bill was that it constituted a political win, as if the American public ought to care more about the political victories and defeats of one guy in Washington than about the actual ramifications of the law on their own healthcare.
Does anyone recognize the sound of this article? I have searched LessWrong in vain, but is it nonetheless here somewhere? Is anyone so familiar with the site that they can confirm definitively that it is not from here, so I can at least cross it off the list? In short, help?
LessWrong, can you help me find an article I read a few months ago, I think here?
I’m sorry in advance for a post that doesn’t really offer the chance for any substantive discussion, but I am engaged in the most futile of all tasks — trying to find again something I read on the Internet six months ago — and I need all the help I can get. So onward to the point:
Within the last 6 months I read an article. In my memory of the event I read it on LessWrong, but perhaps it was on Ovcoming Bias, or linked to from a LW post, or something. The main thesis of the piece was that American politics is covered in the press as a spectator sport, and issues that have enormous impact for millions of Americans are treated as though their only importance lies in their political ramifications. E.g., newspaper headlines say things like “Victory for Obama as Congress passes healthcare bill,” as if the only importance of the bill was that it constituted a political win, as if the American public ought to care more about the political victories and defeats of one guy in Washington than about the actual ramifications of the law on their own healthcare.
Does anyone recognize the sound of this article? I have searched LessWrong in vain, but is it nonetheless here somewhere? Is anyone so familiar with the site that they can confirm definitively that it is not from here, so I can at least cross it off the list? In short, help?
All my thanks.