"The Authoritarians" by Bob Altmeyer

There's a review of "The Authoritarians" at Jerry Coyne's site today. The review is written by Linda Grilli Calhoun, a "retired shrink". If you've ever wondered why rightwing nuts act that way, Altmeyer's book may provide the answer.

Altemeyer is a retired professor of psychology who taught for his entire career at the University of Manitoba.  He spent his research life studying the authoritarian personality, published many articles in journals as well as a couple of books aimed at fellow psychologists.

There's a link at the end of the article that leads to a free download of the book in PDF format! Very nice.

France doesn't get it

Even if you've never read Glenn Greenwald, you should take the time to read this column. It's about the insane efforts various countries are making to ensure that they and their beliefs are not criticized. We've seen it with religion; we've seen it with politics.

Putting a muzzle on people is the end of democracy. And as you'll see in the column, even France (not Iran; not China; France!) doesn't understand this.

Authoritarians try to take over internet

Pretty good article at Yahoo about the insane rush to assert control over the internet. The usual suspects -- Russia, China, Iran, UAE, etc. -- want to control what people see on the net. Control, control, control. I swear, governments are morphing into churches.

Here's an excerpt in case you don't make it to the article (which is worth reading):

Google's Vint Cerf, the ordinarily diplomatic co-author of the basic protocol for Internet data, denounced the proposed new rules as hopeless efforts by some governments and state-controlled telecom authorities to assert their power.

"These persistent attempts are just evidence that this breed of dinosaurs, with their pea-sized brains, hasn't figured out that they are dead yet, because the signal hasn't traveled up their long necks," Cerf told Reuters.

You have to love a guy like Vint. You hafta.