In this episode of Finding Common Battle Grounds, we have another guest: Ken W. Good, an attorney who specializes in bail bonds. We take advantage of Ken's expertise to discuss a movement spreading across the US to end bail bonds under the premise that bail bonds can result in poor people being imprisoned because they cannot afford even low bail amounts. We discussed a Politifact article that investigated (and rated mostly true) a claim by Governor Gavin Newsom that only the US and the Philippines use for-profit or corporate bail bond systems. We used this as a launching point to discuss the consequences of changes to the bail system and whether they contribute to higher crime rates. Conveniently, we all agree that we don't want more crime and that crime has gotten out of control in some locations, but don't agree that we should retain bail for everyone or that our prisons are punitive and too full. We then turn to Google's Gemini glitch that ended up creating inaccurate historical images that reflect a diversity bias over accuracy. We agreed that historical accuracy is important and that Google needed to fix it's AI. We did not end up agreeing that truth is always more important than diversity, with Ryan arguing that truth is complicated and, while it is should always be pursued, it's not always clear what truth is. Ken disagreed and argued that there are capital-T "Truths" and they will always be more important than diversity.

In this episode of Finding Common Battle Grounds, Ryan and Tom are joined by Sarah Sun Liew, a Republican candidate for US Senate for California. We discuss two articles related to immigration. First, we examine Governor Greg Abbott's violation of federal law in putting up barriers (i.e., razor wire, sawblades, etc.) at the US/Mexico border. We all agree that there are issues with immigration and the border but are rather conflicted over whether what Governor Abbott is doing is ethical and how the federal government should respond. The second article we discuss is about the bipartisan effort to fix the border situation (which also included funding for Ukraine and Israel) that was being discussed in early February but was killed when Donald Trump began contacting legislators and telling them he opposed the legislation because it was the primary plank of his platform for re-election as President. Tom and Sarah both claimed that the reporter was biased and that Trump doesn't have that much power. They also argued that President Biden should have done more to get the legislation passed. Ryan disagreed with them, noting that the legislation was generally supported by legislators and many conservatives and was not well-liked by people on the left. The legislation seemed to be popular until Trump came out against it. Ryan suggests that the authoritarian nature of Republicans right now means that they are unwilling to go against the leader/dictator of the Republican Party - Donald Trump. Even so, all three agreed that the border reforms that were being considered should have been passed by the US Legislature.

In this episode of Finding Common Battle Grounds, we tackle two legislative/governmental issues related to higher education (article 1 and article 2). First, we discuss the recent legislative initiative in Utah to ban requiring diversity, equity, and inclusion statements as part of the hiring process at public universities in Utah. As we dug into the details on this topic, it became clear that this was a Republican dog-whistle issue. The diversity statements are not about forcing new hires to sign a statement agreeing to adhere to a specific liberal ideology but rather to make sure that they are willing to teach and interact with a diverse group of people, primarily students. Since they are public universities, the faculty at those universities cannot refuse to teach someone because they are transgender, gay, or a black individual. The universities also want to make sure that they have an inclusive environment for diverse students. Banning these statements, which are not required for all new hires, will not accomplish anything other than pandering to the "anti-woke" mobs. On the second topic, we look at the removal of Introduction to Sociology from the courses that can be included in the general education curriculum at public universities in Florida. This was driven by a desire to weed out "woke" topics at universities. Ryan complicated this issue by noting that a sizable percentage of his discipline has turned to "critical sociology," which is basically advocacy masquerading as science. (NOTE: Ryan doesn't consider himself to be in that camp but rather the other side, which he calls "empirical sociology.") Sociologists and most academics opposed this change by the Florida State Board of Education but would be stupid to think that the people proposing this change would be anything but happy to see sociologists in the state weeping, wailing, and gnashing their teeth. For the proponents of removing sociology, that is just further evidence that they have "poked" at woke liberals. In short, this is government meddling in higher education curriculum for no reason other than to score political points, again.

In this episode of Finding Common Battle Grounds, Ryan and Tom tackle two topics. First, thanks to legislation under consideration in the Florida House and Senate, we discuss rolling back regulations protecting children (really 16 and 17-year-olds) when it comes to the number of hours they can work while school is in session and the tops of jobs they can do. We agree that these laws are problematic and will likely have detrimental effects on young people. We then turn to an incident that happened at Ryan's university: A faculty member in the College of Business who moonlights as a Christian apologist used her invitation to give the commencement speech at the university to proselytize her specific brand of Christianity. We, again, agreed that, while the talk was inappropriate for the context, we both argue that she should have the right to say what she wants to say, even if it is the promotion of Christianity to a religiously diverse and nonreligious audience.

In this episode of Finding Common Battle Grounds, Tom and Ryan tackle two topics. First, we discuss the fact that some individuals and groups have effectively been showing their support for the people of Gaza by calling for violence and even genocide against Israel. Tom pointed out that this seems to be a double standard on college campuses as they would not allow similar calls for violence against Black individuals. Ryan, while condemning the calls for violence, raised the question of whether this isn't an instance of free speech - though perhaps run amuck or gone too far. They ultimately agree that people should be allowed to say pretty much anything within the bounds of what the law has said, but it has to go both ways. The second topic was raised in the context of the severe crackdown on gangs and criminals in El Salvador under the new-ish President, Nayib Bukele. Under his presidency, he has arrested tens of thousands and they are treating the inmates very harshly. As a result, homicides have fallen dramatically, but the people of El Salvador are now effectively living in a police state and have lost lots of freedoms. This opened up a discussion between freedom and security, leading to a discussion of how it is a continuum - you can have more of one, but often at the cost of the other.

In this episode of Finding Common Battle Grounds, Ryan and Tommy tackle two topics: trigger warnings and the military industrial complex. On the first topic, a review article examining the efficacy of trigger warnings was just published illustrating that they often have the opposite of the intended effect, increasing people's anxiety and making it more likely people will watch the content. The general recommendation is that they shouldn't be used. We discuss our takes on this (shocker - we agree). We then turn to some recent news clips about the war in Ukraine and the war between Israel and Hamas that illustrate that an underlying calculation in war efforts in the US is the ability of US companies to profit from the war effort. We discuss this and again find substantial agreement.

It's been a few weeks, but we're back. We talk about some of what we've been up to over the last month, then jump into two news items. First up is an opinion piece by NYTimes contributor David Brooks that suggests professionals (or the professional class) are condescending and dismissive of the working class, which has led them to feel disenfranchised and choose as their representative Donald Trump, who they think sticks it to the professional class (or elites). We discuss this op-ed, tackle the issue of elites again, and then wonder why these individuals chose a billionaire, elite-educated, New Yorker as their champion. The second story we discuss is the renewal of the Florida State Guard by Ron DeSantis, which has been a disaster. The training was a mess, people complained, and the mission is unclear. Tom accurately describes this as both (a) a nothing burger and (b) a disturbing sign that DeSantis wants his own personal guard. We then wrap up with a brief discussion of the killing of a man in Provo by the FBI who had made repeated death threats against Biden and other politicians.

In this episode of Finding Common Battle Grounds, we tackled three topics. We started with the news that a social media influencer worked with a company to create a chatbot for her followers that, when prompted, turned into a sex chat bot. We then discussed the implications of sex chat bots and eventually sex robots for humans, with a little disagreement about the negative outcomes for humanity. We then turned to a discussion of Trump's latest indictment for the mishandling of classified documents. Again, we generally agreed but Tom is confident that the indictment isn't worth the hassle and is worried about the optics - that a sitting President's Justice Department is prosecuting his chief rival in the upcoming election. Ryan recognized the optics but insisted that the law is the law. Finally, we turned briefly to a discussion of the Reddit Blackout in which a number of subreddits went dark to protest monetization and sanitization changes at Reddit, potentially in preparation for an IPO. While we both agreed with the value of free speech, Ryan ultimately argued that free speech on "free" platforms is now largely regulated by what advertisers are willing to allow.

In this episode of Finding Common Battle Grounds, we (Ryan and Tom) tackled three topics. We started with a discussion of Trump's recent civil lawsuit by E. Jean Carroll, which ended with a verdict against him suggesting the jury was convinced that Trump sexually assaulted (i.e., raped) Ms. Carroll. Ryan was wondering how it is that people can support a rapist as President of the US, and Tom responded that it was less about Trump and more about the American populace - they want a win and will take it at any cost, regardless of the (im)morality of their candidate. We then turned to a discussion of the recent congressional hearing that featured three FBI agents who had lost their security clearance and then claimed whistleblower status and argued that the FBI was attacking conservatives. Tom is concerned about the FBI restricting free speech and engaging as the thought police. Ryan noted that one of these individuals was actually at the January 6th riot (not acting as a representative of the FBI but among the protestors/rioters) and the other two continue to espouse conspiracy theories about the January 6th riot that do not align with all of the evidence. We did agree that: (a) military, law enforcement, and FBI members on the ground are likely to lean to the right, and (b) internal elements of the US government are a bigger threat to democracy than are protests and militias. Finally, we turned to the debt ceiling issue that is roiling America at the moment. Tom noted that the government has to pay its debts - it is legally required to do so. If we don't raise the debt ceiling, we effectively would force a balanced budget and would have to cut spending in other areas. Both Tom and Ryan agreed that the US government needs to stop spending more than it brings in and that our national debt is going to cause major problems moving forward.

In this episode of Finding Common Battle Grounds, we started with two topics but then led us off on two tangents. First, we discussed the Fox News settlement with Dominion Voting machines and Fox News's firing of Tucker Carlson. Tom wasn't as familiar with all of the revelations that resulted from the discovery part of the lawsuit that illustrated that the Fox News administration, personalities, and staff knew that they were lying about Dominion but did it anyway in order to maintain high ratings. Even so, Tom thinks that the dishonesty of Fox News is the same with all news outlets and that none of them can be fully trusted whereas Ryan is convinced that Fox News doesn't care about truth but only about profits. Ryan's position on the media is that many mainstream news outlets can generally be trusted to report the news and most are close to neutral. This leads pretty far down the rabbit hole as they end up discussing where and how they get their news. We then turn to the recent confidential document leak that led to the arrest of Jack Teixeira, an Air National Guard airman, who leaked hundreds of classified documents via a Discord server. We mostly sidestep the issue of whether such information should be made available (both of us think we have been slightly misled about the state of the war in Ukraine) and instead focus on what the US should be doing in Ukraine and whether we should be as involved as we are in fighting this proxy war with Russia. Ryan is actually more hawkish here, arguing that the US really does need to intervene in defense wars defending democracies while Tom is more circumspect and thinks that weaponizing the dollar may end up hurting the US in the end and replacing the dollar as the world's reserve currency.