[thedevil]

> Politics is not a truth-seeking exercise. It's no science, law or even journalism. It's an allegiance & authority forming exercise.

You've articulated well something I've been trying to say for a while.

I've been saying I try to avoid politics because politics is the opposite of math - the more you learn, the more stupid your thinking becomes.

I feel like my explanation just made me sound like a hater and yours nails the problem on the head.

[WhompingWindows]

I personally like how Obama viewed politics, as a game of football, perhaps like the recent "worst superbowl ever" where there is NOT much happening most of the time, just posturing/attempts. Lot of injuries, insults, fights, scandals, doping, but also occasionally beautiful plays that remind you sometimes teams are able to score. Analogy does break down on bi-partisanship, as ideally we'd get infrastructure, prescription drugs, and many other bi-partisan things done, and there are few "cooperative" things about sports when it comes to one team vs another.

[ultraluminous]

Well, your explanation is also fundamentally wrong. There is nothing "stupider" about learning how to arrive to a consensus and how to drive a result. The notion that learning math "makes" your thinking "smarter", but also simultaneously unable to affect a large scale change on society (cause politics are stupid!!1) is so obviously wrong I'd question the underlying assumption.