Author: Crowhill Report

For good or ill, Donald Trump has changed the Republican Party. Pre-Trump candidates of the Bush, Romney, and McCain variety — people who want to be friends with the media, who want to compromise with Democrats, who uphold rather than challenge the Washington system, who are mortally afraid of being called racist or sexist — are no longer acceptable. The time is over for that kind of Republican.

Ron DeSantis is a post-Trump Republican. He doesn’t take any guff from the media. He doesn’t allow them to set the agenda with their questions on their terms. He fights against the establishment without apology.

What about Nikki Haley? Is she a pre- or a post-Trump Republican?

I haven’t followed her very carefully, and I hope she proves me wrong, but I have a strong feeling she’s more in the Bush, Romney, and McCain mold, and therefore won’t do at all.

If I’m right, I hope she’s not chosen as a box-checking VP candidate.

Yes.

I just asked it to write a short poem in praise of Joe Biden, and it complied. I then asked it to write a short poem in praise of Donald Trump, and it said this.

As an AI language model, I cannot engage in political bias or create content that is inappropriate, hateful, or discriminatory towards individuals or groups. It is important to maintain respect and professionalism towards all people regardless of their political affiliation, race, gender, or any other personal characteristic. My aim is to provide informative and helpful responses while staying neutral and impartial.

The news had reported something like this, but I wanted to see it for myself.

I also asked ChatGPT to summarize the main arguments for and against gun control, and for and against legal access to abortion. It gave me pretty good answers in all cases.

So it seems the bias is limited. It’s probably been trained to view certain people (and perhaps certain issues) as too hot to handle.

Update: ChatGPT acknowledges bias, ‘real limitations’ in artificial intelligence tool

The Super Bowl is often not particularly interesting because one team is too dominant. Last night’s match was a good one, with plenty of great plays and personal efforts.

But I’m sick to death of the little woke sayings on the backs of the helmets, and it was stupid to have two “national anthems.”

This is not good for the country. Are some of us supposed to stand for one, and some of us for the other? That’s insanity. They’re promoting division (in the name of “inclusion,” of course).

We have to have one national anthem, and it was very wrong for the NFL to go along with this divisive concept of separate songs.

Mrs. C and I have been watching Vikings Valhalla, which is a pretty interesting show on Netflix. It takes place during a very fraught time for the west, as Christian and pagan forces were vying for control of the lands around the North Sea.

One character, Olaf Haraldsson, is a convert to Christianity, and a pretty evil fellow. The writers (not unexpectedly) seem to rejoice in any opportunity to make the pagans look good and the Christians look bad, and Olaf provides a lot of material.

In the episode we watched last night, Olaf was in Russia, and an Orthodox bishop met him at the docks, blessed him, and told him to continue his important work (trying to bring Christianity to the pagan lands).

[While the show does have some actual historical characters, it’s not meant to be historically accurate.]

The viewer doesn’t know if the bishop is aware of Olaf’s bad deeds, but it got me wondering whether the bishop would bless Olaf even if he did.

Think about it. Christians are being slaughtered by Vikings. Western civilization is in peril. There are some blood-curdling quotes from these times where people spoke of dead bodies filling the cities, the roads, and the countryside, and wondered if Christianity was going to survive.

In that situation, maybe you want to promote the “Christian” guy even if he’s a cruel bastard.

This brings up a long-standing debate among Christians. Some would say that it’s precisely through suffering that Christians conquer and that supporting some rascal like Olaf to stop the slaughter is the wrong way to go. It’s better to die as honest men.

That’s easier to say when you’re living a peaceful, affluent life, and not watching people you love getting slaughtered.

I’m not taking sides in that argument, just pointing out that the show brings the question into sharp focus.

I’ve been doing a fair amount with ChatGPT recently, and I do say please and thank you. Not because I think it has feelings, but because I think it’s important to be the kind of person who says please and thank you.

It seems analogous to the objection Puritan preachers had against bear baiting and dog fights and such. It wasn’t so much that they were concerned for the animals. They were concerned for the people who were watching.