Apero_

Interesting! I often look at decisions and try to think "Would the me of 40 years from now regret (not) doing this?". Would the "View from Above" concept apply here? By distancing myself from the current time?

Can I drop a hot question at you? If I worked in a field 7 years ago, then pursued something completely different, and now want to go back to that field, what's the best way to put this on a resume? Be upfront about the gap and how unrelated it was? Or only list the relevant jobs?

Not OP but from what I can gather, they didn't 'choose him', he just mentioned them in a Facebook post. Obama became interested in the idea of " finding smart, thoughtful writing from people who have a different political perspective than I do" (quote from the linked Facebook page) and a WIRED article about this website is one of five links he references.

As an aside, OP makes references to being from the UK. By UK/European standards, Obama is not particularly left-wing but pretty solidly centrist.

I'm interested to hear if you have any ideas on the best way to correct blatant misinformation that someone believes wholeheartedly.

Obviously, a lot of differences in opinions come from what things are accepted as fact. If someone truly believes a demonstrable falsehood as the premise for a belief, then trying to get them to change that belief is almost impossible without disproving the falsehood. However, a lot of extremist opinions seem to be based in the idea that information from sources we consider objective are themselves subjective because they're from the media/government/big business/scientists/doctors/politicians/lawyers/etc.

So if someone comes at me with "I don't believe September 11 ever happened": well, how do you even start? They know about media coverage, they know about the museum and the site, etc. they just don't believe it. So how can someone approaching this kind of conversation 'break through' that blatant disbelief? Or, more precisely: CAN someone break through that kind of disbelief? Another example which springs to mind is that of anti-vaccination campaigners who refuse to accept scientific literature because they believe it's all part of a campaign by 'big pharma'. How can you ever disprove the premise of their beliefs when they have already decided that every source you could reference is biased?

OMG really? I had no idea! I love her and now I guess I know why!