Good Points

Off Topic Politics & World Issues
61

[quote]thunderbolt23 wrote:
Except that it did - without the Civil War, there would have been no Civil Rights Act. The process was - and is - a long one.[/quote]

Riiiiight. I’m sure that all the blacks that lived between 1880 and 1950 would feel much better after hearing that…

(possibly like they feel when somebody tries to explain to any black who lived between 1928 and 1950 that FDR had no other choice but to allow the lynchings to continue. It ain’t pretty.)

[quote]thunderbolt23 wrote:
Well, he is a natural fit - the ‘Illinois Ape’ was ridiculed as a medicore intellect, a bad public speaker, a stubborn moralist, and guilty of waging an ‘illegal war’ all to try and get rid of an institution that would die an organic death if only we allowed it.[/quote]

Riiiiight. Interestingly, you forgot to mention that he was also born poor and became an orphan at a young age. He also didn’t regularly go to church, and was in fact an extremely intelligent self-made man and a superb writer, especially considering he didn’t have any formal education. Anyone can attack anyone with any argument. The problem with Bush is that he is – at his OWN admission – dim, and proud of it.

He’s also born of an extremely wealthy family and had the chance to be educated at some of the Nation’s top schools. So please don’t insult Lincoln’s intelligence by making those kind of comments. He started at the back of the pack and managed to get himself to the front.

Bush started in the front of the pack but has to have an army of people keeping him in the front because he’s trip over himself over and over if left unhelped.

[quote]thunderbolt23 wrote:
He was also a firm opponent of judicial activism.[/quote]

So am I. And actually most liberals.

What Conservatives don’t get is that there’s a “slight” difference between judicial activism and upholding the Constitution and the Bill of Rights. And respecting the ideas behind the Declaration of Independence, namely:

"
No man shall be compelled to frequent or support any religious worship or ministry or shall otherwise suffer on account of his religious opinions or belief, but all men shall be free to profess and by argument to maintain, their opinions in matters of religion. I know but one code of morality for men whether acting singly or collectively.
"

[quote]thunderbolt23 wrote:
Aside from the unalloyed references to God in his speech - which, I suspect, would ordinarily light afire your secular-left sentiments - [/quote]

No, they wouldn’t. I have the utmost respect for Men and Women of Faith. In fact, most of the people I deeply respect in this World are people of deep faith. What I despise is religion, as defined as brainless following of a set of rules without any critical mind.

[quote]thunderbolt23 wrote:
this great speech of reconciliation was primarily to bring together two groups of people that had been at war with one another.[/quote]

Absolutely.

[quote]thunderbolt23 wrote:
Presumably, your implication is that the current President lacks any such desire for unity, but your attempt is a miss. [/quote]

Why? He and his supporters constantly judge and are hostile towards people that don’t think like he does. I’ve read multiple accounts where even in his personal life, GWB is intolerant of people who disagree with him – with no account debunking that. And before you say it’s the “liberally biased press” that came up with that: in the past few weeks I have been working with some of his advisors and they openly corroborated those accounts.

He’s an extremely close-minded man, who doesn’t really accept any rationalization. He decides emotionally, and that makes him, on one hand, extremely easy to manipulate, and on the other extremely dangerous and unpredictable.

Fortunately, emotion was on our side during this past week, and that, along with the experience a lot of us in the consultant team accumulated arguing with conservatives in the past 5 years, we managed to get our points across beautifully (with the help of some crayons and really small words).

Unfortunately, I’m pretty sure my work in the next few weeks (explaining the way to pay for the bill) won’t be equally rewarding, since not only it will necessarily include a lot of long words, it might include the word taxes in the middle – which Bush already said he will not touch. Of course, he doesn’t realize it’s completely impossible to deal with the kind of budget deficits we’re been seeing – and will see – without doing something that he will not like.

And I’m not just talking about increasing taxes, since there are other ways to reduce the deficit. Problem is, he is not open to any of them.

Hence we’ll probably be focusing on selling the ideas to leading people of the two parties as we do to Bush, since if worse comes to worse we’ll fix it in 3 years…

(yes, because there’s a lot of moderate Republicans who are actually intelligent and open-minded people, believe it or not. Hopefully if the GOP wins the next election, it’s at least one of those)

[quote]thunderbolt23 wrote:
Again, great speech, peppered with God-talk, and while Bush is no Lincoln, there isn’t any coherent complaint that Bush doesn’t seek ‘peace with all nations’. [/quote]

If you cannot see the difference in attitude, I can’t help you…

But I respect that you said that “Bush is no Lincoln”. That is very true.

[quote]thunderbolt23 wrote:
Don’t forget that Lincoln created an ultimatum and waged a terrible war against his opponents. While your references to Lincoln’s desire for an ‘easy peace’ after the Civil War are notable, the kind of ‘hard war’ he waged would have had your Leftist righteous indignation at a fever pitch were you around in the 1860s.[/quote]

That’s BS. He was trying to save the Union, and free a whole race of Americans. How would I – or any true leftist ? be “indignated”? What caused me indignation was the obscene return of the South to the hands of White Supremacists after his untimely death…

You really don’t understand leftist liberals, do you? We have no problem with waging an extremely hard war, when there’s no other choice. Our point of disagreement with conservatives is the threshold, not War itself.

I believe that many conservatives like you do tend to confuse liberals with libertarians (liberal individualists). Those are two fundamentally different political philosophies… Libertarians are the ones that fundamentally oppose war. Trust me, there are few people in politics I despised more than Ayn Rand.

Remember that the American president who best embodied all the Leftist principles – FDR – sent the US into a bloody war too, where the US did some ugly stuff. And we don’t regret anything that FDR himself ordered to be done in that war. We’ll go into war and mean it – it’s just that maybe we have a little better imagination for alternatives when they exist. Which, in the case of the Civil War and WWII, they didn’t – and we realize that, as FDR did before everyone else in this country at the time.

62

[quote]Professor X wrote:
thunderbolt23 wrote:
Professor X wrote:

To do the most good, wouldn’t it be better as a country to focus on ways to instill that sense of advancement in youth instead of acting as if an entire segment of the population needs to be forgotten?

This isn’t happening?

If not, how not?

If the youth are not getting a ‘sense of advancement’, who is responsible and what should we do?

What programs are in place to instill that sense of drive in young people? I, personally, am not aware of any unless you include scholarships which are usually independantly sponsored by Universities or companies.

Who is responsible? This is America. Who isn’t?[/quote]

What programs? What programs? You can’t swing a dead fucking cat without hitting a damn ‘program’ designed to lift the poor, downtroden minority out of his plight.

Shouldn’t that tell you something? Everyone sitting around waiting on the gov’t to start another fucking program to help another victim.

It’s bullshit. Government is the least efficient way to get ANYTHING done wrt to social engineering. How many bungled, fumbled and mismanaged ‘programs’ do you need before something even resembleing a bell goes off in that big melon you have on your shoulders?

You don;t need fucking programs - you need “want to”. And that is something you get yourself. Government can’t tax, spend, or legislate self-reliance. Gov’t can only take it away. And that’s exactly what it has done.

63

[quote]rainjack wrote:
You don;t need fucking programs - you need “want to”. And that is something you get yourself. Government can’t tax, spend, or legislate self-reliance. Gov’t can only take it away. And that’s exactly what it has done. [/quote]

You do need programs either started by individuals or government regulated, otherwise, you have no room to bitch about the poor or the problems that large societies of poor in this country create. Either come up with a solution, or continue to be a part of the problem. You mentioned “want to”. Didn’t I already write that? Do you think “want to” will just drop out of the sky on people, especially if they didn’t have that perspective instilled in them in the first place?

There will always be poor in this country, but forgetting about those who do wish to rise above their situation hardly seems like the intelligent course of action. Does this mean we continue well fair in its current state? No, it doesn’t, but it does mean that some measures need to be taken because being poor is not the direct result of not trying in America.

In fact, what is your solution? Kill the poor people? Shut down any and all government assistance?

You mentioned self reliance. There were people who weren’t poor who killed themselves after this hurricane hit. They lost everything. Why penalize the poor for any lack of motivation when you can find that everywhere?

64

[quote]hspder wrote:

Riiiiight. I’m sure that all the blacks that lived between 1880 and 1950 would feel much better after hearing that… [/quote]

Despite your pouting that a utopia didn’t spring out of the end of the Civil War, without it and the preservation of the Union, there is every reason to believe that slavery as an institution would have continued - most likely in a separate country.

Oh, I didn’t forget to mention it.

Nope - his OWN ‘admission’ is self-deprecating humor and self-roasting. I understand such an approach may be difficult for you to grasp. While Bush is no Rhodes scholar, you need to separate self-effacing humor and actual admitted ignorance.

Setting aside the fact that the scions of the Democratic party fit your complaint just as easily, my point was that Lincoln was viewed by the nation’s well-to-do as a bumpkin and dim. The Gettysburg Address was reviled as too simple, too short, and too stupid. Again, my point was not to say Bush is Lincoln redux - my point is compare their respective critics, which are similar - arrogant, dense, and sneering.

Nonsense, and pure invective. Leftists can’t make up their mind - is Bush a criminal mastermind who never stops planning his ceaseless wars or is he just a vacant figurehead?

Maybe Stanford can have a symposium on it, followed up by a committee meeting and then a seminar.

[quote]So am I. And actually most liberals.

What Conservatives don’t get is that there’s a “slight” difference between judicial activism and upholding the Constitution and the Bill of Rights. And respecting the ideas behind the Declaration of Independence, namely:

"
No man shall be compelled to frequent or support any religious worship or ministry or shall otherwise suffer on account of his religious opinions or belief, but all men shall be free to profess and by argument to maintain, their opinions in matters of religion. I know but one code of morality for men whether acting singly or collectively.[/quote]

When anyone mentions ‘judical activism’, leftists go run and hide behind fears of separation of church and state.

A more cogent point, from Lincoln:

“…the candid citizen must confess that if the policy of the Government upon vital questions affecting the whole people is to be irrevocably fixed by decisions of the Supreme Court, the instant they are made in ordinary litigation between parties in personal actions the people will have ceased to be their own rulers, having to that extent practically resigned their Government into the hands of that eminent tribunal.”

This was in response to Dred Scot, the first case to ever utter the dread words ‘substantive due process’.

That is the concern, and while it is probably for another topic thread, left-liberals have no problem delivering vital questions affecting the whole people to be irrevocably fixed by decisions of the Supreme Court, especially when they can’t get their policy accomplished through ordinary democratic channels.

Which I believe is a fair point, as I think so, too - but just as frustrating is the brainless following of a set rules based in Reason without any critical mind.

Bush doesn’t think like you do - and you are openly hostile to him and indulge in all kinds of invective.

No, what you want is him to agree with you, and when he doesn’t he is ‘closed minded’ and ‘intolerant’. Classic leftist error - you get to be completely intolerant of conservative viewpoints, but you don’t offer the same opportunity to the other side?

I find this exceptionally difficult to believe given his response to terrorism, in which he came to the conclusion that the old rules of combat are still in play and the rewarmed neoMarxism - ie, the bad guys are only bad because we make them bad with our polices - was left on the shelf. With due credit, Clinton, while not as aggressive, had the same view.

Wait - I though Bush was extremely closed-minded and stubborn and one of his biggest downfalls was that he won’t change his mind, no matter what - now he is easily manipulated? Egad, no wonder you are an academic.

As for Bush being unpredictable - I really don’t think so. Has he done something - whether you agree with him or not - that you didn’t expect?

While I do find your stifling arrogance entertaining - I am quite familiar with academics who jack off to their own resumes - it is a convenient cheap shot to always sneer at conservatives being dumb. But then, that smothering elitism is what has delivered the recent elections into the hands of the Republicans, despite their screw-ups.

Conservatives tend to have a disdain for endless abstraction - that doesn’t mean conservatives are stupid. Surely at the highest levels of academia they teach you that diversity of viewpoints makes the world go round?

More of the same conceit - and it is very whiney.

Maybe it is your ideas he isn’t open to. Maybe there are others he is.

I realize it must have pained you to write that. I’ve known of this for some time. And I know plenty of libeals that are smart and effective.

Well, you haven’t helped me yet.

Lincoln suspended habeas corpus and defied a Supreme Court ruling.

65

[quote]Professor X wrote:
rainjack wrote:
You don;t need fucking programs - you need “want to”. And that is something you get yourself. Government can’t tax, spend, or legislate self-reliance. Gov’t can only take it away. And that’s exactly what it has done.

You do need programs either started by individuals or government regulated, otherwise, you have no room to bitch about the poor or the problems that large societies of poor in this country create. Either come up with a solution, or continue to be a part of the problem. You mentioned “want to”. Didn’t I already write that? Do you think “want to” will just drop out of the sky on people, especially if they didn’t have that perspective instilled in them in the first place?

There will always be poor in this country, but forgetting about those who do wish to rise above their situation hardly seems like the intelligent course of action. Does this mean we continue well fair in its current state? No, it doesn’t, but it does mean that some measures need to be taken because being poor is not the direct result of not trying in America.

In fact, what is your solution? Kill the poor people? Shut down any and all government assistance?

You mentioned self reliance. There were people who weren’t poor who killed themselves after this hurricane hit. They lost everything. Why penalize the poor for any lack of motivation when you can find that everywhere?[/quote]

Name one damn government program that can even be called a marginal success wrt raising people out of poverty.

The huge chasm between conservatives and liberals is precisely what we are talking about. Liberals feel that it is the responsibility of government programs to take care of those that are inferior to the rest of us. They are too dumb, too black, too retarded, to female, too Indian, too hispanic , too whatever to actually make it in this world. So we need to throw money at them and set up programs so that, at the very least, they will continue to vote for us.

I believe that this ‘want to’ is God breathed into every living human. I don’t believe gov’t is the arbitor of of ‘want to’ I don’t think the elitism displayed by you and Hspder has ever helped a single poor person attain anything resembling a free life, or a black man gain a shread of respect for himself.

My solution? End the cycle of dispair. Treat these folks like equals instead of second class citizens that are incapable of taking control of their own destinies. Allow churches, and other orgs. to step in and lend short termrelief. You can’t honestly tell me that 3 generations on the gov’t tit is helping anyone, can you? I’ll apologize if you’re a liberal democrat running for office, as you couldn’t possibly want antything to happen to the cash cow that gets you re-elected.

I’m more of an expert on what doesn’t work than I am on brainstorming solutions. But if there is anyone out there that thinks the government is the go to guy for solving our problems - they are wrong.

66

[quote]rainjack wrote:
Liberals feel that it is the responsibility of government programs to take care of those that are inferior to the rest of us. They are too dumb, too black, too retarded, to female, too Indian, too hispanic , too whatever to actually make it in this world. So we need to throw money at them and set up programs so that, at the very least, they will continue to vote for us. [/quote]

Inferior? Very telling choice of words. I am obviously not liberal because I don’t think being born poor and into a situation that doesn’t breed much hope makes anyone “inferior”.

Like I thought, you have no solutions…just much bashing of anything designed to help a persistant problem that involves you having to do anything.

67

[quote]Professor X wrote:
Inferior? Very telling choice of words. I am obviously not liberal because I don’t think being born poor and into a situation that doesn’t breed much hope makes anyone “inferior”.[/quote]

It’s the exact attitiude that you are displaying. These people are incapable of doing anything on their own, They need our help. They need a fucking program. Excepting the "f’ word - that is pretty much what you have said. And yes, to me you seem to be displaying a superiority complex. To read anything more into my choice of words is just pissing in the wind.

[quote]Like I thought, you have no solutions…just much bashing of anything designed to help a persistant problem that involves you having to do anything.
[/quote]

I’ve yet to see a single tax dollar funded program give anyone a shred of want to. But I like the way you completely gloss over the failings of the institution in order to comment on my choice of words.

“Want to” suggests that the person in the bad situation “wants to” get out of it bad enough to do something about it. Other than giving him and hand when it is warranted, and a job if one is to be had - what else is there to do? Play yahtzee at the community center on Thursday nights just to show how much I care?

Now answer your own question. The only thing I’ve heard out of you has been that we need programs.

Do tell, ProfX - explain to me a successful gov’t program. I’ve already mention church and other private orgs pitching in - but evidently that is not considered a plan. At least not on your scorecard.

68

[quote]thunderbolt23 wrote:
Again, my point was not to say Bush is Lincoln redux - my point is compare their respective critics, which are similar - arrogant, dense, and sneering.[/quote]

Which means that you’re qualifying the critics based on your personal opinion of the person being critiqued, not on the merits of the criticism.

[quote]thunderbolt23 wrote:
Nonsense, and pure invective. Leftists can’t make up their mind - is Bush a criminal mastermind who never stops planning his ceaseless wars or is he just a vacant figurehead?[/quote]

Don’t put us all in the same bag. I’ve always said he’s simply dumb. Never an EViL MaSTeRMiND. Now, some of the people surrounding him – well, I’ll leave to another discussion.

[quote]thunderbolt23 wrote:
Maybe Stanford can have a symposium on it, followed up by a committee meeting and then a seminar.[/quote]

I don’t know anybody at Stanford that doesn’t think he’s simply dim. So that would be a very short discussion, since people that don’t agree with us apparently will rather attack the institution rather than the interpretation of the facts.

[quote]thunderbolt23 wrote:
When anyone mentions ‘judical activism’, leftists go run and hide behind fears of separation of church and state.

That is the concern, and while it is probably for another topic thread, left-liberals have no problem delivering vital questions affecting the whole people to be irrevocably fixed by decisions of the Supreme Court, especially when they can’t get their policy accomplished through ordinary democratic channels.[/quote]

Again, you’re putting us all in the same bag. I do NOT – I repeat DO NOT – believe in judicial activism and completely agree with Lincoln on his statement. It is not the place of the judges to legislate from the bench. Just because some “left-liberals” do – actually I’d say they’re libertarians rather than liberals – doesn’t mean we all think the same way.

That might be surprising to you, because you simply adjust reality so it matches nicely whatever your leadership tells you. With liberals, it’s quite the opposite, to the point that it actually hurts us politically, since we are in constant disagreement with each other, something that confuses the general public.

What the general public doesn’t realize is that it’s the discussion that creates solutions – solving things “in principle” inevitably yields a lot of bad “solutions”.

As one of my colleagues once said, it’s like the GOP creates a Reality Distortion Field and sucks everybody into it. It?s a very effective marketing technique, but unfortunately a lousy policy for dealing with the actual reality that surrounds us.

[quote]thunderbolt23 wrote:
Which I believe is a fair point, as I think so, too - but just as frustrating is the brainless following of a set rules based in Reason without any critical mind.[/quote]

You’re contradicting yourself. By definition, using Reason means using a Critical Mind (among other things). To put it another way, Critical Thinking is part of Reason. Again, you’re using your own bias to attack a way of thinking you don’t fully understand.

[quote]thunderbolt23 wrote:
Bush doesn’t think like you do - and you are openly hostile to him and indulge in all kinds of invective.[/quote]

Yes, I am hostile to him because he represents a bunch of things I feel are wrong with the US – all at the same time. Can you blame me for that?

[quote]thunderbolt23 wrote:
No, what you want is him to agree with you, and when he doesn’t he is ‘closed minded’ and ‘intolerant’. Classic leftist error - you get to be completely intolerant of conservative viewpoints, but you don’t offer the same opportunity to the other side?[/quote]

We are only intolerant of intolerance – but whenever a conservative viewpoint is NOT based on intolerance, we will think about it and even agree if we think it is reasonable. I have agreed, for example, with Zap and BB many times on these boards. In fact, more often than not we agree. And they’re both Conservatives – just ones that think on their feet instead of living inside the Reality Distortion Field.

[quote]thunderbolt23 wrote:
I find this exceptionally difficult to believe given his response to terrorism, in which he came to the conclusion that the old rules of combat are still in play and the rewarmed neoMarxism - ie, the bad guys are only bad because we make them bad with our polices - was left on the shelf. With due credit, Clinton, while not as aggressive, had the same view.[/quote]

First, he still has a couple of good advisors (and some not so good, but…), and he does occasionally make some good calls when he listens to them. Second, some emotional responses might still be productive in the end. The problem is that they leave a lot of potential for disaster – like going into War in Iraq.

[quote]thunderbolt23 wrote:
Wait - I though Bush was extremely closed-minded and stubborn and one of his biggest downfalls was that he won’t change his mind, no matter what - now he is easily manipulated? Egad, no wonder you are an academic.[/quote]

If by being an academic means learning what you’re talking about before speaking, yes. You don’t seem to understand how manipulation works. Stubborn people are extremely easy to manipulate if they’re dumb because you can easily convince them a certain course of action is a) their own idea and b) fits their view of world.

I’ve personally used demonstrated manipulation techniques in Game Theory classes and even the most stubborn people fall for them easily if they’re dumb enough. There are whole books and websites about it, by the way, so if you look around you might even be able to learn some of the techniques yourself.

[quote]thunderbolt23 wrote:
As for Bush being unpredictable - I really don’t think so. Has he done something - whether you agree with him or not - that you didn’t expect?[/quote]

In macro-terms, not very often. But in more personal, micro-dealings, many people I know have been completely surprised about his reactions. What I’m afraid of is that, as his advisor team disbands (most of them are desperate to get out), nobody knows what he’s going to do.

[quote]thunderbolt23 wrote:
resumes - it is a convenient cheap shot to always sneer at conservatives being dumb. But then, that smothering elitism is what has delivered the recent elections into the hands of the Republicans, despite their screw-ups.[/quote]

There are dumb liberals and smart Republicans. I have never said otherwise. I just say Bush, specifically, is dumb. Some people in these boards are dumb, some of which accidentally are Republicans. Essentially, the fact that Bush calls himself a Republican is basically irrelevant for the purpose of this discussion. It?s just a label. .

[quote]thunderbolt23 wrote:
Conservatives tend to have a disdain for endless abstraction - that doesn’t mean conservatives are stupid. Surely at the highest levels of academia they teach you that diversity of viewpoints makes the world go round? [/quote]

Honestly, I think you have it backwards – at least for the most part of cases. However, I don’t like generalizations anyway, so either way I don’t think that comment is warranted.

[quote]thunderbolt23 wrote:
More of the same conceit - and it is very whiney.[/quote]

Whiney? So you feel that being frustrated with the lack of openness of this administrator to really consider feasible and realistic options on how to curb the budget deficit is whining?

Do you actually understand the consequences of having a budget deficit of the size we have now? Do you realize a) how mind-boggling big is our budget deficit and b) how bad is that? Bush, doesn’t, clearly, but do you?

[quote]thunderbolt23 wrote:
Maybe it is your ideas he isn’t open to. Maybe there are others he is.[/quote]

I wish that was true. If you want to prove your point, well, just show me a list of effective measures he’s taking to curb the deficit, and I’ll shut up, I promise.

[quote]thunderbolt23 wrote:
time. And I know plenty of libeals that are smart and effective.[/quote]

So why do you make such sweeping generalizations about the positions of the left?

[quote]thunderbolt23 wrote:
Lincoln suspended habeas corpus and defied a Supreme Court ruling.[/quote]

And…? At least he showed balls, and for a cause it was clearly just. The whole country was falling apart, balls were needed to make sure it would not happen. Why would I protest against that?

By the way, don’t even try to compare to our ?War on Terrorism?. It’s not like we have Islamofascits just taking over control of a group of states IN THE US and asking for different rules there to, say, allow oppression of women.

We do, however, have Christianofascists taking over whole States, asking for different rules, some of which to allow oppression of a minority. So we protest against that and resort to whatever tools we have. So who?s following Lincoln?s footsteps? The Left or the Right?

Just because I generally would be very worried about a President taking such action, doesn’t mean in certain situations it was not the only possible course of action. Which, it that case, it was – the very existence of the Union, and the life of millions of Black Americans was at stake, inside their own country.

I just wished we had a President half as ballsy as Lincoln that would stop the advancement of the Christian Right in its plight to remove the separation between Church and State ? instituted by our Founding Fathers ? with were of the good kind of Men of God, the kind that respects people who don?t believe in the same things as they do, but still deserve respect as the American citizens they are.

Again, your sweeping generalizations give credence to my statement that you do not understand the Left. So how about trying to understand before you criticize?

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[quote]hspder wrote:

Which means that you’re qualifying the critics based on your personal opinion of the person being critiqued, not on the merits of the criticism.[/quote]

Nope - I am actually saying that his critics - convinced by their smugmness - chose invective over substantive argument and wound up on the wrong side of history.

I am not attacking Stanford - I am attacking the futility of academics generally to propose solutions that actually work outside of the ivory tower.

I am glad, but you are missing what is considered the Liberal/Progressive watershed moment in trying to get the court(s) to legislate new rights from the bench. Perhaps you disagree with them, but seek out info on this - the left-liberals are quite fond of using the courts as an end’around the democratic process. Start with the commentary on Judge Robert’s comfirmation.

Actually, you are quite wrong in your terminology - libertarians despise the concept of judical activism.

Nor do I think ‘all of you’ think the same - but just as you generalize conservatives for purposes of discussion, I generalize about what the Left is up to broadly.

[quote}That might be surprising to you, because you simply adjust reality so it matches nicely whatever your leadership tells you.[/quote]

Nope, and you’re taking the easy way out. I have a list as long as ladders reagrding my gripes about the current leadership. It doesn’t do you well to think that because I am a Bush supporter that I am some brainless conduit of RNC talking points - but that is a tactic that you have chosen and is followed by many anti-Bush folks. And it is weak.

{quote]With liberals, it’s quite the opposite, to the point that it actually hurts us politically, since we are in constant disagreement with each other, something that confuses the general public.[/quote]

I wholeheartedly agree with this. But I don’t think that conservatives are of one mind - if you think so, go read the debates between conservative thinkers.

But I stand by my point that liberals are given to drown themselves in abstraction - and it make them often untrustworthy when decisions have to be made, particularly with imperfect information.

Tell your colleague he swung and missed. That is the kind of blinkered attitude you claim to be Enlightened above - all too often, it seems you and perhaps your colleagues cannot concede that the GOP has a different policy point of view than you in the marketplace of ideas.

The GOP is good at its job. Go read the platform - there is nothing tricky about it.

Again, nope, I’m not - adherence to blind Reason is as bad as adhering to blind faith. If you don’t think so, flip in your history book to the section on the French Revolution. Unalloyed Reason cannot rule any better than unalloyed faith.

Don’t misunderstand me, I don’t think that reason is bad, far from it - I just am acutely aware that militant rationalism is the same virus as religious fundamentalism.

This paints a lovely rhetorical picture, but it is not true. And my silly hyper-abstraction buzzer is going off. This utopian uber-tolerance standard you think you rely on is nothing more than nihilism. And it is dangerous.

And we probably agree on quiet a bit as well, but you keep resorting to this slur about the Reality Distortion Field. It’s cheap and lazy. It is the absence of an argument.

[quote]If by being an academic means learning what you’re talking about before speaking, yes. You don’t seem to understand how manipulation works. Stubborn people are extremely easy to manipulate if they’re dumb because you can easily convince them a certain course of action is a) their own idea and b) fits their view of world.

I’ve personally used demonstrated manipulation techniques in Game Theory classes and even the most stubborn people fall for them easily if they’re dumb enough. There are whole books and websites about it, by the way, so if you look around you might even be able to learn some of the techniques yourself.[/quote]

Being familiar with Game Theory, who exactly is manipulating Bush at this stage in the game?

Every big policy choice he has made can be defended. War? Even liberal hawks are on board. Tax cuts? Hardly unprecedented and is a conservative staple. Is there a chance, however remote, that Bush actually views the world as a Jacksonian conservative and acts accordingly? Could it be that his choices make sense, or are at least debatable?

And here is where you fall short - Bush’s policy choices are all defendable. You don’t have to like them or agree, but they aren’t so interplanetary as to think that someone must be manipulating Bush into actually going through with them.

Isn’t it perfectly plausible that Bush makes his own decisions and that just happen to be at odds with your own?

Yes. But answer me this - do you think that Bush doesn’t ‘get it’ based solely on the fact that he won’t implement a liberal economist’s policy choices?

Maybe Bush doesn’t get it - but more than anything, you seem irritated that he doesn’t agree with you. That is not, no matter how bad you want it to be, evidence that Bush doesn’t get the gravity of the deficit.

For the same reasons that you generalize about the Right. The Left actually stands for some broad, general principles, do they not? Even you think that liberals, generally, are only intolerant of intolerance. I am doing the same thing, but always with the caveat that not all liberals think the same.

True, we aren’t Europe. But do you know why Lincoln suspended habeas corpus, specifically? And do you think Howard Dean would be on board if the same scenario were true today?

Utter, baseless garbage. Which rule oppresses a minority? Rules against gay marriage? There has never been such an institution. Gays aren’t oppressed by not being allowed to marry more than polygamists are.

Let’s see - Lincoln surely would be a saint of liberal tolerance as tolerance deifned by the Left these days?

Lincoln defined slavery and polygamy as the “twin relics of barbarism”. Fighting for gay marriage in the footsteps of Lincoln? Think again.

And here comes another broad generalization of the Left - their definition of ‘oppression’ needs refining into something that doesn’t insult people who are actually oppressed in the world.

Well, I think you may want to dig up the history of the separation of church and state. You are free to make the Living Constitution argument regarding SOCAS, but the kind of separation you seek was not the kind endorsed by the Founding Fathers. Moreover, gay marriage is not exactly a SOCAS issue - although the Religious Right, who I am not found of, certainly make it out to be.

Actually, I understand the Left quote well. I actually make a distinction between liberals and leftists. Most of my friends are left of center. I don’t hate liberals, far from it - I just think they are misguided in their policy choices (and not necessarily all of them). How many times in one reply can you go to the well with “you just don’t understand”? Sorry, but I am unconvinced.

As is, this could go on for days, but I think I am done with this thread. I’ll give you the last word on that note, or you can PM me if you want to keep the fire lit.

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[quote]thunderbolt23 wrote:
Actually, you are quite wrong in your terminology - libertarians despise the concept of judical activism. [/quote]

First of all, there are several forms of libertarianism – there’s even socialist libertarianism. Second, I was thinking about the kind of issues that judges have been legislating from the bench on, most of which resulted in leaving libertarians very happy.

[quote]thunderbolt23 wrote:
But I stand by my point that liberals are given to drown themselves in abstraction - and it make them often untrustworthy when decisions have to be made, particularly with imperfect information.[/quote]

I haven’t seen any evidence of that being the case. I know it’s a common perception, but I honestly don’t feel it is rooted in fact.

[quote]thunderbolt23 wrote:
The GOP is good at its job. Go read the platform - there is nothing tricky about it.[/quote]

As you might imagine, Economy is always the place I look at first and the deepest. And GOP Economic policies are, to put it simply, completely absurd. The two absolute world records on public debt were obtained by two Republican Presidents: Reagan and GWB.

I would have no problem with the typical low-tax policy of the GOP if it were accompanied by budgetary constraint. The problem is, historically, Republican Presidents spend even more than Democratic ones. But I’ll get back to that later.

[quote]thunderbolt23 wrote:
Again, nope, I’m not - adherence to blind Reason is as bad as adhering to blind faith. If you don’t think so, flip in your history book to the section on the French Revolution. Unalloyed Reason cannot rule any better than unalloyed faith. [/quote]

“Blind Reason” is an oxymoron. What you’re saying would be like me saying that Jesus was EViL because some of his followers are.

[quote]thunderbolt23 wrote:
Don’t misunderstand me, I don’t think that reason is bad, far from it - I just am acutely aware that militant rationalism is the same virus as religious fundamentalism.[/quote]

The problem is not reason, much like the problem is not Christianity. The problem is dumb people who think they can apply reason, much like the problem is fascists who call themselves Christians.

[quote]thunderbolt23 wrote:
This paints a lovely rhetorical picture, but it is not true. And my silly hyper-abstraction buzzer is going off. This utopian uber-tolerance standard you think you rely on is nothing more than nihilism. And it is dangerous.[/quote]

Nihilist? That makes no sense. Why on Earth is uber-tolerance nihilist? Do we need to remove meaning from something in order to tolerate it? And dangerous? Even less sense. Why?

[quote]thunderbolt23 wrote:
And we probably agree on quiet a bit as well, but you keep resorting to this slur about the Reality Distortion Field. It’s cheap and lazy. It is the absence of an argument.[/quote]

It’s not cheap and lazy. Forgetting for a moment on all the other complete failures of imagination (like 9/11, the Iraq War, Katrina, and many others), Republicans continue to spend hordes of money that we don’t have. Our financial market hasn’t collapsed under a $500+ billion debt and / or the inflation and interest rates skyrocketed because the financial market is living in la-la land. Calling it a Reality Distortion Field is actually a very humoristic way of explaining something deadly serious.

[quote]thunderbolt23 wrote:
Being familiar with Game Theory, who exactly is manipulating Bush at this stage in the game?[/quote]

Like it wasn’t obvious…?

[quote]thunderbolt23 wrote:
Every big policy choice he has made can be defended. War? Even liberal hawks are on board. Tax cuts? Hardly unprecedented and is a conservative staple. Is there a chance, however remote, that Bush actually views the world as a Jacksonian conservative and acts accordingly? Could it be that his choices make sense, or are at least debatable?[/quote]

As I said he has some good advisors, so sometimes he makes good choices. He surrounds himself by people who are from his party, hence it’s normal that most of the time he adopts conservative policies. My point is that he is not a reliable and rational man himself.

[quote]thunderbolt23 wrote:
And here is where you fall short - Bush’s policy choices are all defendable.[/quote]

Honestly I don’t think that his fiscal and budgetary policies are in any way defendable within the realm of science. I’ve yet to see somebody that has any real knowledge of the science of Economics defend them.

[quote]thunderbolt23 wrote:
You don’t have to like them or agree, but they aren’t so interplanetary as to think that someone must be manipulating Bush into actually going through with them. [/quote]

Why would manipulation result in “interplanetary” choices? Isn’t it much more probable that it would result in choices that would benefit the manipulator, but not in such an open way it would be obvious?

[quote]thunderbolt23 wrote:
Isn’t it perfectly plausible that Bush makes his own decisions and that just happen to be at odds with your own?[/quote]

From what I’ve seen and heard, especially last week? No.

[quote]thunderbolt23 wrote:
Yes. But answer me this - do you think that Bush doesn’t ‘get it’ based solely on the fact that he won’t implement a liberal economist’s policy choices?[/quote]

No. I think he doesn’t ‘get it’ because he won’t implement any policies to combat it.

[quote]thunderbolt23 wrote:
Maybe Bush doesn’t get it - but more than anything, you seem irritated that he doesn’t agree with you. That is not, no matter how bad you want it to be, evidence that Bush doesn’t get the gravity of the deficit.[/quote]

What irritates me is the deficit. I’m about results: if anything he does results in a deficit in the realm of reason, I’ll be the first guy in the planet to praise him and admit I was wrong.

[quote]thunderbolt23 wrote:
But do you know why Lincoln suspended habeas corpus, specifically? And do you think Howard Dean would be on board if the same scenario were true today?[/quote]

Yes, I know why AL suspended habeas corpus. I’m pretty sure Howard Dean would be on board if Islamofascists were getting hold of power in some of the US and break the Union – if the situation were that serious. However, obviously I cannot speak for the guy, I’m not him.

[quote]thunderbolt23 wrote:
Utter, baseless garbage. Which rule oppresses a minority? Rules against gay marriage? There has never been such an institution. Gays aren’t oppressed by not being allowed to marry more than polygamists are.[/quote]

I never mentioned gay marriage. And you haven’t traveled much lately, have you? Even though I should have been expecting it, I was completely flabbergasted at the kind of comments and situations I saw in Red States during my travels in this Summer. And I’m not just talking about the general populating, I’m talking about Government officials, Policemen, etc.

[quote]thunderbolt23 wrote:
And here comes another broad generalization of the Left - their definition of ‘oppression’ needs refining into something that doesn’t insult people who are actually oppressed in the world.[/quote]

So, are you saying our citizens should be content as long as their life is marginally better than in the 3rd World?

[quote]thunderbolt23 wrote:
Well, I think you may want to dig up the history of the separation of church and state. You are free to make the Living Constitution argument regarding SOCAS, but the kind of separation you seek was not the kind endorsed by the Founding Fathers. Moreover, gay marriage is not exactly a SOCAS issue - although the Religious Right, who I am not found of, certainly make it out to be.[/quote]

We could argue on this until the cows came home – they’re not around anymore to tell us which one of us is right. I think we have different perceptions of what the intent was of the Founding Fathers, and let’s leave it at that. That’s the problem with reading stuff off a book rather than asking the author. If it was easy, we wouldn’t have like a gazillion different Christian denominations, would we?