US Congresswoman Gabrielle Giffords Shot, Six Die [Archive]

Louis VI the Fat

01-09-2011, 07:55

Really? That's not at all how your opening post spun it. You could have fooled me with that graphic of Sarah with an AR. It made it seem like, ya know, there was a direct connection between the two.

Is there any evidence, any at all (http://www.politico.com/blogs/bensmith/0111/What_we_know_about_Loughner.html), that suggests the shooter was motivated in any way by Sarah Palin's website?The shooter was a liberal as a juvenile. As an adult he radicalised to become an anti-government extremist. Why don't you moderates speak out against this extremism instead? :smash:

Not every Islamic suicide bomber needs to have steeped out of a mosque five minutes earlier, or even be a pious man. Nor does every extreme anti-governement nutter need to be a paying member of some Tea Party club or Rocky Mountain militia.

In the 1960s/70s the west was plagued by leftist terrorism. This existed in an atmosphere of Communist agitation, of constant questioning of the validity of the capitalist sytem. In the past fifteen years, in America, terrorism has been inspired by the extreme right and by anti-government agitation.

Giffords has been under serious threat ever since the Teas Party started its campaign of extremist anti-government agitation. As have been many other politicians. If one takes half of what is shouted by the Tea Party seriously, then it would be the duty of every American to rise up in arms against his government. Fortunately, most people do not take it seriously. But it only is a matter of time before some unhinged nutter does think it is all for real.

The shocking shooting of Rep. Gabrielle Giffords has Washington and the nation reeling, but the threat of violence is nothing new to the rising young star of the Arizona delegation. The Arizona representative was among several members of Congress whose vote in favor of Obama's health care legislation sparked vandalism and threats by opponents of the bill.

Just a few hours after legislators - including Giffords - voted to approve Obama's controversial health care bill in March 2009, the front door of Giffords' office in Tuscon was smashed in (http://azstarnet.com/news/local/crime/article_eb24e4fe-35dc-11df-ad88-001cc4c03286.html)by vandals.
Last August, Giffords aides called the police (http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2009/08/10/gabrielle-giffords-town-h_n_255656.html)after a man dropped a gun at a similar town hall style event at a Safeway.

She was among at least 10 congressional Democrats who expressed concern (http://www.nytimes.com/2010/03/25/health/policy/25health.html)about their personal security in the face of anonymous threats after voting in support of the health bill.

Crazed Rabbit

01-09-2011, 09:11

Can one flippantly talk about 'reloading' and putting people on your target list and not expect some unhinged nut to take you literally?

I accuse the Tea Party for its inflammatory rhetoric. And I accuse gun obsession. You reap what you sow.

What a crock. Inflammatory rhetoric? Tell me where they called for harming democrats.

For too long politicians have tried to silence people speaking against them by accusing them of encouraging violence through their speech. And now you seem to say small government supporters ought to just shut up because otherwise they're supporting violence.

This suspect seems crazy in the literal sense of the word. I feel I should remind you of what John Stewart has said about this, as it's relevant;

“Guns are not the problem … crazy is the problem” to thunderous applause from Oprah’s audience. You may watch the relevant excerpts in the attached video, but he goes on to make a truly profound statement; “We cannot legislate our society to the craziest amongst us.”

What you, sir, are trying to do is politicize the tragic acts of a madman to push back against a political group.

After the inspiring words of Charlton Heston explaining why we should not allow tragedies to drive us into abandoning the fundamental freedoms that define us as a nation and which bind us together as a people, Stewart admitted to having been one of those who called for the convention to be cancelled and then he did an astonishing thing. He apologized.

He said the apology was for “connecting irresponsibly the actions of two psychotics to an entire group of reasonable people expressing their Constitutional rights... the point is, I was wrong and Heston was right.”

In the past fifteen years, in America, terrorism has been inspired by the extreme right and by anti-government agitation.

Not a big fan of news or history, hmm? :inquisitive:

CR

Louis VI the Fat

01-09-2011, 11:53

For too long politicians have tried to silence people speaking against them by accusing them of encouraging violence through their speech.

This suspect seems crazy in the literal sense of the word.

a madman Surely the principle of incitement to violence itself is not in dispute? If an Imam calls for the destruction of the Great Satan, and then some of his listeners take the message literally and fly a plane intoa bulding, then surely we recognise that there has been an instigation of violence through speech?

As for the killer being 'a madman', 'crazy in the literal sense of the word' - he legally obtained the firearms he used. Something is amiss there, somewhere. Either we are not protected from complete loons aquiring legal firearms, or the guy is not a complete loon, but capable of some understanding of what he is doing and why for.

Here is what Sarah Palin said on the Facebook page where she depicted Gabrielle Giffords in the cross hairs of a rifle scope: "Don't retreat! Instead - RELOAD!" Well, the guy who shot Giffords yesterday managed to keep firing until he killed six, including a child, and wounded 13 .

Palin would no doubt say that she was only speaking in metaphor, that she only meant her followers should work to unseat Giffords and 19 other Democrats who had roused her ire by voting for health care. But anyone with any sense at all knows that violent language can incite actual violence, that metaphor can incite murder. At the very least, Palin added to a climate of violence.

Palin should have taken it as a warning of what might happen when a Tea Party hothead dropped a gun while heckling Giffords at an earlier Congress On Your Corner event, more than a year ago. That did not stop Palin from declaring Giffords a "target." Giffords' district office was subsequently vandalized, and the congresswoman noted that Palin had put "the cross hairs of a gun sight over our district."

"When people do that, they have to realize that there are consequences to that action," Giffords said.
Read more: http://www.nydailynews.com/news/national/2011/01/09/2011-01-09_palin_put_a_target_on_her_she_should_have_known_the_dangers.html#ixzz1AXCJHoNX

Fragony

01-09-2011, 11:56

Really sinister, reminds me of Fortuyn, the call to remove him from society was worded pretty much the same, doubt he had that in mind though. RIP I hope she didn't suffer all to much but I heard it took a while. Nasty this, very. If you have to use violence you never had a point

edit, how the hell did forgot to mention the other victims, terrible tragedy

Louis VI the Fat

01-09-2011, 12:05

Faces of Hope: Babies Born on 9/11.
http://www.amazon.com/Faces-Hope-Babies-Born-11/dp/0757300979

Faces of Hope is a photobook of American children who were born on 9-11, 2001. The nine year old girl who was killed in the shooting was one of them. :shame:

A sad, cruel and ironic twist. The hope, the innocence this girl represented, shot to pieces in the America she grew up in. Some loon who could buy all the arms he needed to fight his government, ended up killing a girl born on 9-11 in a brutal homegrown terrorist attack.

As they say, life is more absurd than literature. It feels like something out of Garcia Marquez, twists as one encounters them in Latin American surrealist literature.

Fragony

01-09-2011, 12:22

That's a bit tasteless Louis, this isn't about gun laws, I can get you an AK47 for 300

update: this is the killer's youtube input https://www.youtube.com:80/watch?v=7uRjwPWaxiY&feature=player_embedded#at=40

PanzerJaeger

01-09-2011, 13:05

Not every Islamic suicide bomber needs to have steeped out of a mosque five minutes earlier, or even be a pious man. Nor does every extreme anti-governement nutter need to be a paying member of some Tea Party club or Rocky Mountain militia.

Actually most (all) Islamic terrorists make their faith a large part of their identity, which leads us back to the my original question. Is there any evidence that Sarah Palin had anything to do with the motivation behind this shooting? It has been over 24 hours now and the shooter was active on the internet; certainly something would have emerged.

And if you think about it, such a motive makes little sense. The election has already been held, the Republicans won big, and the congresswoman was rebuked. If the shooter was a Tea Partier, he is very late to the party.

What is really disgusting about this incident (apart from the actual shooting) has been how quickly the Left has jumped to use it in an attempt to validate their rhetoric about the Tea Party. As in this thread, feigned sympathy for the victims masking cheap political point scoring.

Hosakawa Tito

01-09-2011, 13:08

From what little has been written about the suspect so far, he appears to be suffering from schizophrenia. Arizona Suspect's Recent Acts Offer Hints of Alienation. (http://www.nytimes.com/2011/01/09/us/politics/09shooter.html?pagewanted=1&hp)

“As I knew him he was left wing, quite liberal. & oddly obsessed with the 2012 prophecy,” the former classmate, Caitie Parker, wrote in a series of Twitter (http://topics.nytimes.com/top/news/business/companies/twitter/index.html?inline=nyt-org) feeds Saturday. “I haven’t seen him since ’07 though. He became very reclusive.”

Here's an article in the Wall Street Journal about the suspect. I copy and pasted the text as y'all might have to register to read it from a link.
.
Text By CHARLES FORELLE, ANN ZIMMERMAN And ALEXANDRA BERZON
TUCSON, Ariz.—In high school, Jared Lee Loughner was a scrawny kid with a bushy mop of curly hair under the hood of a gray sweatshirt, a saxophone player at football games who jammed with a friend's garage band.

More recently, in a series of videos he posted on YouTube, Mr. Loughner, now 22 years old, rages against the government and the constitution and refers to himself as a "terrorist."

Jared Lee Loughner, the man suspected of a shooting spree that killed a Federal Judge and critically wounded Congresswoman Gabrielle Giffords, had left a trail of online videos in which he railed against the government. WSJ's Neil Hickey reports.
.Then, a few minutes after 10 a.m. Saturday morning, authorities say Mr. Loughner, armed with a semiautomatic pistol fitted with an extended magazine, shot 19 people, killing six, in the parking lot of a Safeway supermarket a few miles from his parents' home just north of this desert city.

Among the severely wounded was his apparent target, Congresswoman Gabrielle Giffords, a 40-year-old Tucson Democrat in her third term.

Interviews with Mr. Loughner's friends and former classmates, as well as a review of his copious and bizarre online activity, describe a young man who fell into disturbing and erratic behavior.

In his freshman and sophomore years at Mountain View High School, Mr. Loughner flew under the radar. "All he did was play video games and play music," says Tommy Marriotti, a friend from those days.

Mr. Marriotti says much of his free time was devoted to the school band. He was not especially political, Mr. Marriotti said, though he expressed frustration with the Bush Administration.

Christina Lunderberg, 21, a bandmate of Mr Loughner's in high school, said he was a proficient saxophone player. "He was really good and talented and arrogant," Ms. Lunderberg said.

"No one really noticed him," other than his shock of bushy hair, said Josh Hatten, a classmate from elementary, middle school and high school.

By junior year, Mr. Loughner had changed. He used drugs, Mr. Marriotti said, and his grades slumped to the point that he talked about withdrawing from school. He didn't make it back for his senior year.

In 2007, the year he would have graduated high school, Mr. Loughner was arrested in Pima County and charged with drug possession and paraphernalia, according to court records. His case was "dismissed with prejudice."

He turned up at Pima Community College, where he took occasional classes. Once, Mr. Marriotti got an instant message from Mr. Loughner in which he said he was exercising and thinking of joining the military. He asked if Mr. Marriotti wanted to go for a jog. Mr. Marriotti said Mr. Lougher worked at an Eddie Bauer store in a Tucson mall and drove a late-60s Chevy Nova.

At Pima Mr. Loughner had five contacts with college police for library and classroom disruptions at two separate campuses, Pima Community College said in a statement. The college police also found a film made on campus and posted online saying the college was "illegal." In one video on YouTube, Mr. Loughner hints that he was a student at Pima and was ushered off the campus for protesting by the campus police.

At a news conference Saturday, the Pima County sheriff, Clarence Dupnik, minced few words: "There is reason to believe this individual may have a mental issue," he said.

The college confirmed that Mr. Loughner was a student there from 2005 through last October, when he was suspended "for violating the Student Code of Conduct," Rachelle Howell, a spokeswoman for the school, wrote in an email message. The college said Mr. Loughner voluntarily withdrew from the college in October.

By 8:30 p.m., Saturday, police and federal agents had cordoned off the road leading to a house on Soledad Ave. where neighbors said Mr. Loughner lived with his parents. Under floodlights, officials set up a table in the street to collect evidence and called a locksmith to open a safe in the house.

But much evidence of Mr. Loughner's behavior is online, in his videos. The short clips are well made but hard to comprehend. He doesn't appear in any of them and never cites any specific grievances.

In one video, Mr. Loughner says he is an Army recruit at Military Entrance Processing Center in Phoenix. The U.S. Army confirmed that Mr. Loughner tried to join the Army, but was rejected.

"He attempted to enlist in the Army but was rejected for service," an Army spokesman said. The spokesman said that in accordance with the Privacy Act he couldn't discuss why Mr. Loughner was rejected.

In recent months, he appeared to get more active with his video posts, a month ago uploading a video entitled "This Student At Pima Community College; An Unconstitutional Crime," in which he claims he is a victim of fraud for paying for an education he did not receive. In another video, he burns a flag and writes: "If there's no flag in the constitution then the flag in the film is unknown." He exhorts viewers to: "Burn your flag!"

In yet another video, he writes: "Current government officials are in power for their currency, but I'm informing you for your new currency!" He adds that his hope is for viewers to be "literate! The majority of people, who reside in District-8, are illiterate—hilarious. I don't control your English grammar structure, but you control your English grammar structure."

In a video called "How to: Mind Controller," he proclaims: "I'm able to control every belief and religion by being the mind controller!"

In the last video, uploaded to the Website on Dec. 15 and titled "Final Thoughts," Mr. Loughner calls himself a terrorist—"a person who employs terror or terrorism, especially as a political weapon." The video's rambling prose appears on the screen, while music plays in the background. He doesn't appear in any of them.

"You don't have to accept the Federalist laws," one passage reads. "Nonetheless, read the United States of America's Constitution to apprehend all of the current treasonous laws."

The video concludes: "The government is implying mind control and brainwash on the people by controlling grammar."

—John Emshwiller and Peter Sanders contributed to this article.

Fragony

01-09-2011, 13:45

So much for that as it seems right now, but clumsy rethoric, yes. Stupid people do stupid things, mind your words it's dangerous as idiots will actually see it as a cause. That target map in OP, what the hell were they thinking, so very very dumb

Beskar

01-09-2011, 13:48

Rhyfelwyr

01-09-2011, 13:55

What is all the stuff about "grammar" supposed to mean? :mad:

I think it couldn't be clearer the guy was mental and I don't see any signs of inspiration from Palin or the Tea Party in what I've read of him.

All we know of his political views is that he was once a leftist. And that he came to be anti-government.

Anti-government leftists? Sounds like some people on this forum! :idea2:

Now we can all tarnish them through guilt by association...

Fragony

01-09-2011, 13:58

I love this point. Great rhetoric.

I don't, it's cheap to look for any significance in what is a pretty cruel end to her life. She never had to do anything with everything, why use her for it, she's not an argument she just was born on 9/11, so don't use her like one. It isn't clever it isn't ironic, she's just dead

Furunculus

01-09-2011, 14:38

even zee germans are saying its daft for the left to blame palin for this (tho it comes across as tactical advice for the yank left):
http://www.spiegel.de/international/world/0,1518,738627,00.html

plus the telegraph post again, as it says everything that needs saying:

The unseemly rush to blame Sarah Palin, the Tea Party and Republicans for murder in Arizona

Congresswoman Gabrielle Giffords of Arizona, by all accounts an outstanding public servant and person, is battling for her life in hospital after being shot by a 22-year-old man at close range at a “Congress On Your Corner” event in her home district. Six people are dead, including a judge and a girl of nine, and a dozen others are being treated for their wounds.

It is, as President Barack Obama said, an “unspeakable tragedy”. It is also, as he added, “a senseless and terrible act of violence has no place in a free society”. That much we know and the President wisely did not seek to make political capital out of the carnage or jump to conclusions about the motivations of the gunman, named as Jared Loughner.

That, of course, hasn’t stopped some on the Left clamouring to blame Sarah Palin, the Tea Party or Republicans in general for what happened.

Paul Krugman of the “New York Times” suggests darkly that Giffords was shot because she was “a Democrat who survived what was otherwise a GOP sweep in Arizona” and “violent acts are what happen when you create a climate of hate” (those reponsible for such a climate being, of course, Republicans).

TBogg of FireDogLake wades straight in and blames Sarah Palin for the shooting because of a graphic of crosshairs placed on the districts of moderate Democrats who voted for healthcare reform. Was the Palin graphic clever? No. But martial imagery is standard political fare and, as Matt Lewis points out, there’s no shortage of Democrats who’ve engaged in it (VerumSerum has found a Democratic Leadership Committee target map).

Jane Fonda pins it on Sarah Palin, Glenn Beck and the Tea Party.

Even the local sheriff (a Democrat) has been getting in on the act. Sheriff Clarence Dupnik (a Democrat) said:

When you look at unbalanced people, how they respond to the vitriol that comes out of certain mouths about tearing down the government. The anger, the hatred, the bigotry that goes on in this country is getting to be outrageous. And, unfortunately, Arizona I think has become sort of the capital. We have become the Mecca for prejudice and bigotry.

Well, we’ll see. Personally, I’d be more reassured by a sheriff who concentrated on facts rather than over-heated, sweeping generalisations.

So what are the facts we know so far? From what we know about Loughner, he was a deeply disturbed young man who railed about literacy rates, spoke of flag burning and creating a new currency.

Former classmates talk of “nonsensical outbursts” and a person “on his own planet”. His favourite reading apparently included “Mein Kampf” and “The Communist Manifesto”. My colleague Jon Swaine has a summary here of the raving of a person who most people would judge to be a complete nutcase even if he hadn’t gone out and shot people.

Oh, and another former classmate said he was “left wing, quite liberal”. Naturally, this doesn’t stop Jacob Heilbrunn, pontificating that the shootings are evidence of that the “radical right is becoming even more radicalised and violent”.

Ben Smith sums up the current picture of Loughner pretty well:

The obsession with the gold standard and the hostility to the federal government resonate with the far right, the burned American flag with the left, but the discussion of mind control and grammar sound more like mental illness than politics.

This is highly inconvenient for certain people on the Left so they ignore it. They would much prefer the shooter to have been a white male in his 50s, the description the sheriff gave of a second person of interest (we’ll see if such a person materialises) but they’ll still try to make hay with a weirdo like Loughner.

Giffords herself doesn’t quite fit the likely victim of an enraged Right-winger. She is a Blue Dog Democrat, a deficit hawk and voted to lift the ban on guns in DC and voted against Nancy Pelosi for Speaker. On Thursday, she took part in the reading of the Constitution in the House, reading aloud the First Amendment, which guarantees freedom of religion, speech and peaceful assembly.

She’s certainly not the “progressive” that Hanoi Jane tweeted about and provoked as much anger on the Left as on the Right for her political stances. Just the other day, a blogger at DailyKos said that Giffords was “dead to me” for failing to back Pelosi.

Plenty more will emerge in the coming days about Loughner’s motivations and those of any accomplice. It seems certain that the attempted assassination was politically motivated but in exactly what way is, at this stage, very murky.

This is a time for sombre reflection and a calming (rather than an escalation) of rhetoric. Sadly, however, some see it as another opportunity to score political points and vilify those they hate.

Louis VI the Fat

01-09-2011, 14:50

What is really disgusting about this incident (apart from the actual shooting) has been how quickly the Left has jumped to use it in an attempt to validate their rhetoric about the Tea Party. As in this thread, feigned sympathy for the victims masked cheap political point scoring.Genuine outrage, PJ.

The Backroom lacks a search function. I would like to link here to the 'Obama' thread(?), where Banquo and I repeatedly and to some lenght shared our sentiment that we thought that a great many things openly said in US politics are tantamount to treason and sedition.

Political climate is important. It can kill people.

Which begs the question: 'If that is so, silly Louis, then how come all those millions of armed and apparantly easily excitable Tea Party'ers do not kill, save for one (two?) lunatic?'
Well, that is because the link is not that causal. One is not turned from a sane, law-abiding citizen into a murderer by a few Palin bumper stickers. The killer did not decide on his act after careful political delibiration. I think that this man could just as easily have gone on a shooting rampage on his college. It is not the political climate that made him mental, it is what made him chose a political target. And perhaps, just maybe, gave him that final bit of assurance he needed to self-justify his act.

Why are gays and blacks beaten up in the Moscow underground, but not in the Paris and London ones? Is it owing to individual tastes? Or should one look at broader sociological context, regard it in the context of homophobia and racism, a culture of hate? Why do desperate lonely man commit suicide in Japan, but go on a killing spree in the West? And why do women never do sthis stuff? It is all not a matter of individuals, but of sociological phenomena.

Lemur

01-09-2011, 16:05

The Congresswoman sounds like a very sane, very levelheaded person. A loss to our country.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R7046bo92a4

Seamus Fermanagh

01-09-2011, 17:12

I've been saying Ave's for those killed and maimed by this. It is a horrible thing and something of which we should be ashamed.

So far, the dead include the above-mentioned innocent little girl -- my daughter turns 9 today, so I am not far removed from that sense of pain -- along with a 63-year old Federal Judge, a 30-something Giffords staffer who recently got engaged, and three grandmom-types in their 70s.

The Congresswoman is given a fair chance to survive, though nobody is willing to estimate the amount of brain damage. The bullet entered her left temple area and exited from the top left portion of her forehead. Nobody knows what other damage from internal friction and hydrosshock effect may have (or will soon) occur. She responded to the presence of her husband in the hospital, but cannot speak.

Pictures of the shopping area are chilling in their normality. This shopping center could have been picked up and dropped in virtually any suburb or urban area in the USA without anyone noticing. We have all driven by or shopped at hundreds more or less exactly like it.

Politics is a dangerous business in a country that allows all a voice and allows all weapons. From those who signed our Declaration to the present day, our leaders have always paid a price for those freedoms we hold dear.

Five signers of the Declaration were hanged as traitors (roughly 1 in 11).

Four Presidents have been assassinated while in office: Lincoln, Garfield, McKinley, and Kennedy (1 in 11).

Attempted assassinations were made on: Reagan, Carter, Ford, Truman, and FDR; other plots/attempts were headed off by good protection efforts: Nixon, LBJ, others? Several leading candidates for the Presidency have been shot, notably Roosevelt, RFK, and Wallace.

Over our history, 3 Congresspersons have been assassinated (including RFK above) while in office, 2 have been murdered (one by his son, one in Guyana), 1 died in a hunting accident, and 3 more died as the result of a duel.

Dueling also ended the life of Alexander Hamilton.

Politics in the USA has always beeng fractious -- and at times highly so. Violence has always been a component of our society. Political freedom as we enact it has never been obtained for free. The price continues to conform to that acknowledged in the closing of our Declaration. While we would prefer to see the tree watered only with the blood of tyrants, Jefferson was correct in noting the real price of that tree's flourishing.

Husar

01-09-2011, 17:19

And what about the 6 people who died? Collateral damage? Not important?

Why does it always seem like the single congresswoman was/is more valuable as a human being than the six people who died?
Or is that just my impression?

I know she's a politician but the news coverage reminds me of this: http://www.theonion.com/video/beyonce-unhurt-after-stray-bullet-miraculously-hit,14162/

Ronin

01-09-2011, 17:22

Genuine outrage, PJ.

The Backroom lacks a search function. I would like to link here to the 'Obama' thread(?), where Banquo and I repeatedly and to some lenght shared our sentiment that we thought that a great many things openly said in US politics are tantamount to treason and sedition.

Political climate is important. It can kill people.

Which begs the question: 'If that is so, silly Louis, then how come all those millions of armed and apparantly easily excitable Tea Party'ers do not kill, save for one (two?) lunatic?'
Well, that is because the link is not that causal. One is not turned from a sane, law-abiding citizen into a murderer by a few Palin bumper stickers. The killer did not decide on his act after careful political delibiration. I think that this man could just as easily have gone on a shooting rampage on his college. It is not the political climate that made him mental, it is what made him chose a political target. And perhaps, just maybe, gave him that final bit of assurance he needed to self-justify his act.

Why are gays and blacks beaten up in the Moscow underground, but not in the Paris and London ones? Is it owing to individual tastes? Or should one look at broader sociological context, regard it in the context of homophobia and racism, a culture of hate? Why do desperate lonely man commit suicide in Japan, but go on a killing spree in the West? And why do women never do sthis stuff? It is all not a matter of individuals, but of sociological phenomena.

QFT.

Seamus Fermanagh

01-09-2011, 17:25

And what about the 6 people who died? Collateral damage? Not important?

Why does it always seem like the single congresswoman was/is more valuable as a human being than the six people who died?
Or is that just my impression?

I live in a country where the 30 minutes of national new broadcast follows then 30 minutes of local news broadcast and both are followed by an hour's worth of celebrity "news" broadcasting. Of COURSE its the Congressperson who is getting the headlines. That's been human nature for years. We have a painting of Marat dead in his tub, but nobody bothered to paint a final portrait of anybody else murdered in that city that year -- human nature at work here Husar. You lament our mis-ordered priorities (and they are) but you're tilting at windmills.

Crazed Rabbit

01-09-2011, 17:57

Surely the principle of incitement to violence itself is not in dispute? If an Imam calls for the destruction of the Great Satan, and then some of his listeners take the message literally and fly a plane intoa bulding, then surely we recognise that there has been an instigation of violence through speech?

It certainly is in dispute. Show me where Sarah Palin or some other politician incited people to violence. A clumsy graphic design is not incitement to violence. If you're going to compare this to Imams calling for the destruction of the great satan, though show an equivalent example.

Instead what you are trying to do, as I said before, is to use this tragedy to silence political opposition. Politicians and activists of all stripes use inflammatory rhetoric. Such things have been said for years, and they weren't a problem, because most people aren't crazy and understand no one was calling for violence.

It is increasingly obvious this man was not a tea party supporter. And yet you would use his actions to condemn an entire group of people for speaking against the scale of government, and would have us believe that to criticize the government is to call for the killing of people.

Instead, everyone who disagrees is expected to do so mutely and without opposition.

Nuts to that, I say.

CR

Fragony

01-09-2011, 18:48

To be fair it is, they are marked as targets. This really shouldn't have happened, it isn't just clumsy, intentional meh let the loonies think that, but stupid yes and not a little bit stupid, but very very stupid

HoreTore

01-09-2011, 19:11

This is the very definition of terrorism.

Crazed Rabbit

01-09-2011, 19:32

Okay then, Horetore, what political views was he trying to advance?

CR

HoreTore

01-09-2011, 19:35

Okay then, Horetore, what political views was he trying to advance?

CR

Most likely his own.

Louis VI the Fat

01-09-2011, 20:00

CR - try these examples:

There is this place, country X. Its priests say that if you commit suicide you will burn forever, but if you manage to get killed together with killing 'the right persons', you will receive 72 virgins. What effect does the religion of this place have on young suicidal men? Surely there will be less suicides, and more 'martyrs' than in comparable other societies?

Country Y. Men with guns are depicted as weaklings. As effeminate gays. Clumsy fools, nerds who can't decide any fight with arguments. In country Z, tv shows depict guns as a decisive means of resolving conflict. Guns in movies have nearly cartoon like qualities - few ever get really hurt, least of all the hero.
In which country will a man, hurt in his pride, humiliated, be most likely to use guns as a means of last resort to restore his pride?

Country A. Night after night mass media tells stories about how the Jews are avaricious parasytes. Never does the propaganda sleep. In country B there is a lot of emphasis on equality, individuality, on an appreciation of cultural differences.
In which country is a random unhinged loon, not necessarily an ideological anti-Semite himself, most likely to end up taking his frustration out by beating up a random Jew in the street?

Religion, gun culture, a climate of hate - these all have an effect. One does not need to be an ideologue of any of these three to feel their effect. One does not even need to be consciously aware of them to act in accordance with them.
They all have subtle effects. So subtle one does hardly notice them, because the societal parameters, expectations, they set are considered normal. As they say, the last thing a fish will discover is the water it swims in.

And what about the 6 people who died? Collateral damage? Not important?

Why does it always seem like the single congresswoman was/is more valuable as a human being than the six people who died?
Or is that just my impression?We foremost discuss the congresswoman because the six dead ARE collateral damage, to an assault on her and not the other way round.

Also, an attack against an elected representative is an attack against the office, not just against a person.

gaelic cowboy

01-09-2011, 20:41

I seen on telly there is some talk of an accomplice now.

HoreTore

01-09-2011, 20:55

Yeah he's wanted all over the US.

Looks like an older guy, maybe in his 50's? If so it's a big hole in the "young radical loner"-theory.... But it'll tie right into what we've seen with islamist terrorism, where older men are the organizers, and the actual bombers are young men in their early 20's....

Crazed Rabbit

01-09-2011, 21:17

Religion, gun culture, a climate of hate - these all have an effect. One does not need to be an ideologue of any of these three to feel their effect. One does not even need to be consciously aware of them to act in accordance with them.
They all have subtle effects. So subtle one does hardly notice them, because the societal parameters, expectations, they set are considered normal. As they say, the last thing a fish will discover is the water it swims in.

Ah, a climate so insidious and prevalent you proclaim the non-inciting free speech against government, and not mental instability, caused this man to become violent, yet so vague that you can only provide completely hypothetical situations of theoretical countries as actual examples of violence-inciting speech.

You speak of a climate of hate - presumably those in opposition to large government should speak of it tenderly and lovingly while they argue against it, since to argue passionately against it means they are on the hook for every crazy who attacks someone.

CR

HoreTore

01-09-2011, 21:29

So.....

It's impossible to say "we want to win these elections" without putting crosshairs on a map....?

Edit: funnily enough, John McCain is fully capable of arguing against big government without descending into hateful madness. He is more passionate than the deranged loonies associated with Palin and the Tea Party, yet he h never crossed the line and turned to hatred and fear.

But then again, I think he's the kind of man who is fine with the idea of having a black man as president.

a completely inoffensive name

01-09-2011, 22:55

Politics is a dangerous business in a country that allows all a voice and allows all weapons. From those who signed our Declaration to the present day, our leaders have always paid a price for those freedoms we hold dear.

Five signers of the Declaration were hanged as traitors (roughly 1 in 11).

Four Presidents have been assassinated while in office: Lincoln, Garfield, McKinley, and Kennedy (1 in 11).

Attempted assassinations were made on: Reagan, Carter, Ford, Truman, and FDR; other plots/attempts were headed off by good protection efforts: Nixon, LBJ, others? Several leading candidates for the Presidency have been shot, notably Roosevelt, RFK, and Wallace.

Over our history, 3 Congresspersons have been assassinated (including RFK above) while in office, 2 have been murdered (one by his son, one in Guyana), 1 died in a hunting accident, and 3 more died as the result of a duel.

Dueling also ended the life of Alexander Hamilton.

Politics in the USA has always beeng fractious -- and at times highly so. Violence has always been a component of our society. Political freedom as we enact it has never been obtained for free. The price continues to conform to that acknowledged in the closing of our Declaration. While we would prefer to see the tree watered only with the blood of tyrants, Jefferson was correct in noting the real price of that tree's flourishing.

While this is completely true, this is not something that should talked about as if it is inherently American to have violence in our politics. Our Founding Fathers chose violence as the last resort after sending multiple peaceful inquiries to the king asking for representation or a decrease in taxes. They then set about creating a political system which is based around the peaceful transition of power between individuals. Violence marks much of American history, but we must never let violence define American political history.

Crazed Rabbit

01-09-2011, 22:57

So.....

It's impossible to say "we want to win these elections" without putting crosshairs on a map....?

Of course. But that's not really what Louis is talking about.

Edit: funnily enough, John McCain is fully capable of arguing against big government without descending into hateful madness. He is more passionate than the deranged loonies associated with Palin and the Tea Party, yet he h never crossed the line and turned to hatred and fear.

But then again, I think he's the kind of man who is fine with the idea of having a black man as president.

Why don't you link to some examples of the loony leaders of the Tea Party or Palin saying deranged things? You know, concrete examples of turning 'to hatred and fear'.

CR

HoreTore

01-09-2011, 23:07

Of course. But that's not really what Louis is talking about.
Why don't you link to some examples of the loony leaders of the Tea Party or Palin saying deranged things? You know, concrete examples of turning 'to hatred and fear'.

CR

I humbly submit every episode of the Glenn Beck show. Which, as you know, is required viewing for every tea party nutter.

Edit: Oh, and the whole "Obama is a muslim" and "Obama isn't born in the US" nonsense.

Edit2: oh, and of course the pic in the OP. Classic example. And the guy talkled about in the OP who wanted people to join his symbolic murder of opposing candidates.

Hosakawa Tito

01-09-2011, 23:26

The supposed accomplice was a cab driver who was cleared of any involvement by the police, no doubt with much chagrine by many conspiracy theorists. People wishing to spin this for political points without even waiting for the investigation to reveal the facts of this tragedy are really pathetic. A good time for me to go on vacation for a bit. While I'm gone y'all can research this quote from a well known politician, " If they bring a knife to the fight, we bring a gun."

Crazed Rabbit

01-09-2011, 23:32

HoreTore

01-09-2011, 23:35

I believe I have already mentioned one, Palins map of America with crosshairs.

And I've mentioned the birthers too, haven't I?

For another one, how 'bout that old retarded woman McCain corrected when she said Obama was a muslim?

And I suppose you want a quote from Palin as well? How about her "death panel"-nonsense?

Louis VI the Fat

01-10-2011, 02:55

People wishing to spin this for political points without even waiting for the investigation to reveal the facts of this tragedy are really pathetic. A good time for me to go on vacation for a bit. While I'm gone y'all can research this quote from a well known politician, " If they bring a knife to the fight, we bring a gun."This isn't spinning this for political points. I have repeatedly said here on the .org that things are now shouted openly in America's polarised climate that are close to sedition. This tragedy was quite predictable. The question is then whether I should remain silent exactly when matters come to a head.
It is common that in the wake of an Islamic terrorist attack questions are raised about the influence of Islamic extremism. I certainly do. I do not see how this is different.

'As Giffords struggles for her life and the country mourns its dead some insist it is too soon to draw broader political conclusions from this tragedy. But if those conclusions had been understood sooner, it is possible that such a tragedy might have been prevented.'

Louis VI the Fat

01-10-2011, 03:00

“They Bring a Knife…We Bring a Gun”
“Get in Their Faces!”
“I don’t want to quell anger. I think people are right to be angry! I’m angry!”
“Hit Back Twice As Hard”
“We talk to these folks… so I know whose ass to kick.“
“It’s time to Fight for it.”
“Punish your enemies.”
“I’m itching for a fight.”Some more quotes from the guy mentioned by Hosakawa.

What I'm asking for is just a simple link to what you or Louis consider to be inciting violence, or a climate of violence. Not some glib reference, not hypothetical scenarios.

Actual, specific, events.

CRIsolated quotes are not a useful means of describing a complex phenomenon. At any rate, your quotes sound like a dangerous Marxist bend on destroying America. Time to show this tyrant what the second amendment is for!

Here you go for the climate of extremism and polarisation, in which an actual act of political violence is not only predictable, but has been predicted:

Jared Loughner, the suspect in Saturday's shooting spree in Arizona, was not working alone. True, the rampage apparently emerged from his confused, unstable and troubled mind. But it was also the byproduct of a polarised political culture underpinned by increasingly vitriolic, violent and vituperative rhetoric and symbolism.

Fights outside town hall meetings, guns outside rallies, Facebook pages calling for assassinations, discussions about the most propitious moment for armed insurrection. In late October I asked a man in the quaint town of Salida, Colorado, if President Barack Obama had done anything worthwhile. "Well he's increased the guns and ammunitions industry exponentially," he said. "My friends are stockpiling."
To dismiss these as the voices and actions of the marginal was to miss the point and misunderstand the trend. America is more polarised under Obama than it has been in four decades: the week he was elected gun sales leapt 50% year on year.

Where the right is concerned the marginal and the mainstream have rapidly become blurred. Neither the Tea Party nor Obama created these divisions. But over the past two years they have intensified to an alarming degree. Polls last year revealed that a majority of Republicans believe Obama is a Muslim and a socialist who "wants to turn over the sovereignty of the United States (http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/usa) to a one-world government" while two-thirds of Republicans either believe or are not sure that the president is "a racist who hates white people", and more than half believe or are not sure that "he was not born in the US" and that he "wants the terrorists to win".

In this alternative reality armed response becomes, if not logical, then at least debatable. After all, if Obama truly were a foreign-born, white-hating terrorist sympathiser who has usurped the presidency, drastic action would make sense. One anti-Obama campaigner carried a placard saying, "It is time to water the tree of liberty"– a reference to Thomas Jefferson's famous quote: "The tree of liberty must be refreshed from time to time with the blood of patriots and tyrants." It's the same quote Timothy McVeigh was wearing on his T-shirt when he was arrested for bombing the Federal Building in Oklahoma City, killing 168 people.

Moreover, many of these extreme views and much of this antagonistic tone is explicitly sustained and implicitly condoned by the Republican hierarchy. When a congressman shouts "liar" at Obama during his state of the union speech he receives a huge spike in donations. Sharron Angle, the Nevada Republican candidate who came close to ousting Democratic leader Harry Reid, once suggested "second amendment remedies" if the Congress continued on its path. The second amendment refers to the right to bear arms.

In few places was the national atmosphere played out more dramatically than in the border state of Arizona. In April Raul Grijalva, in Gabrielle Giffords's adjacent constituency, faced bomb threats for opposing a new anti-immigration law. In October, his office was daubed with swastikas and white paint. In August she called police after a man dropped a gun at an event similar to the one she attended on Saturday. A few months ago Sarah Palin, targeting Giffords's marginal constituency, put the seat in crosshairs, and encouraged supporters to "reload and take aim". At the time Giffords explained: "The thing is, the way that she has it depicted — the crosshairs of a gun sight over our district — when people do that, they've got to realise that there's consequences for that action."

The connection between this rhetoric and Saturday's events are not causal but contextual. The shooter was not likely to be acting under direct instructions but in an atmosphere that made such an attack more likely rather than less. Whatever his motives, this was a targetted act of domestic political violence, and that scenario was not only predictable but widely predicted.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2011/jan/09/giffords-shooting-political-violence-polarised

PanzerJaeger

01-10-2011, 08:55

Here you go for the climate of extremism and polarisation, in which an actual act of political violence is not only predictable, but has been predicted:

http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2011/jan/09/giffords-shooting-political-violence-polarised

Absolute tripe.

'Even if the motivation for the killings had nothing to do with Sarah Palin, the Tea Party, or Right-wing politics in the slightest, we will still feel justified in using it as an example of the dangers that Sarah Palin, the Tea Party, and Right-wing rhetoric pose.' :shame:

Please tell me Louis that you are trying to make some esoteric point about the Western reaction to Islamic terror and don't honestly buy into this line of reasoning.

Hosakawa Tito

01-10-2011, 13:25

This isn't spinning this for political points. I have repeatedly said here on the .org that things are now shouted openly in America's polarised climate that are close to sedition. This tragedy was quite predictable. The question is then whether I should remain silent exactly when matters come to a head.
It is common that in the wake of an Islamic terrorist attack questions are raised about the influence of Islamic extremism. I certainly do. I do not see how this is different.

'As Giffords struggles for her life and the country mourns its dead some insist it is too soon to draw broader political conclusions from this tragedy. But if those conclusions had been understood sooner, it is possible that such a tragedy might have been prevented.'

I don't recall yer protests back in 2006. Bill Maher Tees Up Sen. John Kerry's Virulent Anti-Republican Campaign Speech. (http://newsbusters.org/node/8175) Strange that all related video accounts have been terminated er lost in cyberspace.

How bout some purty pictures instead?
https://img.photobucket.com/albums/v517/hoppy84/killbush6.jpg

https://img.photobucket.com/albums/v517/hoppy84/killbush.jpg

https://img.photobucket.com/albums/v517/hoppy84/killbush5.jpg

gaelic cowboy

01-10-2011, 13:44

This thread needs more prebuttals (http://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/prebuttal) otherwise someone on the internet will be wrong.

Furunculus

01-10-2011, 13:48

and since we're on the subject of target lists:

http://www.verumserum.com/?p=13647

HoreTore

01-10-2011, 14:33

One pf the advantages to being a euroweenie leftiecommunist is that both US parties are right-wingers to me, and as such I can happily blame anything bad there on "the right". ~:)

I mean honestly, would I expect anything but hate coming from the mouths of christians? Nah....

But that of course doesn't change the fact that the political tone in the US hasa grown more and more hateful over the last decade. Nor the fact that an incident like this is the logical consequence of such a climate.

I will now step back, grab my popcorn, and watch the right-wingers blame each other for this. :smash:

Beskar

01-10-2011, 15:21

One pf the advantages to being a euroweenie leftiecommunist is that both US parties are right-wingers to me, and as such I can happily blame anything bad there on "the right". ~:)

:beam:

Which also makes it funny that Democrats are "Pinko Commie Liberals", when they are still Conservatives when set to an international standard.

Furunculus

01-10-2011, 15:28

Lemur

01-10-2011, 15:34

A couple of thoughts:

Assassins usually emerge from a murky swamp of conspiracy theories, self-baked religious beliefs and paranoia. I can't think offhand of a recent assassin or assassin-wannabe who was a member (in any meaningful way) of a political party. So laying blame for this horrific act at the doorstep of any politician or political group strikes me as unwise.

That said, however, it's utterly disingenuous for American right-wingers to pretend that eliminationist rhetoric has not been a feature of almost every level of the Republican party and Fox News since the election of President 44, or that the right has not created a self-reinforcing poisonous climate. Moreover, the I'm shocked, shocked (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F-Cb9X9fnUM) attitude about the Dem attempt to spin this is a little hard to take with a straight face. Of course the Dems will play this to their advantage, just as the Repubs did with 9/11 and the Dems did with Oklahoma City. It's just an unfortunate coincidence that Palin had that ridiculous map with the crosshairs, but then she seems to be a creature of fortune, and Dame Fortuna spins down as well as up. Luck can only hold for so long before it bites you on the posterior.

Louis VI the Fat

01-10-2011, 16:09

I don't recall yer protests back in 2006. Bill Maher Tees Up Sen. John Kerry's Virulent Anti-Republican Campaign Speech. (http://newsbusters.org/node/8175) Strange that all related video accounts have been terminated er lost in cyberspace.

How bout some purty pictures instead?
https://img.photobucket.com/albums/v517/hoppy84/killbush6.jpg

https://img.photobucket.com/albums/v517/hoppy84/killbush.jpg

https://img.photobucket.com/albums/v517/hoppy84/killbush5.jpgOh, my dear Hosa. I am a bit more refined than that, eh?

See, I would've protested violent anti-Bush rhetoric back in 2006. And I did! I am also blessed with a fine memory, and recall my protesting against careless, inflammatory anti-Bush rhetoric in 2006 right here n the Backroom. :beam:

Remember the movie that speculated and portrayed the assassination of Bush? Xiahou opened a thread about it, him and Rabbit called it in very poor taste. I myself immediately agreed that it was not where American public discourse should be heading:

I get the impression that this smacks of catering to a 'come and watch Dubya get killed!' sentiment. Which is unpalatable. If you don't like Bush, fine, but respect the office. And the sanctity of human life.
https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/showthread.php?68721-Death-of-a-President
I'm not scoring cheap partisan points in this thread. I have spoken out against inflammatory rhetoric poisoning US political discourse whether it came from the left or the right, before and after 2008, and have protested it before and after people got shot, and I will protest it until the end of time.

Louis VI the Fat

01-10-2011, 16:11

Philippus Flavius Homovallumus

01-10-2011, 16:11

I mean honestly, would I expect anything but hate coming from the mouths of christians? Nah....

....and here we have the European equivilant of what is happening in America, except that here the left has been polarised. I was in the pub the other week and an Irishman with a new baby told me he "litterally" wanted to shoot David Cameron in the head.

As much as Palin is not directly responsible the atmosphere in American politics is poisonous and that is undeniably a contributing factor here.

Louis VI the Fat

01-10-2011, 16:19

Please tell me Louis that you are trying to make some esoteric point about the Western reaction to Islamic terror and don't honestly buy into this line of reasoning.I'm afraid I am absolutely serious. Fortunately I am not feeling very alone in this, I am in very esteemed company.

Nobody says things better than Paul Krugman:

When you heard the terrible news from Arizona, were you completely surprised? Or were you, at some level, expecting something like this atrocity to happen?

Put me in the latter category. I’ve had a sick feeling in the pit of my stomach ever since the final stages of the 2008 (http://krugman.blogs.nytimes.com/2008/10/10/not-about-the-financial-crisis/)campaign. I remembered the upsurge in political hatred after Bill Clinton’s election in 1992 — an upsurge that culminated in the Oklahoma City bombing. And you could see, just by watching the crowds at McCain-Palin rallies, that it was ready to happen again. The Department of Homeland Security reached the same conclusion: in April 2009 an internal report (http://www.fas.org/irp/eprint/rightwing.pdf) warned that right-wing extremism was on the rise, with a growing potential for violence.

Conservatives denounced that report. But there has, in fact, been a rising tide of threats and vandalism aimed at elected officials, including both Judge John Roll, who was killed Saturday, and Representative Gabrielle Giffords. One of these days, someone was bound to take it to the next level. And now someone has.

It’s true that the shooter in Arizona appears to have been mentally troubled. But that doesn’t mean that his act can or should be treated as an isolated event, having nothing to do with the national climate.
Last spring Politico.com reported on a surge in threats against members of Congress, which were already up by 300 percent. A number of the people making those threats had a history of mental illness — but something about the current state of America has been causing far more disturbed people than before to act out their illness by threatening, or actually engaging in, political violence.

And there’s not much question what has changed. As Clarence Dupnik, the sheriff responsible for dealing with the Arizona shootings, put it, it’s “the vitriolic rhetoric that we hear day in and day out from people in the radio business and some people in the TV business.” The vast majority of those who listen to that toxic rhetoric stop short of actual violence, but some, inevitably, cross that line.

It’s important to be clear here about the nature of our sickness. It’s not a general lack of “civility,” the favorite term of pundits who want to wish away fundamental policy disagreements. Politeness may be a virtue, but there’s a big difference between bad manners and calls, explicit or implicit, for violence; insults aren’t the same as incitement.

The point is that there’s room in a democracy for people who ridicule and denounce those who disagree with them; there isn’t any place for eliminationist rhetoric, for suggestions that those on the other side of a debate must be removed from that debate by whatever means necessary.

And it’s the saturation of our political discourse — and especially our airwaves — with eliminationist rhetoric that lies behind the rising tide of violence.

Where’s that toxic rhetoric coming from? Let’s not make a false pretense of balance: it’s coming, overwhelmingly, from the right. It’s hard to imagine a Democratic member of Congress urging constituents to be “armed and dangerous” without being ostracized; but Representative Michele Bachmann, who did just that, is a rising star in the G.O.P.
And there’s a huge contrast in the media. Listen to Rachel Maddow or Keith Olbermann, and you’ll hear a lot of caustic remarks and mockery aimed at Republicans. But you won’t hear jokes about shooting government officials or beheading a journalist at The Washington Post. Listen to Glenn Beck or Bill O’Reilly, and you will.

Of course, the likes of Mr. Beck and Mr. O’Reilly are responding to popular demand. Citizens of other democracies may marvel at the American psyche, at the way efforts by mildly liberal presidents to expand health coverage are met with cries of tyranny and talk of armed resistance. Still, that’s what happens whenever a Democrat occupies the White House, and there’s a market for anyone willing to stoke that anger.
But even if hate is what many want to hear, that doesn’t excuse those who pander to that desire. They should be shunned by all decent people.

Unfortunately, that hasn’t been happening: the purveyors of hate have been treated with respect, even deference, by the G.O.P. establishment. As David Frum, the former Bush speechwriter, has put it, “Republicans originally thought that Fox worked for us and now we’re discovering we work for Fox.”

So will the Arizona massacre make our discourse less toxic? It’s really up to G.O.P. leaders. Will they accept the reality of what’s happening to America, and take a stand against eliminationist rhetoric? Or will they try to dismiss the massacre as the mere act of a deranged individual, and go on as before?
If Arizona promotes some real soul-searching, it could prove a turning point. If it doesn’t, Saturday’s atrocity will be just the beginning.
http://www.nytimes.com/2011/01/10/opinion/10krugman.html?_r=1&hpA climate of hate, of extremism. This attack was not a surprise. It is neither the first nor will it be the last. And no, there is no equivalence between the left and the right in this mattter: the vitriol, hate and the violence are overwhelmingly coming from the right. Some soul searching would be order.

Furunculus

01-10-2011, 17:28

But that of course doesn't change the fact that the political tone in the US hasa grown more and more hateful over the last decade. Nor the fact that an incident like this is the logical consequence of such a climate.

I will now step back, grab my popcorn, and watch the right-wingers blame each other for this. :smash:

i've been hearing the same guff from lefties about thatcher for years!

can we expect the assassination of boris as a natural result of hate-filled invective?

gaelic cowboy

01-10-2011, 17:32

I was in the pub the other week and an Irishman with a new baby told me he "litterally" wanted to shoot David Cameron in the head.

Typical porter talk.

Sasaki Kojiro

01-10-2011, 18:17

Ah, a climate so insidious and prevalent you proclaim the non-inciting free speech against government, and not mental instability, caused this man to become violent, yet so vague that you can only provide completely hypothetical situations of theoretical countries as actual examples of violence-inciting speech.

It certainly is in dispute. Show me where Sarah Palin or some other politician incited people to violence. A clumsy graphic design is not incitement to violence. If you're going to compare this to Imams calling for the destruction of the great satan, though show an equivalent example.

Is there any evidence that Sarah Palin had anything to do with the motivation behind this shooting? It has been over 24 hours now and the shooter was active on the internet; certainly something would have emerged.

Sorry, but you guys are cheating here. Any talk of poltical climate will naturally be vague and the evidence chain to an individual event will be practically invisible. But what basis do you have for roundly rejecting it? Louis already pointed out some sociological examples. And remember it isn't an isolated incident.

I think the rhetoric can be criticized regardless, and the fact that they are free to say it is no argument for it being right for them to say it, you know better than that CR. Don't you think we'd be better off without all that kind of "it's time to water the tree of liberty" crap? And this isn't a partisan issue, I think I've given my opinion of protesters in general before.

In late October I asked a man in the quaint town of Salida, Colorado, if President Barack Obama had done anything worthwhile. "Well he's increased the guns and ammunitions industry exponentially," he said. "My friends are stockpiling."
To dismiss these as the voices and actions of the marginal was to miss the point and misunderstand the trend. America is more polarised under Obama than it has been in four decades: the week he was elected gun sales leapt 50% year on year.

Just more evidence of how terrible the guardian is louis. What percent of that gun sales spike is do to rather realistic concerns that a democratic congress will pass more resctrictive gun laws, rather than planning for armed resistance? This is just fearmongering.

Polls last year revealed that a majority of Republicans believe Obama is a Muslim and a socialist who "wants to turn over the sovereignty of the United States to a one-world government" while two-thirds of Republicans either believe or are not sure that the president is "a racist who hates white people", and more than half believe or are not sure that "he was not born in the US" and that he "wants the terrorists to win".

These polls have always been crap. I don't respect the intelligence of people who assume that polls automatically reveal what people believe.

One anti-Obama campaigner carried a placard saying, "It is time to water the tree of liberty"– a reference to Thomas Jefferson's famous quote: "The tree of liberty must be refreshed from time to time with the blood of patriots and tyrants." It's the same quote Timothy McVeigh was wearing on his T-shirt when he was arrested for bombing the Federal Building in Oklahoma City, killing 168 people.

:rolleyes:

al Roumi

01-10-2011, 18:26

Some soul searching would be order.

pff, wouldn't it be easier for them to find the holy grail?

/joke

Lemur

01-10-2011, 18:44

An interesting point (http://www.thedailybeast.com/blogs-and-stories/2011-01-10/gabrielle-giffords-shooting-proves-the-tea-partys-homegrown-terror-blind-spot/):

The Giffords shooting doesn’t prove that Sarah Palin has blood on her hands. What it does prove is that when it comes to terrorism, people like Sarah Palin have a serious blind spot. On the political right, and at times even the political center, there is a casual assumption—so taken for granted that it is rarely even spoken—that the only terrorist threat America faces is from jihadist Islam. There was a lot of talk a couple of weeks back, you’ll remember, about a terrorist attack during the holiday season. And there’s been a lot of talk in the last couple of years about the threat of homegrown terrorists. Well, we’ve just experienced a terrorist attack over the holiday season, and it was indeed homegrown. Had the shooters’ name been Abdul Mohammed, you’d be hearing the familiar drumbeat about the need for profiling and the pathologies of Islam. But since his name was Jared Lee Loughner, he gets called “mentally unstable”; the word “terrorist” rarely comes up. When are we going to acknowledge that good old-fashioned white Americans are every bit as capable of killing civilians for a political cause as people with brown skin who pray to Allah? There’s a tradition here. Historically, American elites, especially conservative American elites, have tended to reserve the term “terrorism” for political violence committed by foreigners. In the early 20th century, for instance, there was enormous fear, even hysteria, about the terrorist threat from anarchist and communist immigrants from Eastern or Southern Europe, people like Sacco and Vanzetti. In the aftermath of World War I, large numbers of immigrant radicals were arrested and deported. Nothing similar happened to members of the white, protestant Ku Klux Klan, even though its violence was more widespread.

I see his point and yet I don't. Clearly the shooter was unhinged, so ascribing "terrorist" motives is suspect. And yet, clearly the Islamists who attacked us on 9/11 were also unhinged, if in a more organized fashion. Not sure where to draw the lines here. As per usual, however, we underestimate the domestic threat while overplaying the foreign. That seems to be our default position.

al Roumi

01-10-2011, 18:59

The point is surely the demagoguery and the mutual violently hostile rhetoric. To my mind, an attack may as easily have come from the left, someone attacking Palin, for example. She faces perhaps even more vitriol from the US left wing than Gifford afaik.

Hosakawa Tito

01-10-2011, 19:12

I'm afraid I am absolutely serious. Fortunately I am not feeling very alone in this, I am in very esteemed company.

Nobody says things better than Paul Krugman:

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/01/10/opinion/10krugman.html?_r=1&hpA climate of hate, of extremism. This attack was not a surprise. It is neither the first nor will it be the last. And no, there is no equivalence between the left and the right in this mattter: the vitriol, hate and the violence are overwhelmingly coming from the right. Some soul searching would be order.

Ah yes, Mr. Krugman. Memo to Paul Krugman: My Search was not in Vain. (http://www.verumserum.com/?p=13647)

Soul searching is in order by both sides of the political aisle. Heck the blood wasn't even dry and political activists of all persuasions were chewing on important questions like : Who in American politics deserves a slice of the blame? What public officials find themselves with a sudden opportunity for political gain from this tragedy?

This represents the worst & most cynical aspect of Washington. That is the exact tone that I am heartily sick of.

https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/images/kagemusha/misc/quote_icon.png Originally Posted by HoreTore https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/images/kagemusha/buttons/viewpost-right.png (https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/showthread.php?p=2053245546#post2053245546)
But that of course doesn't change the fact that the political tone in the US hasa grown more and more hateful over the last decade. Nor the fact that an incident like this is the logical consequence of such a climate.

I will now step back, grab my popcorn, and watch the right-wingers blame each other for this. :smash:

Enjoy your schadenfreude, careful not to choke. :daisy:

Lemur

01-10-2011, 19:32

Well, that was quick. The very first Incredibly Stupid Law (http://thecaucus.blogs.nytimes.com/2011/01/09/live-blog-latest-developments-on-arizona-shooting/?src=twt&twt=thecaucus#bill-to-ban-crosshairs) related to this shooting has now been proposed:

Representative Bob Brady of Pennsylvania told The Caucus he plans to introduce a bill that would ban symbols like that now-infamous campaign cross-hair map.

"You can't threaten the president with a bull's-eye or a cross hair," Mr. Brady, a Democrat, said, and his measure would make it a crime to do so to a member of Congress or federal employee, as well.

Asked if he believed the map incited the gunman in Tucson, he replied, "I don't know what's in that nut's head. I would rather be safe than sorry."

a completely inoffensive name

01-10-2011, 20:37

Palin's completely moronic maps and statements didn't directly or indirectly contribute to the shooting that took place. So suggest so would imo, be unwise considering there is not enough evidence at this current time to suggest that. Not all the facts about the suspect have even been released at this point, the investigation is not over.

However, the larger point to make here is that such statements and maps from Palin and other politicians demonizing the other side should completely stop. Why? Because it is just ******* disgraceful and it quite frankly is insulting to spout that kind of stuff to anyone to who has experienced the same tragedy that the congresswoman has. The only reason why this particular shooting is important is because a judge was killed and because a congresswoman got shot, but plenty of everyday normal people get shot and killed every day. They have families and friends who are affected by the loss as well and to go about on a campaign of insinuating that we must water the tree of liberty in America with "evil tyrants (nods head over to democrats)" blood is just downright indecent towards people who really have experienced what it's like to have a loved one have his blood water the lawn after a drive by shooting.

It's time to grow up and I am not trying to make this a right-wing bashing post, but it is quite evident that most of the childish and reckless statements in the discourse are propagated by right wing talking heads. Seriously you guys, this is just a terrible tragedy and on one hand you got the left with baseless accusations and on the other hand you got the right acting like childish teenagers, slinging violent phrases like teenagers sling swear words within every sentence.

Meneldil

01-10-2011, 21:23

I'm just surprised that this only happens now.

If you honestly can't see how Fox, Sarah Palin, the Tea Party and the various conspiracionnist nutjobs who plague the US aren't tied to this, then you're a fool. Using military terms for politics is usually not really a good sign.

Lemur

01-10-2011, 21:45

David Frum, as usual, is right on the money (http://www.frumforum.com/what-palin-needed-to-say-after-giffords-shooting):

Obviously, Palin never intended to summon people to harm Representative Giffords. There was no evidence that the shooter was a Palin follower, and in short order it became evident that he was actuated by a serious mental illness. Whatever you think about Palin’s “don’t retreat, reload” rhetoric, it could not be blamed for this crime.

So – argument won? No. Argument lost.

Palin failed to appreciate the question being posed to her. That question was not: “Are you culpable for the shooting?” The question was: “Having put this unfortunate image on the record, can you respond to the shooting in a way that demonstrates your larger humanity? And possibly also your potential to serve as leader of the entire nation?”

And of course, in classical I-accuse-you-of-exactly-what-I-am-accused-of fashion, nutjob Glenn Beck throws gasoline on the nutty embers (http://news.yahoo.com/s/yblog_thecutline/20110110/bs_yblog_thecutline/beck-reads-palin-email-on-air-i-hate-violence):

"Sarah, as you know, peace is always the answer," Beck said on air, reading from his email. "I know you are feeling the same heat, if not much more on this. I want you to know you have my support. But please look into protection for your family. An attempt on you could bring the republic down."

"Bring the republic down"? For reals?

HoreTore

01-10-2011, 22:12

....and here we have the European equivilant of what is happening in America, except that here the left has been polarised.[ere.

Political assasinations in Norway: 0

Attempted assasinations in Norway: 0

Yes, us Norwegian lefties are a real terror.....

a completely inoffensive name

01-10-2011, 22:17

Not going back on what I just said, but this video should be HoreTore's evidence for CR's demands for specific events of violent speech:

http://videocafe.crooksandliars.com/heather/bill-moyers-journal-rage-radio

Louis VI the Fat

01-10-2011, 23:42

Ah yes, Mr. Krugman. Memo to Paul Krugman: My Search was not in Vain. (http://www.verumserum.com/?p=13647)Yes. I know about this Democrat target map. I've known about it since before I started this thread, I saw it when I was googling for the Palin map. Like Rabbit's Obama quotes, it is not about contextless quotes or isolated maps or the occasional outburst. It is about an entire philosophy, a sustained tone.

The hard right / Tea Party has insurrection and 'constitutional minimalism' and guns and a vehement anti-governmental philosophy at the heart of its political message. As much as the liberal hard left is obsessed with gender and race issues.

It is preposterous to take an incidental, isolated women's issue quote by Ann Coulter to show that the hard right is just as much about gender and race issues as the hard left. It is equally preposterous to find a handful of quotes and pictures that show the hardleft is as much about guns and anti-government as the hard right. Either would fail to understand some of the core issues of both political wings.

Hosakawa Tito

01-10-2011, 23:44

Jared Loughner's sickness is not the product of politics. (http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748703667904576071943007100666.html?mod=WSJ_article_MoreIn_Opinion#articleTabs%3Darticl e)

This line of argument is itself an attack on democratic discourse, and it is amazing that it even needs to be rebutted. Taking such an argument seriously will only encourage more crazy people to believe they can trigger a national soul-searching if they shoot at a political target. We should denounce the murders and the murderer, rather than doing him the honor of suggesting that his violence flows in any explainable fashion from democratic debate.
President Obama does have an opportunity here, but it is not to link—"deftly" or otherwise—his political opponents to Mr. Loughner. This would only further poison and polarize our public debate. Mr. Obama can lift the level of public discourse by explaining the reality of Mr. Loughner's illness and calling out those on the right and left who want to blame the other side for murder. That would be a genuinely Presidential act of leadership, and it would have the added advantage of being honest about the murders in Tucson.

A bit of rationality to rebutt the drive-by media.

HoreTore

01-10-2011, 23:58

An attack on democratic discourse? What drugs are those guys on?

This is an attack on political agitation. Which is something dramatically different to sensible, democratic debate.

I am truly fascinated that a good newspaper like WSJ is unable to see the clear difference between the two. Lenin is probably laughing is mummified behind off in his mausoleum.

Lemur

01-11-2011, 00:16

the drive-by media.
Hmm. I would avoid using Mr. Limbaugh's pet phrase, even though I agree with your point. No need to bring the fat, thrice-divorced demagogue into this, seeing as he is one of the prime examples of a public persona who dances on the edge of incitement (http://hubpages.com/hub/Rush-Limbaugh-Quotes-on-Obamacare).

I also find it kinda hilarious that many of the same people who have been throwing firebombs and spouting eliminationist rhetoric are now claiming that saying anything about them and their role in creating an atmosphere of anger will ... um ... create an atmosphere of anger ... or something like that ...

drone

01-11-2011, 00:43

I am truly fascinated that a good newspaper like WSJ is unable to see the clear difference between the two. Lenin is probably laughing is mummified behind off in his mausoleum.
The WSJ is owned by Murdoch now. ~;)

Representative Bob Brady of Pennsylvania told The Caucus he plans to introduce a bill that would ban symbols like that now-infamous campaign cross-hair map.

"You can't threaten the president with a bull's-eye or a cross hair," Mr. Brady, a Democrat, said, and his measure would make it a crime to do so to a member of Congress or federal employee, as well.

Asked if he believed the map incited the gunman in Tucson, he replied, "I don't know what's in that nut's head. I would rather be safe than sorry."
The cynic in me was waiting for something like this. I'm sure something is also in the works to get congresspeople Secret Service details or something similar to raise them above the unwashed masses.

ELITEofWARMANGINGERYBREADMEN88

01-11-2011, 00:48

As much as I hate liberals, I have to say, as a moderate Libertarian, that the Right isn't helping matters much.

drone

01-11-2011, 00:56

It's nice to see the good people at WBC doing their part (http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2011/01/09/westboro-baptist-church-arizona_n_806319.html) to tone down the rhetoric. ~:rolleyes:

Lemur

01-11-2011, 01:06

The Westboro folks ... ugh. What can you say that hasn't been said a thousand times? Sick, sad people.

Here's a pretty good essay (http://theamericanscene.com/2011/01/10/tone-versus-substance), comes close to expressing what I'm feeling. I do not believe any particular politician or group bears any direct responsibility for the assassin. However, the eliminationist rhetoric has been a bit much, and after an event such as this, should be toned the hell down.

Since Barack Obama took office, prominent voices on the right have called him an ally of Islamist radicals in their Grand Jihad against America, a radical Kenyan anti-colonialist, a man who pals around with terrorists and used a financial crisis to deliberately weaken America, an usurper who was born abroad and isn’t even eligible to be president, a guy who has somehow made it so that it’s okay for black kids to beat up white kids on buses, etc. I haven’t even touched on the conspiracy theories of Glenn Beck. The birthers excepted, the people making these chargers are celebrated by movement conservatives – they’re given book deals, awards, and speaking engagements.

If all of these charges were true, a radicalized citizenry would be an appropriate response. But even the conservatives who defend Palin, Beck, Limbaugh, D’Souza, McCarthy, and so many others don’t behave as if they believe all the nonsense they assert. The strongest case against these people isn’t that their rhetoric inspires political violence. It’s that they frequently utter indefensible nonsense. The problem isn’t their tone. It’s that the substance of what they’re saying is so blinkered that it isn’t even taken seriously by their ideological allies (even if they’re too cowardly, mercenary or team driven to admit as much).

They’re in a tough spot these days partly because it’s impossible for them to mount the defense of their rhetoric that is true: “I am a frivolous person, and I don’t choose my words based on their meaning. Rather, I behave like the worst caricature of a politician. If you think my rhetoric logically implies that people should behave violently, you’re mistaken – neither my audience nor my peers in the conservative movement are engaged in a logical enterprise, and it’s unfair of you to imply that people take what I say so seriously that I can be blamed for a real world event. Don’t you see that this is all a big game? This is how politics works. Stop pretending you’re not in on the joke.”

Greyblades

01-11-2011, 03:07

Westboro? Weren't they the guys the kkk denied affiliation with?

Sasaki Kojiro

01-11-2011, 03:13

This line of argument is itself an attack on democratic discourse, and it is amazing that it even needs to be rebutted. Taking such an argument seriously will only encourage more crazy people to believe they can trigger a national soul-searching if they shoot at a political target. We should denounce the murders and the murderer, rather than doing him the honor of suggesting that his violence flows in any explainable fashion from democratic debate.

This is terrible. Suggesting that violent rhetoric encourages crazy people to attack political targets? TALK LIKE THAT ENCOURAGES CRAZY PEOPLE TO ATTACK POLITICAL TARGETS

If all of these charges were true, a radicalized citizenry would be an appropriate response. But even the conservatives who defend Palin, Beck, Limbaugh, D’Souza, McCarthy, and so many others don’t behave as if they believe all the nonsense they assert. The strongest case against these people isn’t that their rhetoric inspires political violence. It’s that they frequently utter indefensible nonsense. The problem isn’t their tone. It’s that the substance of what they’re saying is so blinkered that it isn’t even taken seriously by their ideological allies (even if they’re too cowardly, mercenary or team driven to admit as much).

They’re in a tough spot these days partly because it’s impossible for them to mount the defense of their rhetoric that is true: “I am a frivolous person, and I don’t choose my words based on their meaning. Rather, I behave like the worst caricature of a politician. If you think my rhetoric logically implies that people should behave violently, you’re mistaken – neither my audience nor my peers in the conservative movement are engaged in a logical enterprise, and it’s unfair of you to imply that people take what I say so seriously that I can be blamed for a real world event. Don’t you see that this is all a big game? This is how politics works. Stop pretending you’re not in on the joke.”

This on the other hand, is excellent. Although it's still an open question whether their tone is has this effect.

Crazed Rabbit

01-11-2011, 03:36

The hard right / Tea Party has insurrection and 'constitutional minimalism' and guns and a vehement anti-governmental philosophy at the heart of its political message. As much as the liberal hard left is obsessed with gender and race issues.

The message may be different, but the aggressive approach is shared. To say the right has more potentially violent rhetoric than the left is without evidence. Obama kept up a tone of fighting and defeating his political opponents. Many leftist protesters expressed seething hatred at Bush and republicans.

Don't you think we'd be better off without all that kind of "it's time to water the tree of liberty" crap?

It comes from a phrase spoken by one of our best Presidents - Thomas Jefferson. I don't think those who speak it truly appreciate what it means, believing themselves to be the patriots and their opponents the tyrants exclusively.

Nor do I think our discourse has sunk to some unplumbed depth (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y_zTN4BXvYI).

CR

Sasaki Kojiro

01-11-2011, 03:59

It comes from a phrase spoken by one of our best Presidents - Thomas Jefferson. I don't think those who speak it truly appreciate what it means, believing themselves to be the patriots and their opponents the tyrants exclusively.

It seems like a dumb idea to me, and we supplanted it with the tradition of peaceful protests long ago.

Yet where does this anarchy exist? Where did it ever exist, except in the single instance of Massachusetts? And can history produce an instance of rebellion so honourably conducted? I say nothing of it's motives. They were founded in ignorance, not wickedness. God forbid we should ever be 20 years without such a rebellion. The people cannot be all, & always, well informed. The part which is wrong will be discontented in proportion to the importance of the facts they misconceive. If they remain quiet under such misconceptions it is a lethargy, the forerunner of death to the public liberty. We have had 13. states independent 11. years. There has been one rebellion. That comes to one rebellion in a century & a half for each state. What country before ever existed a century & half without a rebellion? & what country can preserve it's liberties if their rulers are not warned from time to time that their people preserve the spirit of resistance? Let them take arms

This quote to me sounds like he would ditch the blood of patriots part if he were alive today. We remind the government differently today.

PanzerJaeger

01-11-2011, 04:35

Sorry, but you guys are cheating here. Any talk of poltical climate will naturally be vague and the evidence chain to an individual event will be practically invisible. But what basis do you have for roundly rejecting it?

I think those trying to link this to the Right have the burden of proof, don't you? I mean I could say that this guy was angry that Giffords didn't push for a public option and what basis would anyone have for rejecting that theory? I could say that he was mad that McDonalds left pickles on his burger that morning when he specifically requested no pickles. What basis would anyone have for rejecting that theory? The point being, we have no clue what motivated this guy, and what clues we do have about his politics do not paint a man associated with the traditional Left-Right political dynamic.

The Left has been forced to step back from their initial baseless claims of Palin and Tea Party motivations, and have now fallen back on vague claims of hostile rhetoric.

So I'll repeat, is there any evidence, any at all, that the shooter was motivated by the "angry" political atmosphere? Is it possible that the shooter could have been acting in a mental vacuum of his own delirium that had absolutely nothing to do with the political climate?

Until such a link is established, this remains a monumental example of jumping the gun (no pun intended) at best, and a media hit job at worst.

Sasaki Kojiro

01-11-2011, 04:44

Criticize the media all you want, but I don't see why it's a burden of proof thing here. That would be pretty stifling for the backroom. I think it's an interesting idea.

Xiahou

01-11-2011, 04:54

I think those trying to link this to the Right have the burden of proof, don't you?And just when did you stop beating your wife?

Nor do I think our discourse has sunk to some unplumbed depth (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y_zTN4BXvYI). :laugh4:
That's awesome. It seems more often than not, most of the people who go around wringing their hands saying "this is the worst X ever" are historically clueless and/or just trying to stir people up. I guess that's why its usually the news media that does it- to gin up ratings.

Fragony

01-11-2011, 11:55

Critisize the media all you want but Louis is right, the climate for political assassination has been created, got little patience for boohoohoo when that's pointed out. This woman was attacked by a rightwing nutjob and he murdered 7 while doing it, distantiating rather than defence would be the proper thing to do. Common she was marked as a target on a map, what do you expect will happen. The people who called for the removal of Fortuyn from our society are still pretending they don't understand what they did, but it's simply murder by proxy

PanzerJaeger

01-11-2011, 13:02

Criticize the media all you want, but I don't see why it's a burden of proof thing here. That would be pretty stifling for the backroom. I think it's an interesting idea.

Certainly the backroom is no courtroom, but for a claim to have merit don't you think it should at least have some factual support? Using one of my previous examples, if I were to come into the thread and claim that this guy was a radical Leftist who was angry that Giffords did not do enough to further a Leftist agenda while the Democrats had control of congress, shouldn't I have at least some basis for it beyond my own imagination?

So far, there is no basis for any of the claims being made in this thread. It may very well turn out that he was in some way or another influenced by the Right in some capacity, but at this point all the whining is nothing but speculation with the intent of scoring political points off of this tragedy. It is disgusting.

This woman was attacked by a rightwing nutjob

Apparently you know something I do not. Can you link to the story that confirms his Right-wing views?

Lemur

01-11-2011, 15:14

Can you link to the story that confirms his Right-wing views?
Well, maybe it was a left-wing white supremacist organization (http://politics.blogs.foxnews.com/2011/01/09/dhs-memo-suggests-shooter-may-be-linked-racist-organization), anything's possible ...

[S]trong suspicion is being direceted at American Renaissance, an organization that Loughner mentioned in some of his internet postings and federal law enforcement officials are investigating Loughner's possible links to the organization. The organization is a monthly publication that promotes a variety of white racial positions.

"The group's ideology is anti government, anti immigration, anti ZOG (Zionist Occupational Government), anti Semitic," according to the memo which goes on to point out that Congressman Giffords is the first Jewish female elected to high office in Arizona. A recent posting on American Renaissance's website on January 7 begins with an article entitled: "Exit poll: Whites are Different." The site goes on to list anti-immigration articles. Investigators are also pursuing Loughner's alleged anti-Semitism.

Vladimir

01-11-2011, 17:07

Well, maybe it was a left-wing white supremacist organization (http://politics.blogs.foxnews.com/2011/01/09/dhs-memo-suggests-shooter-may-be-linked-racist-organization), anything's possible ...

[S]trong suspicion is being direceted at American Renaissance, an organization that Loughner mentioned in some of his internet postings and federal law enforcement officials are investigating Loughner's possible links to the organization. The organization is a monthly publication that promotes a variety of white racial positions.

"The group's ideology is anti government, anti immigration, anti ZOG (Zionist Occupational Government), anti Semitic," according to the memo which goes on to point out that Congressman Giffords is the first Jewish female elected to high office in Arizona. A recent posting on American Renaissance's website on January 7 begins with an article entitled: "Exit poll: Whites are Different." The site goes on to list anti-immigration articles. Investigators are also pursuing Loughner's alleged anti-Semitism.

Maybe he was a right-wing Marxist? He apparently was a grammar Nazi.

At the extreme end of the political spectrum he was it the line becomes a circle.

Whatever. It's very entertaining. Everyone views him through their own filter and most people apparently have a need to fit him into a certain slot. It provides them with some level of comfort.

Xiahou

01-11-2011, 18:00

Whatever. It's very entertaining. Everyone views him through their own filter and most people apparently have a need to fit him into a certain slot. It provides them with some level of comfort.I view him as a pathetic whacko.... what's that say about me?

I think the efforts by many thus far to attribute his actions to anything other than himself is pathetic.

Lemur

01-11-2011, 18:39

If my little girl had just been killed, I can't imagine being this rational or cogent (http://reason.com/blog/2011/01/10/father-of-slain-9-year-old-spe) in the aftermath:

This shouldn't happen in this country, or anywhere else, but in a free society, we're going to be subject to people like this. I prefer this to the alternative.

Wow. Just wow.

Meanwhile:

I think the efforts by many thus far to attribute his actions to anything other than himself is pathetic.
To which I quote National Review (http://www.nationalreview.com/articles/228579/jihad-texas/editors):

We also suffer from a larger American unwillingness to acknowledge political violence. We rightly applaud ourselves for having avoided Europe’s upheavals. Yet the historic free flow of ideas in this country means that pernicious ones will lodge in the minds of very bad actors. Few of our famous assassins were mere loony loners without political motives. JFK’s assassin was a Marxist, RFK’s was another Palestinian, McKinley’s was an anarchist. Lincoln was murdered by a rogue Confederate intelligence operation. The solution is not to restrict freedom, but to take ideas seriously — to flag them and combat them; to monitor those who take them to extremes and to come down on them when they first cross the line to incitement or action [...]

We have a difficult enough problem as it is: We cannot know where we are unless we honestly identify and discuss what happens around us.

Brenus

01-11-2011, 20:57

Funny.
You spread the idea that the guy at the top is not legitimate, that the State is taking your freedom, that the Government is illegitimate and coming directly from Hell, and that you have not only to resist by vote but you have to stockpile weapons and munitions, that your political enemies are in fact Foreigners (or agent of a Foreign Power) then when a man with a mental deficiency does something like this you say you have nothing, no responsibility whatsoever.

What next?

“I just obey orders”?

HoreTore

01-11-2011, 21:07

It's nice to see the good people at WBC doing their part (http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2011/01/09/westboro-baptist-church-arizona_n_806319.html) to tone down the rhetoric. ~:rolleyes:

US law is seriously lacking if the police have no grounds for detaining such a "protest" and prosecute them for harrassment.

There is a line. Such behaviour at a funeral is criminal behaviour.

Lemur

01-11-2011, 22:07

[W]hen a man with a mental deficiency does something like this you say you have nothing, no responsibility whatsoever.
A further rebuttal to those who suggest that any discussion of the political culture is irrelevant and in poor taste, from a person who seems to know what he is talking about (http://voices.washingtonpost.com/plum-line/2011/01/mental_illness_expert_we_shoul.html):

"It's a reasonable question to ask," Dr. Marvin Swartz, a psychiatry professor at Duke University who specializes in how environment impacts the behavior of the mentally ill, said in an interview this morning. "The nature of someone's delusions is affected by culture. It's a reasonable line of inquiry to ask, `How does a political culture affect the content of people's delusions?'" [...]

"We know the manifestation of mental illness is affected by cultural factors," Dr. Swartz said. "One's cultural context does effect people's thinking and particularly their delusions. It gives some content and shape to their delusions. While we don know whether there was a specific relationship between the political climate that he was exposed to and his thinking, it's a reasonable line of inquiry to explore."

Asked whether Loughner's mental illness invalidated questions as to whether his behavior might have been partly caused by the political climate or by violent rhetoric and imagery, Dr. Swartz said it shouldn't.

"Studying the cultural influences on people's delusions or persecutory thinking, and looking at different aspects of culture and how they effect people's behavior, is a legitmate area of inquiry," Dr. Swartz said.

drone

01-11-2011, 22:11

JFK’s assassin was a Marxist
So you think Castro was behind it. :inquisitive: I always figured you thought it was the MIC...

HoreTore

01-11-2011, 22:25

So you think Castro was behind it. :inquisitive: I always figured you thought it was the MIC...

It's just a smoke screen to cover the actions of the LUL*.

*League of United Lemurs

Lemur

01-11-2011, 22:30

*League of United Lemurs
The first rule about LUL is we do not talk about LUL.

Proving that there's no such thing as bad publicity, Glock sales (http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2011-01-11/glock-pistol-sales-surge-in-aftermath-of-shooting-of-arizona-s-giffords.html) are soaring in Arizona.

After a Glock-wielding gunman killed six people at a Tucson shopping center on Jan. 8, Greg Wolff, the owner of two Arizona gun shops, told his manager to get ready for a stampede of new customers.

Wolff was right. Instead of hurting sales, the massacre had the $499 semi-automatic pistols -- popular with police, sport shooters and gangsters -- flying out the doors of his Glockmeister stores in Mesa and Phoenix.

“We’re at double our volume over what we usually do,” Wolff said two days after the shooting spree that also left 14 wounded, including Democratic Representative Gabrielle Giffords, who remains in critical condition. [...]

“When something like this happens people get worried that the government is going to ban stuff,” Wolff said.

So does this mean that the Glock 19 will surpass the AR-15 as the most overpriced gun in America?

-edit-

And joining the Wetboro Baptists in the tastelessness hall of fame, Mr. Limbaugh declares that the shooter has the "full support" of the Democratic Party. Amazing. I expect nobody on the right will call him on this (http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2011/01/11/rush-limbaugh-jared-loughner-full-support-democrat_n_807543.html).

What Mr. Loughner knows is that he has the full support of a major political party in this country. He's sitting there in jail. He knows what's going on, he knows that...the Democrat party is attempting to find anybody but him to blame. He knows if he plays his cards right, he's just a victim. He's the latest in a never-ending parade of victims brought about by the unfairness of America...this guy clearly understands he's getting all the attention and he understands he's got a political party doing everything it can, plus a local sheriff doing everything that they can to make sure he's not convicted of murder - but something lesser.

Vuk

01-11-2011, 23:17

I am sorry, but everyone who is trying to exploit a tragedy like this for political gain is pretty pathetic. Of course all of you pointing figures at the right now will ignore the fact that he was a hard core liberal who attended a high-school that was part of a pro-communist schooling system set up by Bill Ayers and funded by Obama. You know, if you want to point fingers, a lot more can be pointed at the left? (Anyone here want to open up the debate on drugs again?)
Quit the pathetic blame games and get a life.

HoreTore

01-11-2011, 23:20

Mussolini was a member of the communist party in his youth.

Does that mean he was a communist dictator?

Edit: heck, I myself cheered for the Conservative party when I was 13-14. Does that mean I'm actually a conservative and my membership in the Socialist Left party is null and void....?

How 'bout that time I ran for parliament on the Communist Party's list? Does that exclude me from ever becomming a member of any other party?

woad&fangs

01-11-2011, 23:25

edited away due to incorrect source

a completely inoffensive name

01-12-2011, 00:45

People keep sending this around as proof that right wing rhetoric is promoting violence:

http://www.csmonitor.com/USA/Society/2010/1016/Did-Glenn-Beck-s-rhetoric-inspire-violence

Crazed Rabbit

01-12-2011, 04:16

Seamus Fermanagh

01-12-2011, 05:28

I think the current climate of hyper-partisanship among the politically involved in the USA has much deeper roots than is currently being addressed. This did not start with Bush, or Clinton, or even within the last 3 decades. I believe it can be traced to two components: The Cold War realpolitick practiced by the USA, and television.

The last time US politics was truly quiescent was during the 1950s -- everybody liked Ike. That is an exaggeration, of course, but the liberal opposition to Ike was Adlai Stevenson and his youth movement was of an alltogether gentler variety. Ike was a dedicated centrist on most issues, only taking a hawkish stance against the USSR and actually coming down on the side of liberalism on a number of social issues -- remember that desegregation began under Ike.

Eisenhower did establish, however, the US's willingness to prop up all sorts of horrid kleptocrats and dictatorial thugs so long as they opposed Soviet communism (Yes, the Truman Doctrine towards Greece and Turkey set the groundwork for this, but it was Ike who let the CIA overthrow the government of Iran, a coup d'etat in Guatemala, support for Battista and the virtual shoving of Castro into the Soviet sphere of influence, etc.).

At this same time, television was introduced and rapidly became the unifying element of US culture. This was hailed by MacLuhan as the advent of the "global village," which is far too correct. Of course, in addition to being closer and more in touch with the world around us, we also have the opportunity to poke our noses into one another's business on a much more frequent and intrusive level.

In the 1960s, the Cold War reached it's "peak." The Cuban missile crisis involved a shared level of national fear that was almost unprecedented. Shortly thereafter, Kennedy is assassinated and LBJ undertakes the Great Society at home and changes the Kennedy policy of covert operations support for full on military support and heightens the Vietnam conflict to an amazing level (while also micro-managing individual aircraft sorties from the Oval Office...sheesh). Combine the rapid expansion in the number of college students with the counter-culture spawned by disillusionment with the Cold War in general and with Vietnam in particular (the regime we started out supporting was a bunch of klepto-thugs; we continued to support all sorts of Latin American dictatorati; the shah was evil; we let the Czechs die on the vine; etc) -- we got to watch daily broadcasts everyday with kill totals published like a baseball score in nice little graphics on the evening news. TV brought home just how ghastly war was in a way that hadn't really been experienced by the American homefront since 1865.

This opposition undercut Johnson from the political left and caused him to withdraw. Old school liberal Herbert Hoover had enough appeal to take the nomination despite the anti-war element's opposition, but had to move left to hold enough of his party's grass roots operators to win the nomination. This let Nixon employ the famous Southern Strategy and clobber Hoover in the general election. Nixon then backtracked on his implied goal of ending the war within his first term and the anti-war movement went into overdrive.

In addition, since both Nixon and his Veep Agnew (both borderline crooks or worse in terms of machine-style political manipulation), had gone out of their way to attack the media, who Nixon had never gotten along with from the Ike era onward, the media was more than willing to stick it to tricky Dick. When Watergate provided them the ammunition, the media used it to bring down Nixon's presidency.

Just before he went down, however, Nixon used defense curtailment suggestions by the 1972 Dem nominee McGovern to paint McGovern as a liberal wimp who would leave American on its knees to the Soviets (McGovern wanted to get out of Vietnam as rapidly as it could be shifted to the Vietnamese which was actually close to what Nixon ended up doing; he wanted to reduce the carrier fleet and focus on troops to shore up NATO and handle low-intensity conflict more effectively, etc. Nixon thus painted him as a coward wimp -- which is ironic since it was McGovern who nearly had his posterior shot off while flying bombers out of Italy in WW2 and earning a combat DFC as opposed to Nixon's less threat-filled service). Nixon didn't merely oppose McGovern, he set out to destroy him and did, winning the biggest landslide in US electoral history prior to Reagan's win in 1984.

Nixon was loathed and the left went rabid over it as Watergate expanded into the scandal it became. The media began to solidify into its left-centrist stance that it has maintained for the most part since. Nixon's criminality made it possible for Carter to win over Gerald Ford in 1976. Carter then enacted a principled foreign policy, reversing support for many of the Cold War regimes that we'd tolerated/supported/abbeted/created from whole cloth earlier in the Cold War. He also gutted the military. By 1980, unable to defeat Islamic Iran (who for some reason hadn't forgiven the USA for 24 years of support for the Shah based on 24 months of the Carter presidency), Reagan was able to paint Carter as weak and inneffectual. Lots of right wingers to this day do not merely think Reagan was better, but that Carter was the exemplar of what was wrong with Democrat leadership/policies. The media loathed Reagan and took any opportunity to portray him as a doddering old man, warmonger, etc. This has been the basic mantra for political partisanship since.

What has heightened it further is the media. Blame Ted Turner for the 24 hour news cycle; Reagan for the death of the Fairness Doctrine; and the Internet for the growth of the blog. Of themselves, all good things. Worldwide news coverage available through CNN; free speech unrestricted by artificial limitations on radio; internet connectivity and the wealth of knowlege available through the 'net.

However, news focuses on conflict -- always. It is inimical to good reportage (go back and read Lippman etc. if you don't want to take my word for it). Conflict sells advertising and gets peoples' attention. Implicitly, however, it also rewards with air time and exposure those people who play off or incite conflict and thereby make a good story. Ann Coulter throws bombs because it gets attention. The media reports on them for that same reason. The same can be said of terrorist efforts throughout the 1970s and 1980s -- media exposure was part of the goal.

Talk radio took over the US airwaves very soon after the Fairness Doctrine was removed. Why? Without that doctrine, radio stations no longer had to provide expensive broadcast time to shows that wouldn't get ratings to provide "fairness" to offset the opinions being expressed by another show. Limbaugh, Boortz and their copyists now had a stage for their rants, their incitement of conflict (in the media/story sense, neither is an advocate of actual violence), and their show.

Finally, we have the internet and the growing blogosphere. This too succumbs to the conflict sells dictum. Want somebody to read your post? Rant a bit and use a good deal of invective and charged language. Forget wall of words posts -- just call them a dirty no-good socialist reactionary. Again, incites a sense of conflict....and sells.

Does a charged and partisan political climate contribute to violence? Possibly. Did it cause this shooting to happen? Almost certainly not. But the charged climate is real, agitation can lead to bitterness, and the end result may not be something we enjoy. Though I relish argument, the old standard posed by Aristotle is supposed to apply: thesis and antithesis yielding to synthesis.

We understand out techonologies without understanding their impact upon us. We've been working with fire for how long now? Using tools for how long? Speaking to one another to coordinate actions for what span of time? We will be a while learning how to master the hypermediated context that is now the norm -- and coping with its limitations.

Just a thought.

Cecil XIX

01-12-2011, 05:50

Frankly, I wish our political rhetoric was more heated than it is now.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y_zTN4BXvYI

EDIT: Whoops, Crazed Rabbit beat me to it.

The message may be different, but the aggressive approach is shared. To say the right has more potentially violent rhetoric than the left is without evidence. Obama kept up a tone of fighting and defeating his political opponents. Many leftist protesters expressed seething hatred at Bush and republicans.

It comes from a phrase spoken by one of our best Presidents - Thomas Jefferson. I don't think those who speak it truly appreciate what it means, believing themselves to be the patriots and their opponents the tyrants exclusively.

Nor do I think our discourse has sunk to some unplumbed depth (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y_zTN4BXvYI).

CR

PanzerJaeger

01-12-2011, 12:19

Well, maybe it was a left-wing white supremacist organization (http://politics.blogs.foxnews.com/2011/01/09/dhs-memo-suggests-shooter-may-be-linked-racist-organization), anything's possible ...

Or, maybe still, he wasn't linked to the group at all (http://www.politico.com/news/stories/0111/47438.html). Anything is possible.

An Arizona law enforcement agency is backing away from a document it produced in the aftermath of Saturday’s shootings in Tucson – and which was leaked to Fox News – that linked the man accused with carrying out the crimes to a white nationalist publication.

“I do have no reason to believe in anything that we did that (Loughner) had any direct connection or was being directed by American Renaissance,” Denlinger, an Arizona state police major, told POLITICO Tuesday.

And joining the Wetboro Baptists in the tastelessness hall of fame, Mr. Limbaugh declares that the shooter has the "full support" of the Democratic Party. Amazing. I expect nobody on the right will call him on this.

After the vitriol that has been directed at him in the last 48 hours with no merit, I don't blame him for lashing out. Not to mention that he actually has a point. Democrats have seized on this from the beginning to score political points.

Anyway, I thought I was in the minority in thinking that we might want to wait until an actual motive is established before burning down Sarah Palin's house, but as usual the American people (http://www.politico.com/news/stories/0111/47420.html) prove more rational than certain backroom personalities.

Nearly six in 10 Americans say that the country’s heated political rhetoric isn’t to blame for the Saturday shooting in Tucson, according to a new poll Tuesday.

In a CBS News poll — the first in the wake of the tragic killings — 57 percent of those surveyed said they didn’t think alleged gunman Jared Lee Loughner was motivated by the country’s sometimes raucous political discourse. Thirty-two percent said they thought it was, the poll found.

Lemur

01-12-2011, 15:05

Or, maybe still, he wasn't linked to the group at all (http://www.politico.com/news/stories/0111/47438.html). Anything is possible.
Yup, saw that update earlier today. Before you puff up into a perfect sphere of offendedness and high dudgeon, please note that I have been saying from the beginning of this thread that no politician or party can be blamed for the shooter's actions. Judging by the tone of your post, I'm guessing you glossed over that.

After the vitriol that has been directed at him in the last 48 hours with no merit, I don't blame [Limbaugh] for lashing out. Not to mention that he actually has a point.
Mm-hmmm. At this point, I don't believe there is anything Boss Limbaugh could say that would cause his adherents to question or correct him. As you demonstrate.

Anyway, I thought I was in the minority in thinking that we might want to wait until an actual motive is established before burning down Sarah Palin's house [...]
What is it with right-wingers and the rhetoric of victimization? Why is it that everyone from Limbaugh to Beck to PJ is behaving as though they were somehow the victims of this tragedy?

PanzerJaeger

01-12-2011, 15:26

Yup, saw that update earlier today. Before you puff up into a perfect sphere of offendedness and high dudgeon, please note that I have been saying from the beginning of this thread that no politician or party can be blamed for the shooter's actions. Judging by the tone of your post, I'm guessing you glossed over that.

I simply corrected your earlier false assertion with accurate information. I'm not sure why you're being so sensitive, nothing personal. :shrug:

Mm-hmmm. At this point, I don't believe there is anything Boss Limbaugh could say that would cause his adherents to question or correct him. As you demonstrate.

I don't listen to Rush. I do know that prominent Democrats, including that dolt of a sheriff in Tucson, have tried to tie him to this event without any evidence that the shooter even listened to his program. Those are very serious allegations, and I don't blame him for calling the Democrats out on their insistence that this event validates their rhetoric against the Right without even a tangential link to base their claims on. They want it so bad, and it is indeed disgusting to watch.

What is it with right-wingers and the rhetoric of victimization? Why is it that everyone from Limbaugh to Beck to PJ is behaving as though they were somehow the victims of this tragedy?

Again, there is no need to make this personal.

Beskar

01-12-2011, 16:14

...PJ is behaving as though they were somehow the victims of this tragedy?

Again, there is no need to make this personal.

PJ plays victim card again.

al Roumi

01-12-2011, 16:58

Anyway, I thought I was in the minority in thinking that we might want to wait until an actual motive is established before burning down Sarah Palin's house, but as usual the American people (http://www.politico.com/news/stories/0111/47420.html) prove more rational than certain backroom personalities.

Nearly six in 10 Americans say that the country’s heated political rhetoric isn’t to blame for the Saturday shooting in Tucson, according to a new poll Tuesday.

In a CBS News poll — the first in the wake of the tragic killings — 57 percent of those surveyed said they didn’t think alleged gunman Jared Lee Loughner was motivated by the country’s sometimes raucous political discourse. Thirty-two percent said they thought it was, the poll found.

And to top it off, the demagogues call on more demagoguery to justify themselves... Beautiful.

Strike For The South

01-12-2011, 22:04

Beskar

01-12-2011, 22:11

I heard there is much mental illness within the loony right.

Strike For The South

01-12-2011, 22:16

I heard there is much mental illness within the loony right.

You can play that snarky card all you want but when 50% of the mans you tube talks about grammar it becomes quite clear he does not operate on any spectrum that could be considred normal

Booth, now THAT'S a political assassian

Louis VI the Fat

01-12-2011, 23:23

As much as I would love to point Palins soccer mom empire and blame it, I can't. Clearly Louis has no such scruples but his wonderfully verbose posts aside, all anyone has is tenuous links and assumptions.

I think this guys mental illness had much more to do with the killings than did any political entity.

Now do we have a healthy political climate right now? No.
Have we ever? No.

But to even frame this as the first shot is some 2nd rebillion is overstating things a bitThe killer does not have a clear political agenda, he's a loon. But: a loon who decided to become a killer, and one who picked a political target at that.

The link is not direct. There is no smoking gun of a membership of his of some political club, or a notebok with some rationally worded politcal thought.
But the killer is not a fool either. He is (almost) capable of leading a normal life, can attent college, hold a job. He is nto retarded, he is just schizophrenic, incapable of empathy, has a chaotic, confusing mixture of reality and his dreams in his mind. Thsi chaos, this 'conscious dreaming' as he calls it, he at some level understands is beyond his control. So something else is in control. What is? The government which seeks to control grammar. This is messing with his head. The oppressive government, the intrusive government, evil Washington, imposing fake grammar as well as a fake currency, all inconstitutnional.

In the 1950's, this lunatic would've fought aliens, would've resisted them from trying to take him over with Martian mind control guns. In the 1800's, he would've been called Ezekiel and he would've fought biblical demons, messing with his head. In 2011, he fights an oppressive government and its unconstitutional grammar and currency control over him.

Strike For The South

01-12-2011, 23:39

In the 1950's, this lunatic would've fought aliens, would've resisted them from trying to take him over with Martian mind control guns. In the 1800's, he would've been called Ezekiel and he would've fought biblical demons, messing with his head. In 2011, he fights an oppressive government and its unconstitutional grammar and currency control over him.

The amount of vitriol has very little do to with that though.

What's it going to be? curb our freedom of speech rights so crazy people maybe a LITTLE less likely to go off and be crazy?

I am willing to accept a few dead people every few years so Beck and Olbermann can continue with their craziness.

The institutions that we safegaurd are 10X more important than the people

Lemur

01-13-2011, 00:41

Oh. Your. God. Sarah Palin declares (http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/nation/la-na-palin-arizona-shooting-20110113,0,6446695.story) that she is subject to a blood libel (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blood_libel). This is not a joke, I am not sourcing from the Onion. Best response I've yet seen:

Sarah Palin has a perfect right, both legally and morally, to protest those who are trying to directly tie her, her rhetoric, or the rhetoric of her political allies, to Loughner.

Doing so by asserting that her and her pals getting pinked for their political messaging is just like the entire nation of the Jews enduring centuries of pogroms and persecution because of the enduring lie that they murdered babies for their religious ceremonies? [...]

Again: Palin perfectly correct to complain about those trying to blame her for Loughner’s actions. But of all the stupid, appalling, jackassed things Sarah Palin has ever said in the history of the time she’s inflicted herself on the consciousness of our great nation, this is, alas, merely the most recent.

Sasaki Kojiro

01-13-2011, 02:10

The amount of vitriol has very little do to with that though.

What's it going to be? curb our freedom of speech rights so crazy people maybe a LITTLE less likely to go off and be crazy?

I am willing to accept a few dead people every few years so Beck and Olbermann can continue with their craziness.

The institutions that we safegaurd are 10X more important than the people

No, the crappy posturing is already a bad and damaging thing. Louis is argument is at worst like those studies showing how exercise makes you smarter, sure the link is suspect but you should be exercising anyway.

Crazed Rabbit

01-13-2011, 02:50

The killer does not have a clear political agenda, he's a loon. But: a loon who decided to become a killer, and one who picked a political target at that.

The link is not direct. There is no smoking gun of a membership of his of some political club, or a notebok with some rationally worded politcal thought.
But the killer is not a fool either. He is (almost) capable of leading a normal life, can attent college, hold a job. He is nto retarded, he is just schizophrenic, incapable of empathy, has a chaotic, confusing mixture of reality and his dreams in his mind. Thsi chaos, this 'conscious dreaming' as he calls it, he at some level understands is beyond his control. So something else is in control. What is? The government which seeks to control grammar. This is messing with his head. The oppressive government, the intrusive government, evil Washington, imposing fake grammar as well as a fake currency, all inconstitutnional.

In the 1950's, this lunatic would've fought aliens, would've resisted them from trying to take him over with Martian mind control guns. In the 1800's, he would've been called Ezekiel and he would've fought biblical demons, messing with his head. In 2011, he fights an oppressive government and its unconstitutional grammar and currency control over him.

Fresh off of Drudge:
Jared Loughner’s friend says suspect ‘Did not watch TV … disliked the news’ (https://www.mediabistro.com/tvnewser/jared-loughners-friend-says-suspect-did-not-watch-tv-disliked-the-news_b48040)

He did not watch TV. He disliked the news. He didn’t listen to political radio. He didn’t take sides. He wasn’t on the left. He wasn’t on the right.

On the list for really stupid laws proposed: Rep King wants to ban knowingly carrying a gun within 'certain high profile government officials'. Because, you know, the peasant's right to self defense goes away when the nobles are nearby, so that the safety of the nobles can be maintained (not that such a law would do anything to stop people who did want to kill government folks).

CR

a completely inoffensive name

01-13-2011, 03:13

My policy has always been:

Disregard Drudge.
Acquire sanity.

Vuk

01-13-2011, 04:02

My policy has always been:

Disregard Drudge.
Acquire sanity.
What went wrong then?

a completely inoffensive name

01-13-2011, 04:16

What went wrong then?

Everyone else didn't follow my advice and went insane from the Drudge.

Centurion1

01-13-2011, 04:45

liberal talking heads are just as bad as far right talking heads. i mean my god the arrogance. i was watching "morning joe" and one of joe scarborough's common talkers was talking about how dumb the military is. (obviously not so bluntly but you can read into it....) does Joe scarborough one of the networks ardent republicans disagree? nope he concurs.

when you can call in a 9 line from memory make a battlefield diagnosis, call in artillery on a target all while under fire yourself. let alone lets leave the infantry and go to intelligence corps operations or aviation. when you can fly a jet worth more than you can likely ever make at the age of 24 carrying nuclear warheads come talk to me.

point being. the left is no better and no worse than the right. at all.

this is a tragedy. perpetrated by a lunatic. no wings attached. If you ask me we should all launch a campaign against strunk and white they more than anyone else is to blame for this tragedy.

Crazed Rabbit

01-13-2011, 04:58

Comeon ACIN, everyone's doing it.

Also;

U.S. Rep. Paul E. Kanjorski sometimes talks now as if he's free to say anything.

...

This week Mr. Kanjorski told The Times-Tribune editorial board about how large companies don't want the government changing the way it does business because they make big money off the government, and about how he's getting closer to supporting a single-payer health care system "because the health insurance industry is about as corrupt as you can ask for as an industry."

"They're blood suckers," he said.

This was followed by a reference to Rick Scott, the Republican candidate for Florida governor, who was ousted in 1997 as head of the giant health care company Columbia/HCA, amid the nation's largest Medicare and Medicaid fraud scandal. The company paid $1.7 billion in fines and civil settlements.

"That Scott down there that's running for governor of Florida," Mr. Kanjorski said. "Instead of running for governor of Florida, they ought to have him and shoot him. Put him against the wall and shoot him. He stole billions of dollars from the United States government and he's running for governor of Florida. He's a millionaire and a billionaire. He's no hero. He's a damn crook. It's just we don't prosecute big crooks."

Read more: http://thetimes-tribune.com/opinion/editorials-columns/roderick-random/kanjorski-ponders-nuts-bolts-from-blue-1.1052739#ixzz1AsovEmcK

Gee, that's the worse I've seen so far from a politician of any stripe.

CR

a completely inoffensive name

01-13-2011, 08:05

Gee, that's the worse I've seen so far from a politician of any stripe.

This is the worst I've seen so far from a politician of any stripe.

http://twitter.com/WestWingReport/status/25345393017487361

Crazed Rabbit

01-13-2011, 08:42

Sorry, I don't think that's as bad, and I want a non-twitter source. It doesn't compare to flat out saying "Instead of running for governor of Florida, they ought to have him and shoot him. Put him against the wall and shoot him."

CR

a completely inoffensive name

01-13-2011, 09:09

Furunculus

01-13-2011, 09:30

your dodging the fact that you are unable to demonstrate that the right is worse than the left, which given the tone appears to be your intent.

a completely inoffensive name

01-13-2011, 09:35

your dodging the fact that you are unable to demonstrate that the right is worse than the left, which given the tone appears to be your intent.

It's been demonstrated, you are just unwilling to admit the people who think differently then you are right.

Fragony

01-13-2011, 09:37

Rightwingers usually don't host Karl Marx and Mein Kampf, just saying. Palin does hold blame for possible attacks but maybe things aren't as they seem

a completely inoffensive name

01-13-2011, 09:44

Rightwingers usually don't host Karl Marx and Mein Kampf, just saying. Palin does hold blame for possible attacks but maybe things aren't as they seem

Weird about Mein Kampf because that is right wing.

Fragony

01-13-2011, 09:54

Weird about Mein Kampf because that is right wing.

No it's not it's deeply anti-capitalist, in great contrast with tea-party

a completely inoffensive name

01-13-2011, 10:08

No it's not it's deeply anti-capitalist, in great contrast with tea-party

Not really, he was anti capitalist but also extremely anti communist. It was a semi state directed economy, but private property was still maintained. The economic policies of the Nazi's were taken from left and right both to the point where it is really a wash in that manner. However, to say that the overall tone of the book is not right wing authoritarian is false.

EDIT: Don't contrast anything with the Tea Party. The Tea Party doesn't even know what it really stands for.

Fragony

01-13-2011, 10:24

a completely inoffensive name

01-13-2011, 10:33

Hitler wasn't just leftist he was extreme-leftist, he hated the communists for different reasons but admitted it was basicly the same thing. Palin's stunt is very dangerous she should have known better, but it might a coincidence that it led to this massacre. Griffen seems like an unlikely candidate anyway, pro gun posession for example, also pro-Israel from what I've heard. Media jumped on like a pack of starved hyena's but they might got it wrong, looks more like a neo-nazi rather than the tea crowd

He was certainly not extreme-left, he left businesses to make their own competitive decisions and promoted competition among businesses and kept private property as long as it didn't interfere with the states business. From my understanding he directed the economy only to the point where the state could always benefit from the companies and be stronger from it. He wasn't out to dismantle the idea of private enterprise but it seemed more like out to make sure that none of the economic elites could challenge his authority and at the same time bolster his government's strength.

EDIT: Just a quick look at the wiki page says it was mainly a right-wing philosophy. The political compass we use to introduce ourselves in the stickied thread puts him as a little bit to the right.

HoreTore

01-13-2011, 10:35

Frags is still in denial, ACIN.

Everything bad must be "the other side".

As for the democrats, however, their policy have most in common with the policy of a european conservative pwrty, though with a small minority who would identify with the right with of a european labour party(ie. blair).

Ralph Nader is closest to the european left.

Fragony

01-13-2011, 10:45

He wasn't against private property of party members but economy was subjective to the state. There is really nothing that can put Hitler in the rightwing sphere, unless you see racism and militarism as rightwing, with racism you would almost have a point because of the social darwinism of the 19th century, but if you make up a balance calling Mein Kampf and Hitler rightwing is way off. Read any socialist manifest and replace 'capital' with 'jew'

disclaimer, this isn't meant as an attack on the modern left, that's way off as well

HoreTore

01-13-2011, 10:53

Nationalism is a right-wing thing, frags, and what ties him to the right. Same goes for imperialism. Franco called his idelogy "fascism with social reform", which is fitting.

But is it standard, capitalist right-wing? No, hence the term "the third way", meaning that national socialism is "in between" socialism and capitalism.

There are three kinds of "right-wing":
1. Capitalist right, which hitler was not
2. Religous right, which hitler was not
3. Nationalist right, which Hitler was

It should also be noted that Lenin adored jews.

Fragony

01-13-2011, 11:03

Nationalism is a right-wing thing, frags, and what ties him to the right.

So they say, doesn't mean it's true. It are the most capitalist country's that are the most outward minded in reality. Again, it's not comparable with the modern left

Furunculus

01-13-2011, 11:08

It's been demonstrated, you are just unwilling to admit the people who think differently then you are right.

bollox, i watched years of visceral bush hatred from the left, now i am witnessing years of visceral 'liberal' hatred from the right.

i am seeing targets maps from both sides, and i am seeing imflamatory statements about killing the opposition from both sides.

no difference.

a completely inoffensive name

01-13-2011, 11:09

So they say, doesn't mean it's true. It are the most capitalist country's that are the most outward minded in reality. Again, it's not comparable with the modern left

The "they" you are talking about seem to be PhD. professionals of political science Frag...

a completely inoffensive name

01-13-2011, 11:18

bollox, i watched years of visceral bush hatred from the left, now i am witnessing years of visceral 'liberal' hatred from the right.

i am seeing targets maps from both sides, and i am seeing imflamatory statements about killing the opposition from both sides.

no difference.

The difference is that the left as dozen idiots who spout violent rhetoric, and the right have a clear majority of their talking heads making violent statements at some point throughout the day.

What it comes down to is that I say, hey look at what:

Palin
Rush
Hannity
Romney
Huckabee
Gingrich
Beck
Napolitano
O Reilly
Greta van Susteren
Doocey
Carlson
Bill Kristol
Rove
Ingraham
and Lou Dobbs are saying. These are all pundit's who talk on the radio and television to millions for a living. Not politicians with a job.

Then you go ahead and say oh yeah well here is:

idiot from Daily Kos with ~4,000 viewers
idiot from Huffinton Post with ~500,000 viewers

See? It's totally the same thing. Umm, no it's not. In this case when we are talking about social impact, it comes down to quantity over quality. Repeat something long enough and people believe it.

Fragony

01-13-2011, 11:25

The "they" you are talking about seem to be PhD. professionals of political science Frag...

So? People with phd's tend to be kinda devided on terminology, outdated concepts anyway. What are the most international minded society's, free-market ones, which are the most inward aka nationalist?

Furunculus

01-13-2011, 11:27

The difference is that the left as dozen idiots who spout violent rhetoric, and the right have a clear majority of their talking heads making violent statements at some point throughout the day.

What it comes down to is that I say, hey look at what:

Palin
Rush
Hannity
Romney
Huckabee
Gingrich
Beck
Napolitano
O Reilly
Greta van Susteren
Doocey
Carlson
Bill Kristol
Rove
Ingraham
and Lou Dobbs are saying. These are all pundit's who talk on the radio and television to millions for a living. Not politicians with a job.

Then you go ahead and say oh yeah well here is:

idiot from Daily Kos with ~4,000 viewers
idiot from Huffinton Post with ~500,000 viewers

See? It's totally the same thing. Umm, no it's not. In this case when we are talking about social impact, it comes down to quantity over quality. Repeat something long enough and people believe it.

i'm not talking about the propensity of talking heads to be idiots, i'm talking about the reaction of the political sides as a whole.

no difference.

a completely inoffensive name

01-13-2011, 11:36

So? People with phd's tend to be kinda devided on terminology, outdated concepts anyway. What are the most international minded society's, free-market ones, which are the most inward aka nationalist?

I don't know Frag, you would have to go to someone who is an expert on analyzing the political and economic breakdown of a country...people with PhDs in political science and economics.

Please don't pull the "my first hand experience is better than their education." That might work for a electrician telling his newbie apprentice how to go about the first month, but it doesn't fly when it comes to politics and policy.

HoreTore

01-13-2011, 11:38

a completely inoffensive name

01-13-2011, 11:39

i'm not talking about the propensity of talking heads to be idiots, i'm talking about the reaction of the political sides as a whole.

no difference.

The punditry give the reaction for each side. The punditry set the discourse for everyone. The pundits give the public their talking points to repeat in public.

Fisherking

01-13-2011, 11:39

National Socialist Workers Party is the usual translation.

fascism is usually defined as a kind of cult worship of a leader.

Totalitarianism is usually considered left wing.

Nationalizing industries is normally a leftwing ploy.

But all that is immaterial.

One side is trying to pin what happened on the other side for political gain and the other side is striking out to defend its self.

How novel!

So we look forward to new ways of stopping madmen from committing acts that they are prepared to die in the attempt of.

It is all about political gain. Who can pin it on the other guy. Isn’t that new?

There is nothing to be done that can undo the past.

Furunculus

01-13-2011, 11:49

The punditry give the reaction for each side. The punditry set the discourse for everyone. The pundits give the public their talking points to repeat in public.

and......................?

across the spectrum of the divide i see the same visceral hatred. no. difference.

a completely inoffensive name

01-13-2011, 11:53

and......................?

across the spectrum of the divide i see the same visceral hatred. no. difference.

names please. show me the videos of the left wing pundits suggesting we should "lock and load" or perhaps even "burn bush".

You say you "see" no difference, but you won't tell me who or what you are looking at from the left.

Fragony

01-13-2011, 11:55

I don't know Frag, you would have to go to someone who is an expert on analyzing the political and economic breakdown of a country...people with PhDs in political science and economics.

Please don't pull the "my first hand experience is better than their education." That might work for a electrician telling his newbie apprentice how to go about the first month, but it doesn't fly when it comes to politics and policy.

Makes you think I don't know anything about political and economic theory. Show me how nationalism is rightwing, that's just something armchair-cosmopolitan gutmensch decided, theory by and for

a completely inoffensive name

01-13-2011, 12:00

Makes you think I don't know anything about political and economic theory. Show me how nationalism is rightwing, that's just something armchair-cosmopolitan gutmensch decided, theory by and for

I'm not saying you don't know anything. I am saying those with the PhD next to their name know more than you.

HoreTore

01-13-2011, 12:01

Because the vast majority of the people who identify themselves as nationalists also identify themselves as belonging to the right.

Fragony

01-13-2011, 12:07

Because the vast majority of the people who identify themselves as nationalists also identify themselves as belonging to the right.

So? Maybe they are wrong about that, North Korea, Venuzuela, Cuba, got anything similar for me?

Fisherking

01-13-2011, 12:10

I'm not saying you don't know anything. I am saying those with the PhD next to their name know more than you.

Hahaha!

Those with PhD in back of their names’ want you to think they know more than you.

Some may but there is a high percentage of educated idiots out there too.

Who is who? You take your chances....

HoreTore

01-13-2011, 12:18

So? Maybe they are wrong about that, North Korea, Venuzuela, Cuba, got anything similar for me?

Words have the meaning we give them.

Most people have given the meaning "right" to the word "nationalist". Thus, nationalism belongs to the right.

Just like nationalization belongs to the left, even though no social democratic party in europe would ever dream of nationalizing stuff.

Fragony

01-13-2011, 12:19

Hahaha!

Those with PhD in back of their names’ want you to think they know more than you.

Some may but there is a high percentage of educated idiots out there too.

Who is who? You take your chances....

Tell me about it, we have this muppet of a historian here who insisted Austria-Hungary bordered the black sea, and talked about the backward culture in Berlin in the twenties, PhD please
Words have the meaning we give them.

Most people have given the meaning "right" to the word "nationalist". Thus, nationalism belongs to the right.

Ah, can I call you Suzy, gonna talk a drag-queen out of you BY POWER OF WORDS. Your :daisy: isn't going to magically fall of

Fisherking

01-13-2011, 12:22

As I said earlier:

National Socialist Workers Party is the usual translation.

fascism is usually defined as a kind of cult worship of a leader.

Totalitarianism is usually considered left wing.

Nationalizing industries is normally a leftwing ploy.

But all that is immaterial.

One side is trying to pin what happened on the other side for political gain and the other side is striking out to defend its self.

How novel!

So we look forward to new ways of stopping madmen from committing acts that they are prepared to die in the attempt of.

It is all about political gain. Who can pin it on the other guy. Isn’t that new?

There is nothing to be done that can undo the past.

This is a lot of pointless bull....

a completely inoffensive name

01-13-2011, 12:25

Hahaha!

Those with PhD in back of their names’ want you to think they know more than you.

Some may but there is a high percentage of educated idiots out there too.

Who is who? You take your chances....

Just because someone acts as a moron to a certain degree in their life doesn't mean that suddenly that invalidates their PhD. They knew their **** in the field they specialized in, that they spent 6,7,8 years of their lives extensively studying as a living.

Hey guys, Sasaki made a stupid statement the other day about (unrelated subject) [he actually didn't, I am just using you for my point Sasaki, forgive me], perhaps he doesn't really know as much about psychology as his degree gives the impression of. (Hint: There is a fallacy here.)

Am I saying the PhDs are perfect? No, but I get tired of people who haven't dedicated their lives to a field talk about how the experts are little more then glorified liberals with their name on a piece of paper.

It's one of the reasons I left the libertarian camp. After listening to everyone bashing about modern economists such as Krugman, talking about how they are all wrong and that we need the gold standard back, I suddenly asked myself, why exactly does all the major institutions teach and produce economists who are not Ron Pauls? Gee, either this is all a big liberal conspiracy or maybe the general consensus that the gold standard and removing the FED would be a step backwards are actually right.

HoreTore

01-13-2011, 12:29

It's just regular anti-elitism.

Very common within populist movements, both right and left.

Fisherking

01-13-2011, 12:41

Just because someone acts as a moron to a certain degree in their life doesn't mean that suddenly that invalidates their PhD. They knew their **** in the field they specialized in, that they spent 6,7,8 years of their lives extensively studying as a living.

Hey guys, Sasaki made a stupid statement the other day about (unrelated subject) [he actually didn't, I am just using you for my point Sasaki, forgive me], perhaps he doesn't really know as much about psychology as his degree gives the impression of. (Hint: There is a fallacy here.)

Am I saying the PhDs are perfect? No, but I get tired of people who haven't dedicated their lives to a field talk about how the experts are little more then glorified liberals with their name on a piece of paper.

It's one of the reasons I left the libertarian camp. After listening to everyone bashing about modern economists such as Krugman, talking about how they are all wrong and that we need the gold standard back, I suddenly asked myself, why exactly does all the major institutions teach and produce economists who are not Ron Pauls? Gee, either this is all a big liberal conspiracy or maybe the general consensus that the gold standard and removing the FED would be a step backwards are actually right.

I am not thrashing anyone in particular.

I don’t know anything about the statements.

But few things are fixed and static. Few things are always true and without exception.

There is always some risk in taking Expert Opinion...just because someone feels they are expert or someone else takes them as expert doesn’t rule out error.

When faced with conflicting opinions often the truth is something in-between. And sometimes someplace else entirely.

Furunculus

01-13-2011, 12:51

names please. show me the videos of the left wing pundits suggesting we should "lock and load" or perhaps even "burn bush".

You say you "see" no difference, but you won't tell me who or what you are looking at from the left.

you're obsessing about pundits again, i'm talking about my global impression of the right and left of US politics over the last decade.

polarised and angry. both sides. long time.

a completely inoffensive name

01-13-2011, 12:56

I am not thrashing anyone in particular.

I don’t know anything about the statements.

But few things are fixed and static. Few things are always true and without exception.

There is always some risk in taking Expert Opinion...just because someone feels they are expert or someone else takes them as expert doesn’t rule out error.

When faced with conflicting opinions often the truth is something in-between. And sometimes someplace else entirely.

Well, we were not talking about someone in particular. We were talking about the consensus of the political science academic community, which seem to have labeled Nazism and Hitler in the right wing sphere contrary to what Fragony is saying. It is good to be skeptical of the individual even if does have a PhD, but Frag is rejecting the consensus, which is nonsense. Not to say you should abandon all skepticism of the consensus, but you get what I am saying.

Also there is a distinction between who are experts and people who think they are experts. To me, someone with a degree in economics is educated about it. Someone with a masters is extremely knowledgeable about it. Someone with a PhD is an expert in the field. No real way around it. If you have the PhD, you are an expert, if you don't, well you might know a lot about what you are talking about but chances are no one would hire you to teach a class at a University (from my understanding Masters is not sufficient to teach for most Universities).

al Roumi

01-13-2011, 12:58

Can we perhaps all agree on one thing? That it was not us, it was the other people's fault?

And I kind of agree with Louis now, left and right don't meen a bloody thing. They are just adversorial tags with no factual meaning other than the side of the parliamentary benches people sat on in the English parliament -and I rather think we've moved on from the policy and disputes of the time, yet the terminology persists. Your ongoing discussion demonstrates the weakness of limiting perspectives to a left/right dichotomy...

a completely inoffensive name

01-13-2011, 13:03

you're obsessing about pundits again, i'm talking about my global impression of the right and left of US politics over the last decade.

polarised and angry. both sides. long time.

The bold, underlined part is what I was looking for. You only see what you want to see. Your impression is that both sides are the same, even though reality seems to disagree on that.

What are we discussing about if the argument is coming down to whether or not you see the facts or not?

Fragony

01-13-2011, 13:05

HoreTore

01-13-2011, 13:06

The funny thing is tough, that Fragony's interpretation smacks of the snobbish elitism he cries out against - as he said that what the common man means is irrelevant, what matters is where he feels nationalists belong.

Ironside

01-13-2011, 13:08

National Socialist Workers Party is the usual translation.
Aye. The Socialist part was mostly eradicated early on though.

fascism is usually defined as a kind of cult worship of a leader.
There's more to it, but that's one part of it correct.

Totalitarianism is usually considered left wing.

:inquisitive: Warping the scale are you? Are an absolute king a left winger? Are the new capitalistic China left wing, or did it stop being totalitarian? Communism have a large tendency to become a totalitarian leader cult, but that's not inherant to the system, but it's biggest flaw.

Nationalizing industries is normally a leftwing ploy.

Non-capitalistic yes, but the right wing isn't only about free markets (that's the old center).

And that's whats makes it confusing. If you ignore the historical backround and try to rewrite it today, you'll end up with bizzare artifacts, like Anarcho-Socialists being more right wing than Libertarians (govermental control), Swedes being the most right wing nation (induvidual freedom), churches being left wing (social control).

A new topic is probably needed if to expand the subject, if someone wishes. It doesn't belong here.

One side is trying to pin what happened on the other side for political gain and the other side is striking out to defend its self.

It could also contain a bit of "told you so". But the choise of target made it a political mudslinging that a discussion of the political climate.

So we look forward to new ways of stopping madmen from committing acts that they are prepared to die in the attempt of.

Aren't the best defense to prevent them from even considering to do the act? Why are the random nutters and the politically motivated both more prone to attack a controversial figure, if there's no correlation at all?

About the 1800 comercials, while a good joke, are you sure it's a good sign that the comercials are 200 years old and was used in the first real US election? Treason charges, talks about revolution and murder of political figures is not a good debating climate.
It a nice study on how little the words means in communication though. Don't take a single word as literal.

a completely inoffensive name

01-13-2011, 13:08

Example from here 'stop the right before the right stops you', official labour-jugend slogan. The left calls for violence all the time, and we know they mean it, they don't seem to notice that about themselves, or they do but feel they can because they regard themselves morally superior. In all fairness nowhere as bad as Palin did with her map though that's insane, but no clean hands, not at all

See, I agree with everything you just said here. 100% no clean hands on either hand, but to go from that to saying both sides are the same is jumping a bit of logic. Just because both sides have called for violence many times throughout history doesn't not mean that within the current US discourse that both sides are equally contributing to the violent rhetoric.

Fragony

01-13-2011, 13:29

Furunculus

01-13-2011, 13:30

The bold, underlined part is what I was looking for. You only see what you want to see. Your impression is that both sides are the same, even though reality seems to disagree on that.

What are we discussing about if the argument is coming down to whether or not you see the facts or not?

bollox. what facts?

both sides have used targets.
both sides have talking of killing, or "taking out" the other.
both sides support base has been responsible for broad demonisation of the 'other'

you talk of me only seeing what i want to see and reality disagreeing, i say that is a crock, and the evidence witnessed in the tea-party years in no substantial measure outweighs that of the anti-bush days.

Idaho

01-13-2011, 13:31

Fragony

01-13-2011, 13:41

That's the right all over. Opportunist and intellectually moribund.

Moribund, got to remember that one for scrabble it even souns smart. That's kinda hysterical, so you are going to be the one that's going to give anything similar to NK, Venuzuela and Cuba I take?

Furunculus

01-13-2011, 13:43

That's the right all over. Opportunist and intellectually moribund.

intellectually moribund, really?

british political history really doesn't give that statement any credence, could you elaborate please?

Fisherking

01-13-2011, 13:50

Aye. The Socialist part was mostly eradicated early on though.

There's more to it, but that's one part of it correct.

:inquisitive: Warping the scale are you? Are an absolute king a left winger? Are the new capitalistic China left wing, or did it stop being totalitarian? Communism have a large tendency to become a totalitarian leader cult, but that's not inherant to the system, but it's biggest flaw.

Non-capitalistic yes, but the right wing isn't only about free markets (that's the old center).

And that's whats makes it confusing. If you ignore the historical backround and try to rewrite it today, you'll end up with bizzare artifacts, like Anarcho-Socialists being more right wing than Libertarians (govermental control), Swedes being the most right wing nation (induvidual freedom), churches being left wing (social control).

A new topic is probably needed if to expand the subject, if someone wishes. It doesn't belong here.

It could also contain a bit of "told you so". But the choise of target made it a political mudslinging that a discussion of the political climate.

Aren't the best defense to prevent them from even considering to do the act? Why are the random nutters and the politically motivated both more prone to attack a controversial figure, if there's no correlation at all?

About the 1800 comercials, while a good joke, are you sure it's a good sign that the comercials are 200 years old and was used in the first real US election? Treason charges, talks about revolution and murder of political figures is not a good debating climate.
It a nice study on how little the words means in communication though. Don't take a single word as literal.

Hitler formed a totalitarian state. He found early on that he needed the large interests and it served his purpose to leave them in place rather than start from scratch and build them anew.

Nationalism was used as a tool. It was also used by Stalin in the Great Patriotic War.
He used a broad appeal but he also suppressed groups on the left and the right.

That is why some view the political scale as circular. The extremisms mirror each other in many ways. There is still room to debate which it was or would have become.

I am sure that instituting a police state would go a long way in alleviating the problems of this nature.

Then we can discuss whether a leftwing or rightwing police state is better.

HoreTore

01-13-2011, 13:54

If 100 people say a tomatoe is blue does that make it any less red?

So when a guy with a Ph.D. says something, it's true, even though the rest of the world disagrees with him?

As to your "proof":

Pinochet, Argentina and Franco are three examples of capitalism plus authoritarian nationalism.

As for Cuba, they have working heavily with Africa, and trained nurses, doctors and teacheer free of charge before sending them back to Africa. The Soviet Union did the same thing. Indeed, every communist country has traded extensively with all other communist countries, just like every capitalist couny has traded with every other capitalist country.

There have been plenty of trade within the two blocks, but the have been little trade between the two. Capitalist countries haven't traded with communist countries, while communist countries haven't traded with capitalist countries.

Fragony

01-13-2011, 14:07

Peanuts compared to Mao, Stalin, Hitler, Kim-Jung, Pol Pot etc et encore

al Roumi

01-13-2011, 14:24

If 100 people say a tomatoe is blue does that make it any less red?

Plenty of people here seeing red.

ding-ding!

Fragony

01-13-2011, 14:45

Plenty of people here seeing red.

ding-ding!

Not my fault you guys get emotional

kaboom!

Fisherking

01-13-2011, 14:57

kaboom!

Oh NO!

another example of a right-winger inciting violence!!!

SEE What You Did!!!

:gah:

Lemur

01-13-2011, 15:41

There appear to be very few true Scotsmen (http://www.logicalfallacies.info/presumption/no-true-scotsman/) in this debate.

Fisherking, that last jab/joke was pretty much the opposite of classy. Reminder: six innocent people are dead and a very sharp congresscritter has been shot through the brain. Yes, the gunman was a loon, but loons react to their environment. There is more to this than Teh Evil Libs trying to pin blame on Teh Innocent Righties.

Further reminder: Ex-Governor Palin produced a map which named Rep. Giffords and put a crosshair over her district. Was this causal in any way? Nope. Extremely unfortunate? Yep. Furthermore, Giffords came out and said that the targeting and the language were problematic, in her phrase, "words have consequences." Furthermore, someone left a handgun at one of her events, a brick was thrown through her campaign window, death threats were received due to her support of the health care bill, etc. So even though the gunman was a lone loon, he was not acting in a vacuum.

Because of all of these congruent events, light-hearted jokes about a "right-winger inciting violence" are wildly inappropriate.

Watch the video below. Consider that this woman was shortly after shot through the head. Decide whether or not you want to continue to treat this discussion as a ridiculous, manufactured piece of political theater generated by the weak-minded opportunism of Teh Evil Lefties.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qs75zKxJxVY

Fragony

01-13-2011, 15:56

She's right, things like that have consequences it was so stupid, hope she will be ok she seems like a really nice person

Furunculus

01-13-2011, 16:06

Decide whether or not you want to continue to treat this discussion as a ridiculous, manufactured piece of political theater generated by the weak-minded opportunism of Teh Evil Lefties.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qs75zKxJxVY

when i consider this sentence, in the light of the discussion here, i am forced to reflect on the last sentence in that recorded interview which goes something like as follows: "we do have extreme elements on each side of the divide, it's about time we thought seriously about how we got here."

and while i see all the political sniping going on here, i can only feel sorry for the tragedy of what happened to a deeply likeable politician for NO good reason.

Fisherking

01-13-2011, 16:30

Fisherking, that last jab/joke was pretty much the opposite of classy. Reminder: six innocent people are dead and a very sharp congresscritter has been shot through the brain. Yes, the gunman was a loon, but loons react to their environment. There is more to this than Teh Evil Libs trying to pin blame on Teh Innocent Righties.

If you read my posts you might see that I feel deeply that this tragedy is being overlooked in favor of political name-calling and finger-pointing.

It is political opportunism at its worst.

I am supporting neither side. My post was to illustrate to some degree what is already taking place.

The level of polarization has reached a point where both sides see the other as evil and some may feel justified in what ever they do to remove such threats.

It has to stop!

Sasaki Kojiro

01-13-2011, 16:32

See, I agree with everything you just said here. 100% no clean hands on either hand, but to go from that to saying both sides are the same is jumping a bit of logic. Just because both sides have called for violence many times throughout history doesn't not mean that within the current US discourse that both sides are equally contributing to the violent rhetoric.

I think it's entirely possible that the right uses more violent rhetoric. There are trends of pacifism and anti-gun beliefs on the left, a liberal president in office, a general ability to get upset about dolphins being killed, etc.

But I just don't see it as an important statistic. What are we supposed to do with it? I have a general disdain for anyone who uses crappy rhetoric in politics period. I vastly prefer someone I disagree with who writes or speaks well to someone who I agree with in general who doesn't. So why should the question about which group does it more interest me?

Just because someone acts as a moron to a certain degree in their life doesn't mean that suddenly that invalidates their PhD. They knew their **** in the field they specialized in, that they spent 6,7,8 years of their lives extensively studying as a living.

Hey guys, Sasaki made a stupid statement the other day about (unrelated subject) [he actually didn't, I am just using you for my point Sasaki, forgive me], perhaps he doesn't really know as much about psychology as his degree gives the impression of. (Hint: There is a fallacy here.)

Am I saying the PhDs are perfect? No, but I get tired of people who haven't dedicated their lives to a field talk about how the experts are little more then glorified liberals with their name on a piece of paper.

It's one of the reasons I left the libertarian camp. After listening to everyone bashing about modern economists such as Krugman, talking about how they are all wrong and that we need the gold standard back, I suddenly asked myself, why exactly does all the major institutions teach and produce economists who are not Ron Pauls? Gee, either this is all a big liberal conspiracy or maybe the general consensus that the gold standard and removing the FED would be a step backwards are actually right.

This argument is great in theory. Obviously a phd's opinion is worth more than a non-phd all else being equal. But in practice I prefer to use the patended sasaki "does this guy know what he's talking about"-o-meter.

Because it's actually true that you can know that an argument advanced by someone with a phd is wrong without knowing much about the field. There are broad trends and biases that people fall prey to, there are theories that are too neat and tidy for the real world, theories that misuse words to reach a conclusion (gardner's theory of multiple intelligences comes to mind, he redefines intelligence).

I skimmed the argument about hitler so what I said has no relation to that.

About modern economics, you ought to read the book "The black swan" by nicholas taleb. I honestly can't imagine you not being interested.

Fragony

01-13-2011, 16:38

and while i see all the political sniping going on here, i can only feel sorry for the tragedy of what happened to a deeply likeable politician for NO good reason.

Well a very good reason probably, idiotic rethoric. But I am deeply annoyed by the outrage after having seen how political assasination works (Fortuyn)

Furunculus

01-13-2011, 17:00

there will always be whack jobs in search of a 'justification'. did dutch society rise up and purge all the anti-pims from the face of the earth? no.

Idaho

01-13-2011, 17:04

intellectually moribund, really?

british political history really doesn't give that statement any credence, could you elaborate please?

It's a reaction away from thought or wider concerns. It's emphasis is all about re-cementing the values, culture and political pre-eminance of the richest sections of society.

Idaho

01-13-2011, 17:07

This assassination thing is interesting in that it might prick the mcarthyite bubble that builds up in US society from time to time. A rightist undercurrent which bubbles over into freedom fries and the like. The idea that their is some imagined US that is the finished product, to be protected from all who would try and make any changes.

Furunculus

01-13-2011, 17:24

It's a reaction away from thought or wider concerns. It's emphasis is all about re-cementing the values, culture and political pre-eminance of the richest sections of society.

and yet..................... of the three major forces in british politics, one is only a century old and the other collapsed into irrelevance a nearly century ago.

only the consrvative and unionist party has a continuous history of political relevance, and thus electoral success, that spans somewhere between two and four centuries depending on how measure the timeline.

it doesn't matter whether it moves away from this, or towards that, nor too how many rich people it cements in positions of undeserved privilege, what matters is whether it continues to be representative of the enfranchised electorate that it can win elections.

your assertion that the Tories are intellectually moribund, and i quote:
"That's the right all over. Opportunist and intellectually moribund."

has VERY little to recommend it.

Lemur

01-13-2011, 17:30

I vastly prefer someone I disagree with who writes or speaks well to someone who I agree with in general who doesn't.
Seconded. A classy opponent is preferable to a jerkish ally.

This assassination thing is interesting in that it might prick the mcarthyite bubble that builds up in US society from time to time.
We shall see. In politics, the counter-punch is usually stronger than the punch, so who exactly will win the blame-game food fight is an open question. Seems probable to me that both parties shall diminish themselves, if that's possible.

Haven't had a chance to watch it yet, what with work and children bogging down my life, but the general consensus seems to be that President 44 did a good job last night. Even NRO is saying nice things (http://www.nationalreview.com/corner/257050/non-accusatory-case-civility-rich-lowry), which is sort of like Hamas giving grudging approval to Netanyahu. Anyway. For those with the time:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ztbJmXQDIGA

Tellos Athenaios

01-13-2011, 17:42

This argument is great in theory. Obviously a phd's opinion is worth more than a non-phd all else being equal. But in practice I prefer to use the patended sasaki "does this guy know what he's talking about"-o-meter. Yes you would. But I might prefer the Tellos version of this meter, Fragony would definitely use his own revolutionary&magical version, and I'm sure Furunculus would cast an appraising eye on the configuration of my version and decide to buy himself a more conservative one preferring to save money for arms&armour upgrades.

And while we are on the subject of the Common-sense-Sasaki-o-meter: does Sasaki, in fact, have anything to recommend him over the Phd? Do you honestly feel that you know what you're talking about for any given subject? That is something to take into account when you pass “common sense” judgment. What if you are wrong? Not being an expert you will overestimate your own ability and lack the understanding needed to see and analyse your errors. You will be completely unable to fathom why your common sense fails when the expert can point out plenty of beginner's mistakes.

So I think you'll agree that this Sasaki version of the common-sense-o-meter doesn't work for people in the real world. Might be fine for your needs, but the broader market requires something else. Something more researched, and well informed. Perhaps the opinion of an expert?

Strike For The South

01-13-2011, 17:44

I love the whole educated idoits thing

Yes you can disagree with a someone who has a PhD and of course these people can be wrong but don't assume for a second that there is not merit in what they are talking about, and unless you can back your asseritions with credible evidence...shut your damn mouth freaking whipersnappers

Once again, this man is such an outlier that while he may have been pushed over the edge by the vitrol he is the same kind of guy who yells at the McDs employee because the McRib is gone, pininng the blame just won't work

Vuk

01-13-2011, 17:45

About Nazism being rightwing, nice try.
Of course, no one of any ideology wants to be associated with Hitler, and everyone wants to associate their opponents with Hitler. The Left has simple done a better job (coincidently, most people with PhD's are on the Left).
The core of Right Wing ideology (at least in terms of the USofA) is economic (aka. The Free Market). There is also social conservatism, which while important, always plays second fiddle to economic ideology when determining someone's 'Rightwingness'. How you or anyone else can classify Nationalism as Rightwing (at least in the sense of the USofA) is beyond me). Economically, Hitler was far Left. Socially, Hitler was polar Left. What the American Right stands for is the absolute freedom of the individual, and the limiting of the government to the point where it just has the power to perform a few, essential tasks. Hitler's social and economic policies contradicted these absolutely essential principles in every way imaginable. Hitler was just as Left wing as Stalin.
Both were dictators (something the Right does not believe in) who used their governments to control industry and the lives of their citizens (again, things the Right does not believe in), both emphasized the government over the people (which is the exact opposite of the Right). In Stalin's case he did so by preaching that the whole was greater than the individual, and Hitler did it with his fascist ideas. In the end, communism (socialism) and fascism were just different means to the same, Far Left end. To categorize it as Right Wing is simple to try to distance it from yourself and attack the Right (something that people with PhD next to their names looooove to do).

Strike For The South

01-13-2011, 17:49

Trying to ascribe Hitlers facism or Stalinism with the modern American definitions of right and left is perpertually stupid and is only used in a pinch to whip up the base

And LOL that "the Right" doesn't beilive in dictators. I can name off a few if you would like me to, Reagan was REAL close with a few of them

Lemur

01-13-2011, 17:51

In the end, communism (socialism) and fascism were just different means to the same, Far Left end.
Off-topic and Godwintastic, while equating everyone who disagrees with mass murderers! Well done!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VpMFVKO6eCk

Tellos Athenaios

01-13-2011, 17:52

I love the whole educated idoits thing
Strike, something I've been wondering about when you write idoits, is that a deliberate misspelling? (I ask because it happens to be a few English words strung together.)

Strike For The South

01-13-2011, 17:54

Strike, something I've been wondering about when you write idoits, is that a deliberate misspelling? (I ask because it happens to be a few English words strung together.)

Meh, My grammar here has been bad for years, I very ralery proofread posts here as I am a busy man with many obligations

Also I may or may not have undiagnosed dyslexia

Vuk

01-13-2011, 17:58

Yes you would. But I might prefer the Tellos version of this meter, Fragony would definitely use his own revolutionary&magical version, and I'm sure Furunculus would cast an appraising eye on the configuration of my version and decide to buy himself a more conservative one preferring to save money for arms&armour upgrades.

And while we are on the subject of the Common-sense-Sasaki-o-meter: does Sasaki, in fact, have anything to recommend him over the Phd? Do you honestly feel that you know what you're talking about for any given subject? That is something to take into account when you pass “common sense” judgment. What if you are wrong? Not being an expert you will overestimate your own ability and lack the understanding needed to see and analyse your errors. You will be completely unable to fathom why your common sense fails when the expert can point out plenty of beginner's mistakes.

So I think you'll agree that this Sasaki version of the common-sense-o-meter doesn't work for people in the real world. Might be fine for your needs, but the broader market requires something else. Something more researched, and well informed. Perhaps the opinion of an expert?

Tellos, there is tons of disagreement amongst those who have PhD's, and people with PhD's often make up their minds on matters considering way too little information. People with PhD's are useful for presenting evidence. It is smart to take their conclusions into account, but in the end, you are better off drawing your own conclusions based on the information that they find. Guess what? Those guys with PhD's are no different than anyone else in the world when it comes to wanting to prove a point. All too often they will seek out only material that supports their argument, twist words, and in extreme cases make up information to support their view points. If someone on an internet forum presents sourced, reliable information to you, and some bloke with a PhD does, you would be no better off automatically believing the conclusion on the information that the bloke with the PhD draws than that of the random guy on the forum. Both are going to be interested in affirming their own beliefs, which they usually hold before they even get their PhD, and is not founded on their academic research. You would be better off trying to find out their influences, reading the sources, further investigating, and drawing your own conclusions. The guy with the PhD is more likely to have better sourcing (which is a good thing), but his conclusion is no more likely to be correct. (which is what is important)
A PhD does mean something, but not that their conclusions are necessarily better than those of other or of the ones that you, yourself can draw. And trust me, I have known a loot of mud dumb professors. Two of my professors said that Hungarians were Slavs, one said that a Napoleonic era gun was just as likely (ie 50/50) to blow up in your face than not, one said that Charlemagne did not establish any schools during his reign (in answer to a student's question). I could go on, and on, and on. Point is that they are not supposed to be teaching if they have not done substantial research into an area, and yet I have had professors teach about areas that I had done much more research into, and areas that they frankly did not know crap about what they were speaking. ei a third grader level of knowledge, and wrong on many details.)

Strike For The South

01-13-2011, 18:02

Tellos, there is tons of disagreement amongst those who have PhD's, and people with PhD's often make up their minds on matters considering way too little information. People with PhD's are useful for presenting evidence. It is smart to take their conclusions into account, but in the end, you are better off drawing your own conclusions based on the information that they find. Guess what? Those guys with PhD's are no different than anyone else in the world when it comes to wanting to prove a point. All too often they will seek out only material that supports their argument, twist words, and in extreme cases make up information to support their view points. If someone on an internet forum presents sourced, reliable information to you, and some bloke with a PhD does, you would be no better off automatically believing the conclusion on the information that the bloke with the PhD draws than that of the random guy on the forum. Both are going to be interested in affirming their own beliefs, which they usually hold before they even get their PhD, and is not founded on their academic research. You would be better off trying to find out their influences, reading the sources, further investigating, and drawing your own conclusions. The guy with the PhD is more likely to have better sourcing (which is a good thing), but his conclusion is no more likely to be correct. (which is what is important)
A PhD does mean something, but not that their conclusions are necessarily better than those of other or of the ones that you, yourself can draw. And trust me, I have known a loot of mud dumb professors. Two of my professors said that Hungarians were Slavs, one said that a Napoleonic era gun was just as likely (ie 50/50) to blow up in your face than not, one said that Charlemagne did not establish any schools during his reign (in answer to a student's question). I could go on, and on, and on. Point is that they are not supposed to be teaching if they have not done substantial research into an area, and yet I have had professors teach about areas that I had done much more research into, and areas that they frankly did not know crap about what they were speaking. ei a third grader level of knowledge, and wrong on many details.)

I love the smell of anti intellectualism in the morining

ya know MAO tried something like this in the great leap forward. THAT'S TOATTLY LEFT WING OF YOU.

RIGHT WINGERS WOULD NEVER EVER EVER DISAGREE WITH AN AUTHORITY FIGURE

Vuk

01-13-2011, 18:03

Off-topic and Godwintastic, while equating everyone who disagrees with mass murderers! Well done!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VpMFVKO6eCk

No, not at all. If you had read the posts of the last page Lemur, you would see that it was on topic. Funny then that you did not tell ACIN that.
And no, I am not saying that ALL people of the Left are Nazis, but that ALL Nazis were on the Left. There is a big difference.

@StrIKE And yet, what ACIN tried to do just a few pages ago was equate Nazism with the US Right. My point is that by US definition, but Stalin and Hitler were Far Left. Euroweiners can have whatever definitions they want, but when talking about American Right and Left, you must use the American definitions of Right and Left (because that is how Americans identify themselves).

Vuk

01-13-2011, 18:06

I love the smell of anti intellectualism in the morining

ya know MAO tried something like this in the great leap forward. THAT'S TOATTLY LEFT WING OF YOU.

RIGHT WINGERS WOULD NEVER EVER EVER DISAGREE WITH AN AUTHORITY FIGURE

It is not anti intellectual. I believe that everyone owes it to themselves to be an intellectual, and I place great value on it. You see, the problem is that many people posing as intellectuals are not. In fact, they are just politically polarized people who used the fancy methods they learn at their Universities to try to make their position sound as good as possible, and their opponents worse.
In fact, I would go as far as to say that the better a wordsmith/orator/writer a person is, the more cautious you should be when considering their arguments, as such a person in the worst case could simply be doing a good job at making a bad argument look good.

So please, quit throwing out the soundbytes and read my post. :bow:

EDIT: Actually Strike, Mao got a huge part of his support and some of his top men from Colleges in China. If it weren't for the College students, Mao would not have been successful.

Strike For The South

01-13-2011, 18:16

It is not anti intellectual. I believe that everyone owes it to themselves to be an intellectual, and I place great value on it. You see, the problem is that many people posing as intellectuals are not. In fact, they are just politically polarized people who used the fancy methods they learn at their Universities to try to make their position sound as good as possible, and their opponents worse.
In fact, I would go as far as to say that the better a wordsmith/orator/writer a person is, the more cautious you should be when considering their arguments, as such a person in the worst case could simply be doing a good job at making a bad argument look good.

So please, quit throwing out the soundbytes and read my post. :bow:

Simply because I can sum up my feelings succintly does not mean they are sound bites, it simply means people read my posts instead of daunting walls of texts which invetabily fall into the "I'm not saying, I'm just saying"

These people you talk about spend years at uni having there papers and methods being ripped apart. Do some of them have what is considered a left bent? Yes. Until you can argue with them after being put through the same amount of scholastic scrutiny I really don't want to hear it. And no I don't consider your unsubstantiated "gotcha" moments as anything more than someone with an agenda trying to prove a point.

America has always been wary if intelluctauls even in the best of times, which of course explains why our political discourse is 2 parts jingonism and 1 part xenophobia

EDIT: Actually Strike, Mao got a huge part of his support and some of his top men from Colleges in China. If it weren't for the College students, Mao would not have been successful.

Exactly, the students, the teachers were targeted. I don't want to have to hold your hand through this, I think you're big enough we can finally take the training wheels off.

Furunculus

01-13-2011, 18:21

I love the smell of anti intellectualism in the morining

"Anti-intellectualism is hostility towards and mistrust of intellect, intellectuals, and intellectual pursuits,"
of the six potential primary attributes here you can possibly ascribe two.

"usually expressed as the derision of education, philosophy, literature, art, and science, as impractical and contemptible."
and of the descriptive elements that reinforce the above you would struggle to ascribe any.

the charge of anti intellectualism based of the text above would difficult to prove........

Louis VI the Fat

01-13-2011, 18:21

Cool, an interesting thread got totally Godwined by the peanut gallery.

https://img810.imageshack.us/img810/4091/godwin.png

Strike For The South

01-13-2011, 18:29

"Anti-intellectualism is hostility towards and mistrust of intellect, intellectuals, and intellectual pursuits,"
of the six potential primary attributes here you can possibly ascribe two.

"usually expressed as the derision of education, philosophy, literature, art, and science, as impractical and contemptible."
and of the descriptive you would struggle to ascribe any.

the brand of anti intellectualism based of the text above would difficult to prove........

So I'm playing a bit fast and loose with the defintions. I think Vuks deep seeded mistrust of "the PhDs" is certainly a form of anti intellectualism.

Cool, an interesting thread got totally Godwined by the peanut gallery.

https://img810.imageshack.us/img810/4091/godwin.png

Oh geez,

Ok Louis I think it has been clearly established that the man was outlier. Now even if we agree that the heated rhectoric caused him to snap where should the line be drawn? I agree that crosshairs on a map are juvinelle and simply a way to pander to the LCD but I don't think banning this kind of speech will do anything to keep crazy people under wraps.

I certianly see where you are coming from, tense times make tense people and crazy tense people are bad buisness but how can we legislate this out? I feel the onus falls on the people of America to not be swayed by firebreathing preacher men posing as people who know what they are talking about. No amount of legislation can force you to turn off Beck

Fisherking

01-13-2011, 18:48

Oh geez,

Ok Louis I think it has been clearly established that the man was outlier. Now even if we agree that the heated rhectoric caused him to snap where should the line be drawn? I agree that crosshairs on a map are juvinelle and simply a way to pander to the LCD but I don't think banning this kind of speech will do anything to keep crazy people under wraps.

I certianly see where you are coming from, tense times make tense people and crazy tense people are bad buisness but how can we legislate this out? I feel the onus falls on the people of America to not be swayed by firebreathing preacher men posing as people who know what they are talking about. No amount of legislation can force you to turn off Beck

humh humh, yep

Of course it can be legislated...as I said before you do prefer a leftwing police state or a right wing police state?

Centurion1

01-13-2011, 18:48

Palin is not as popular as everyone thinks she is a novelty and i know very few fellow conservatives who want her in office
Rush- is an old blowhard. no one gives a damn about him
Hannity- is really not the great devil everyone makes him out to be. the worst he does is latch onto tiny liberal foibles and not let go.....
Romney- mitt romney was governor of a very very liberal state. he is an intelligent and pretty reasonable man i havent heard much hate speech from him....
Huckabee- an affable idiot from (is it missouri)
Gingrich- old newt? yeah he uses inflammatory speech but i dont think one could call it hate speech inciting violence
Beck- really...... hes an imbecile and he isnt that hateful just stupid.
Napolitano- yeah if you think hes spouting hate speech your blind and deaf.
O Reilly- is a ego inflated jackass not a hate mongerer
Greta van Susteren- GRETA! lol i just lol'ed
Doocey- steve doocey this list gets worse and worse. the men is a pretty boy anchor with a reasonable intellect on morning fox news the equivalent to fox news comedy central.
Carlson- yeah not really
Bill Kristol- bwahahaha
Rove- the man is not hateful
Ingraham you mean ingrahm?
and Lou Dobbs bwahahaha

really..... go down the list of every fox host you can find. your world view is tainted if anyones is. you called furnunclus and told him on that yet you meander along in your blisssfully unaware life telling people you are completely unbiased and know absolutely the political climates of the major US parties. what world experience do you have? your a university student, one of the most left polarized institutions in the country. No one lives like a university student. I am too, but at least i admit i am biased to some extent and cannot speak and generalize about millions of americans.

that list? utter bullshit.

Strike For The South

01-13-2011, 18:52

humh humh, yep

Of course it can be legislated...as I said before you do prefer a leftwing police state or a right wing police state?

Um neither?

HoreTore

01-13-2011, 18:58

Should I start arguing that since Stalin have zero views in common with me, he is thus not a leftie, and as such must belong to the right...?

Nah, on second thought I'm still not insane....

Vuk

01-13-2011, 19:04

So I'm playing a bit fast and loose with the defintions. I think Vuks deep seeded mistrust of "the PhDs" is certainly a form of anti intellectualism.

Mr. Intellectual doesn't know what words mean? Couldn't be...
I do not have a mistrust of PhDs, I am merely not willing to give the argument of one with a PhD anymore consideration than that of someone without a PhD. Not having your love affair with professors is not the same as deeply mistrusting them. Maybe if you have read that 'daunting wall of text'... Forgive me that my thoughts cannot be summed up in four syllables...

Simply because I can sum up my feelings succintly does not mean they are sound bites, it simply means people read my posts instead of daunting walls of texts which invetabily fall into the "I'm not saying, I'm just saying"

These people you talk about spend years at uni having there papers and methods being ripped apart. Do some of them have what is considered a left bent? Yes. Until you can argue with them after being put through the same amount of scholastic scrutiny I really don't want to hear it. And no I don't consider your unsubstantiated "gotcha" moments as anything more than someone with an agenda trying to prove a point.

America has always been wary if intelluctauls even in the best of times, which of course explains why our political discourse is 2 parts jingonism and 1 part xenophobia

Exactly, the students, the teachers were targeted. I don't want to have to hold your hand through this, I think you're big enough we can finally take the training wheels off.

"Daunting wall of text"? Are we being anti intellectual now Striko Baggins? I hate to say it Strike, but I think you are really guilty of just plain old not reading people's posts and then assuming you know what they said. (as you have proven in many other threads) If you have an aversion to reading, then why bother responding and making a fool out of yourself?
Tell me Strike, if having a PhD means not being wrong, then how is it that there are tons of disagreements amongst scholars, and often tens of different positions (with hundreds of sub-positions)? Assuming that EVERYONE is not equally as right, that means that all but one of these positions (and therefore thousands of professors) are wrong, despite all the scrutiny, yada, yada, yada. Do you know what all that scrutiny does? It makes them better able to form an argument, which is NOT the same thing as being right.
What that means is that just like in the real world, you get some people who know what they are talking about and some people who don't, but unlike larger society, they all know how to support their positions (no matter how right or wrong) well.
I read an excerpt from a really good book (written by a professor) last semester that said that most of the superstition, mystical beliefs, and false science in the "Dark Ages" was the result of a top-down effect, and originated in Universities. At times PhD bearing people have been the light of reason, and at other times they have been the dark side of humanity (I am thinking about Eugenics in the thirties and forties, as well as psychology in the forties and fifties). Just like other groups of people, they can be very right, and very wrong. It depends largely on who is funding/sponsoring/influencing them and their research, and where their allegiances lie. Just like other people, they are human, and are not free from corrupt influence.
I have nothing against professors, but I have something against the blind worship of them. I know many people with PhDs who I have a great deal of respect for, and consider amongst the smartest, most reasonable people whom I know. Unfortunately I know other who command far less respect.

Vuk

01-13-2011, 19:08

Should I start arguing that since Stalin have zero views in common with me, he is thus not a leftie, and as such must belong to the right...?

Nah, on second thought I'm still not insane....

No Hore Tore, you and ACIN pulled a Godwin and tried to tie Hitler to the Right. My point is that the American Right is NOT related to the European Right, as we have very different definitions. We were talking about the American Right, and if you look at the definitions of Right and Left in America, Hitler and Stalin were both far Left. You Euroweiners can call him whatever you want in you own little continent, but to start applying your definitions on a discussion of American Right and Left is total BS. They are completely different things.

PanzerJaeger

01-13-2011, 19:15

So even though the gunman was a lone loon, he was not acting in a vacuum.

Is there any evidence of this?

Watch the video below. Consider that this woman was shortly after shot through the head. Decide whether or not you want to continue to treat this discussion as a ridiculous, manufactured piece of political theater generated by the weak-minded opportunism of Teh Evil Lefties.

The shooting was a tragedy. The reaction has been a ridiculous, manufactured piece of political theater generated by the weak-minded opportunism of the Left.

There is not much that can be said about Giffords' situation other than expressions of hope for her recovery, so the conversation will naturally revolve around the political spectacle created by the Left.

HoreTore

01-13-2011, 19:17

Strike For The South

01-13-2011, 19:18

Mr. Intellectual doesn't know what words mean? Couldn't be...
I do not have a mistrust of PhDs, I am merely not willing to give the argument of one with a PhD anymore consideration than that of someone without a PhD. Not having your love affair with professors is not the same as deeply mistrusting them. Maybe if you have read that 'daunting wall of text'... Forgive me that my thoughts cannot be summed up in four syllables...

Well that's your loss, That's like saying "My doctor diagnosed me but grandma says it's cancer" I don't know what to say other than If you get sick you see an MD, if you need representaion you get a JD why are all other fields of study invalid to you?

"Daunting wall of text"? Are we being anti intellectual now Striko Baggins? I hate to say it Strike, but I think you are really guilty of just plain old not reading people's posts and then assuming you know what they said. (as you have proven in many other threads) If you have an aversion to reading, then why bother responding and making a fool out of yourself?
Most of your posts are the same amount of recationary conservativism sprinkled with a bit of shoddy history. I fill in the holes where I see fit.

Tell me Strike, if having a PhD means not being wrong, then how is it that there are tons of disagreements amongst scholars, and often tens of different positions (with hundreds of sub-positions)? Assuming that EVERYONE is not equally as right, that means that all but one of these positions (and therefore thousands of professors) are wrong, despite all the scrutiny, yada, yada, yada. Do you know what all that scrutiny does? It makes them better able to form an argument, which is NOT the same thing as being right.

Yes you can disagree with a someone who has a PhD and of course these people can be wrong but don't assume for a second that there is not merit in what they are talking about, and unless you can back your asseritions with credible evidence...shut your damn mouth freaking whipersnappers

I simply ask one backs ones assertions with primary and secondary sources. Scrutiny causes one to revaulate ones positions.

What that means is that just like in the real world, you get some people who know what they are talking about and some people who don't, but unlike larger society, they all know how to support their positions (no matter how right or wrong) well.
I read an excerpt from a really good book (written by a professor) last semester that said that most of the superstition, mystical beliefs, and false science in the "Dark Ages" was the result of a top-down effect, and originated in Universities. At times PhD bearing people have been the light of reason, and at other times they have been the dark side of humanity (I am thinking about Eugenics in the thirties and forties, as well as psychology in the forties and fifties). Just like other groups of people, they can be very right, and very wrong. It depends largely on who is funding/sponsoring/influencing them and their research, and where their allegiances lie. Just like other people, they are human, and are not free from corrupt influence.
I have nothing against professors, but I have something against the blind worship of them. I know many people with PhDs who I have a great deal of respect for, and consider amongst the smartest, most reasonable people whom I know. Unfortunately I know other who command far less respect.

Ok that's all fine and dandy but you are arguing with someone not in the room.

Lemur

01-13-2011, 19:22

Is there any evidence of this?
Excuse me, are you seriously asking if I can prove that an individual with a family, classmates and online activites was not acting in a vacuum? Reconsider this question and try again, please. Also see the comments by a person with a relevant PhD and job experience in this field (http://voices.washingtonpost.com/plum-line/2011/01/mental_illness_expert_we_shoul.html):

"We know the manifestation of mental illness is affected by cultural factors," Dr. Swartz said. "One's cultural context does effect people's thinking and particularly their delusions. It gives some content and shape to their delusions. While we don't know whether there was a specific relationship between the political climate that he was exposed to and his thinking, it's a reasonable line of inquiry to explore."

Asked whether Loughner's mental illness invalidated questions as to whether his behavior might have been partly caused by the political climate or by violent rhetoric and imagery, Dr. Swartz said it shouldn't.

"Studying the cultural influences on people's delusions or persecutory thinking, and looking at different aspects of culture and how they effect people's behavior, is a legitmate area of inquiry," Dr. Swartz said.

The reaction has been a ridiculous, manufactured piece of political theater generated by the weak-minded opportunism of the Left.
If you're all done posturing for effect, I'd love to, you know, hear what you actually think.

Vuk

01-13-2011, 19:33

Well that's your loss, That's like saying "My doctor diagnosed me but grandma says it's cancer" I don't know what to say other than If you get sick you see an MD, if you need representaion you get a JD why are all other fields of study invalid to you?

Most of your posts are the same amount of recationary conservativism sprinkled with a bit of shoddy history. I fill in the holes where I see fit.

I simply ask one backs ones assertions with primary and secondary sources. Scrutiny causes one to revaulate ones positions.

Ok that's all fine and dandy but you are arguing with someone not in the room.

A: I have had doctors diagnose me incorrectly, and consulted other professionals who ended up diagnosing me correctly, so I am skeptical even of doctors. I had had Strep Throat before, and he told me that I did not have it, even though I recognized the white bacteria in the back of my mouth. His quick bacteria test did not find it, so I went weeks without medication until I got a second opinion, and had to argue for several minutes with a nurse to get the 24 hour test, and finally get my darned medication. The second test ended up showing that I did indeed have Strep Throat.
B: While doctors can make mistakes and equipment can malfunction, most times they do not have an ideological reason to misdiagnose you, nor do they have preconceived notions that they will be merely finding evidence to support, therefore I regard their opinion much more than I do that of the common person, or that of Professors in other fields.
C: You contradicted yourself several times in this post. You say that I am "arguing with someone not in the room", and yet when I made the same statement earlier you argued with me. You said that you would not consider the opinion of someone without a PhD, and said that it is arrogant to question someone with a PhD. THAT is what I was arguing. If you did not say straight out that someone with a PhD could not be wrong, you did imply it, and you certainly said that it is arrogant and wrong for one without a PhD to argue with one who does have a PhD. What you are doing now is backtracking.

Vuk

01-13-2011, 19:35

Not really, he was anti capitalist but also extremely anti communist. It was a semi state directed economy, but private property was still maintained. The economic policies of the Nazi's were taken from left and right both to the point where it is really a wash in that manner. However, to say that the overall tone of the book is not right wing authoritarian is false.

EDIT: Don't contrast anything with the Tea Party. The Tea Party doesn't even know what it really stands for.

Hitler wasn't just leftist he was extreme-leftist, he hated the communists for different reasons but admitted it was basicly the same thing. Palin's stunt is very dangerous she should have known better, but it might a coincidence that it led to this massacre. Griffen seems like an unlikely candidate anyway, pro gun posession for example, also pro-Israel from what I've heard. Media jumped on like a pack of starved hyena's but they might got it wrong, looks more like a neo-nazi rather than the tea crowd

He was certainly not extreme-left, he left businesses to make their own competitive decisions and promoted competition among businesses and kept private property as long as it didn't interfere with the states business. From my understanding he directed the economy only to the point where the state could always benefit from the companies and be stronger from it. He wasn't out to dismantle the idea of private enterprise but it seemed more like out to make sure that none of the economic elites could challenge his authority and at the same time bolster his government's strength.

EDIT: Just a quick look at the wiki page says it was mainly a right-wing philosophy. The political compass we use to introduce ourselves in the stickied thread puts him as a little bit to the right.

Frags is still in denial, ACIN.

Everything bad must be "the other side".

As for the democrats, however, their policy have most in common with the policy of a european conservative pwrty, though with a small minority who would identify with the right with of a european labour party(ie. blair).

Ralph Nader is closest to the european left.

He wasn't against private property of party members but economy was subjective to the state. There is really nothing that can put Hitler in the rightwing sphere, unless you see racism and militarism as rightwing, with racism you would almost have a point because of the social darwinism of the 19th century, but if you make up a balance calling Mein Kampf and Hitler rightwing is way off. Read any socialist manifest and replace 'capital' with 'jew'

disclaimer, this isn't meant as an attack on the modern left, that's way off as well

Nationalism is a right-wing thing, frags, and what ties him to the right. Same goes for imperialism. Franco called his idelogy "fascism with social reform", which is fitting.

But is it standard, capitalist right-wing? No, hence the term "the third way", meaning that national socialism is "in between" socialism and capitalism.

There are three kinds of "right-wing":
1. Capitalist right, which hitler was not
2. Religous right, which hitler was not
3. Nationalist right, which Hitler was

It should also be noted that Lenin adored jews.

Maybe you should reread the thread. Here it is.

EDIT: Frags said that it could not be Right Wing rhetoric behind his actions, because he posted Mein Kampf online, and that is not something that the Right Wing in America believes in. ACIN then pulled a Godwin and tried to tie it to the Right in America.

Strike For The South

01-13-2011, 19:37

C: You contradicted yourself several times in this post. You say that I am "arguing with someone not in the room", and yet when I made the same statement earlier you argued with me. You said that you would not consider the opinion of someone without a PhD, and said that it is arrogant to question someone with a PhD. THAT is what I was arguing. If you did not say straight out that someone with a PhD could not be wrong, you did imply it, and you certainly said that it is arrogant and wrong for one without a PhD to argue with one who does have a PhD. What you are doing now is backtracking.

Holy nut sack on a stick did you not read what I posted earlier?

Yes you can disagree with a someone who has a PhD and of course these people can be wrong but don't assume for a second that there is not merit in what they are talking about, and unless you can back your asseritions with credible evidence...shut your damn mouth freaking whipersnappers

Lemur

01-13-2011, 19:53

Don't have the time to keep up, but this appears to be Stupid Law Proposal Number Two (http://thehill.com/blogs/floor-action/house/137601-gops-gohmert-plans-to-introduce-bill-to-allow-firearms-on-house-floor):

A spokesperson for Rep. Louie Gohmert (R-Texas) told The Hill on Wednesday afternoon that the congressman plans to introduce legislation that will allow members of Congress to carry weapons both in the District of Columbia and on the House floor.

“There is a rash of legislation further infringing on Second Amendment rights that has been unwisely proffered in the wake of events in Tucson,” Gohmert told The Hill in a statement regarding the proposed legislation. “If members of Congress wishes to carry a weapon in the federal District of Columbia, it should be permissible. Accordingly, we are in the process of drafting a bill that will allow members of Congress to do that.”

Gohmert said he does not plan to carry weapon himself, but that he believe members of Congress ought have the right to protect themselves from “sudden acts of violence like the heartless shooting in Tucson, Arizona.”

And once we're done making crosshairs illegal and making it permissible for Boehner and Pelosi to pack heat on the floor, maybe we can revisit the Freedom Fries issue?

HoreTore

01-13-2011, 20:01

Maybe you should reread the thread. Here it is.

EDIT: Frags said that it could not be Right Wing rhetoric behind his actions, because he posted Mein Kampf online, and that is not something that the Right Wing in America believes in. ACIN then pulled a Godwin and tried to tie it to the Right in America.

So, where was it I started this again? And when was it I tied Hitler to the current "american right"(I'm guessing you refer to the libertarian movement)?

drone

01-13-2011, 20:36

Lemur

01-13-2011, 20:51

If this passes, I may actually start watching CSPAN.
Bad laws often emanate from tragedies like this one. A great post today from The Economist (http://www.economist.com/blogs/democracyinamerica/2011/01/shooting_gabrielle_giffords):

We desperately and pathetically grope for some blameworthy failure of foresight, some forward-looking lesson, some food for prudence. It doesn't matter if there are none to be found. We'll make it all up if we have to.

Not every general feature of Saturday's shootings in Tucson has been seized upon. No one is proposing new rules for supermarkets, young white guys, or sun-baked locales. The things we already fear and already desire more thoroughly to control are most vividly salient to us. We seize on those: guns, crazy people. Did Jared Lee Loughner shoot government officials with a gun? Ban guns within 1,000 feet of government officials! Was Jared Lee Loughner detectably crazy? Make involuntary commitment easier! Did Jared Lee Loughner buy a gun while detectably crazy? Tighten background-screening requirements! Did Jared Lee Loughner's gun sport an extended magazine? Ban extended magazines! [...]

We may badly want to do something, but we will be better off in the end if we hug our jerking knees and find our cool. The ordinary operation of the criminal-justice system is enough for now. If you've got to do something, why not tell a pundit or politician yammering on about background checks or forced institutionalisation to please shut up, since it's just too soon for reason to prevail.

drone

01-13-2011, 21:09

Bad laws often emanate from tragedies like this one.
Indeed, the USA PATRIOT Act comes to mind...

Edit-> I'm going to have to think up some really bad acronym names for the knee-jerk laws being discussed here. :thinking:

Louis VI the Fat

01-13-2011, 21:15

Was Jared Lee Loughner detectably crazy? Make involuntary commitment easier! Did Jared Lee Loughner buy a gun while detectably crazy? Tighten background-screening requirements! Did Jared Lee Loughner's gun sport an extended magazine? Ban extended magazines!...I agree with all of these...

:hide:

Louis VI the Fat

01-13-2011, 21:21

Ok Louis I think it has been clearly established that the man was outlier. Now even if we agree that the heated rhectoric caused him to snap where should the line be drawn? I agree that crosshairs on a map are juvinelle and simply a way to pander to the LCD but I don't think banning this kind of speech will do anything to keep crazy people under wraps.

I certianly see where you are coming from, tense times make tense people and crazy tense people are bad buisness but how can we legislate this out? I feel the onus falls on the people of America to not be swayed by firebreathing preacher men posing as people who know what they are talking about. No amount of legislation can force you to turn off BeckOne should not legislate Beck off the air. People should stop listening to him in great numbers. This relegates him and his ilk back to where they belong: obscurantist, extremist drivel.

That would make it less likely for instable minds to become influenced, to lose their touch with sane reality. The schizophreniac is not readily capable of understanding that 'Socialist takeover! Government tyranny!' is rhetorics, meant to whip the base into a frenzy. He can not easily distinguish between reality and a portrayal of reality.

Sasaki Kojiro

01-13-2011, 21:23

Yes you would. But I might prefer the Tellos version of this meter, Fragony would definitely use his own revolutionary&magical version, and I'm sure Furunculus would cast an appraising eye on the configuration of my version and decide to buy himself a more conservative one preferring to save money for arms&armour upgrades.

I'd prefer the meter of someone who was a super-genius because I've wasted too much time reading stuff that turned out to be crap, but I'm stuck with what I got. I don't know why you'd prefer your own over all others as you imply. And actually, a lot of judging what you read is seeing if the author is good at judging what they have read...

And while we are on the subject of the Common-sense-Sasaki-o-meter: does Sasaki, in fact, have anything to recommend him over the Phd? Do you honestly feel that you know what you're talking about for any given subject? That is something to take into account when you pass “common sense” judgment. What if you are wrong? Not being an expert you will overestimate your own ability and lack the understanding needed to see and analyse your errors. You will be completely unable to fathom why your common sense fails when the expert can point out plenty of beginner's mistakes.

What on earth are you trying to say here? I don't know why you are ranting about common sense. We are talking about judging things in an appropriately skeptical way and knowing what to trust and what not to trust.

Someone says "I have evidence that Cortexiphan decreases the risk of heart disease". You say, is he selling it? No, he's an independent researcher and evidently a scientist. So from all you know it probably does. Someone says "I (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Daryl_Bem) have a study that shows precognition, and here's my crappy reasoning where I rant about how all the other scientists are close minded. I don't have an explanation for the effect but I believe quantum physics has something to do with it" and you should be skeptical.

There is a lot of trash here. You seem to be arguing for credulity, why? Well most likely you are making some crappy assumptions based on your only experience with this concept being in terms of the climate science debate.

So I think you'll agree that this Sasaki version of the common-sense-o-meter doesn't work for people in the real world. Might be fine for your needs, but the broader market requires something else. Something more researched, and well informed. Perhaps the opinion of an expert?

I wrote a lot of stuff about how incredibly terrible your argument is, but I'm pretty sure you were just thinking "GLOBAL WARMING SKEPTICS REALLY ANNOY ME ARGOUHONUSE9G9UL8DUD" when you wrote this. Simply put, if there were two articles on a subject, you would trust yourself to make one judgment of which was better--their degree. And I find it extremely doubtful that you would stop there, and not be willing to look for fallacious reasoning, baseless conclusions, etc. You cannot literally be telling me that you have no ability to judge anything outside of your own field--that you would believe in precognition until you read otherwise.

Sasaki Kojiro

01-13-2011, 21:43

One should not legislate Beck off the air. People should stop listening to him in great numbers. This relegates him and his ilk back to where they belong: obscurantist, extremist drivel.

That would make it less likely for instable minds to become influenced, to lose their touch with sane reality. The schizophreniac is not readily capable of understanding that 'Socialist takeover! Government tyranny!' is rhetorics, meant to whip the base into a frenzy. He can not easily distinguish between reality and a portrayal of reality.

I've kind of been skimming the "what made him do it" side for a while because it's usually pointless until some time has passed, but the bit on the wiki really makes it seem like he wasn't motivated by the rhetoric at all. His beef seemed entirely to be with the fact that he asked her a question about one of his conspiracy theories and she ignored it.

Another old friend, Bryce Tierney, discussed several of Loughner's views. According to him, Loughner had exhibited a longstanding dislike for Gabrielle Giffords, a Blue Dog Democrat, and he repeatedly derided her as a "fake." This grudge intensified when he attended her August 25, 2007 campaign event and she did not, in his view, sufficiently answer the question he asked her. The question was, "What is government if words have no meaning?"[17] Loughner kept a letter from the 2007 event in which Giffords thanked him for attending a 2007 event. An envelope in the same box as the letter was scrawled with phrases like "die *****" and "assassination plans have been made."[25]

Giffords' answer, whatever it was, didn't satisfy Loughner. "He said, 'Can you believe it, they wouldn't answer my question,' and I told him, 'Dude, no one's going to answer that,'" Tierney recalls. "Ever since that, he thought she was fake, he had something against her."

Also, it seems like they are willing to say that he's a paranoid schizophrenic now. Louis, isn't paranoia about the government fairly common regardless of the rhetoric of the time?

The fact that her office window was smashed and those other incidents are much better arguments against violent rhetoric.

Idaho

01-13-2011, 21:57

and yet..................... of the three major forces in british politics, one is only a century old and the other collapsed into irrelevance a nearly century ago.

only the consrvative and unionist party has a continuous history of political relevance, and thus electoral success, that spans somewhere between two and four centuries depending on how measure the timeline.

it doesn't matter whether it moves away from this, or towards that, nor too how many rich people it cements in positions of undeserved privilege, what matters is whether it continues to be representative of the enfranchised electorate that it can win elections.

your assertion that the Tories are intellectually moribund, and i quote:
"That's the right all over. Opportunist and intellectually moribund."

has VERY little to recommend it.

The Tories are the very embodiment and representation of the ruling political and economic elite of the country. It's hardly surprising that they have existed for so long! It's probably more surprising that anyone else has held power. Although when they have they've been Torified.

Vuk

01-13-2011, 22:08

One should not legislate Beck off the air. People should stop listening to him in great numbers. This relegates him and his ilk back to where they belong: obscurantist, extremist drivel.

That would make it less likely for instable minds to become influenced, to lose their touch with sane reality. The schizophreniac is not readily capable of understanding that 'Socialist takeover! Government tyranny!' is rhetorics, meant to whip the base into a frenzy. He can not easily distinguish between reality and a portrayal of reality.
It was not Beck's 'rantings' that motivated him though, he did not even listen to Beck. The truth is that he was a leftist, and if any politics did influence him, it is therefore more likely that it was leftist politics. (Remember all the anti-government, CIA ABDUCTIONS AND TORTURE CAMPS, etc rhetoric that was coming from liberals when Bush was in office?)
I am not trying to blame this on the political rhetoric of either side, because I honestly think that it had nothing to do with it, but if you are going to say that political rhetoric is what turned the poor, innocent man into a heartless murderer, then it is most likely leftist rhetoric, and not right wing rhetoric (he was a leftist educated in a pro-communist highschool founded by Bill Ayers after all).

I honestly think that it is heartless and rather disgusting of you and everyone else who is exploiting the suffering of those who have died so that you can play your little political games. I know, they are just Americans, but get a life.

Lemur

01-13-2011, 22:14

The truth is that he was a leftist, and if any politics did influence him, it is therefore more likely that it was leftist politics.

I honestly think that it is heartless and rather disgusting of you and everyone else who is exploiting the suffering of those who have died so that you can play your little political games.
You're basing the "he was a leftist" meme on his posted "favorite books" thing, right? The one that includes Mein Kampf and Animal Farm?

Secondly, read those two quotes back to back. Who is trying to define the loon's politics, mirror mirror? Admittedly, you go on to say that you don't think this was a politically motivated act, but then you circle back and drag the corpse of Bill Ayers out for good measure. I mean, really, Vuk, you can debate on a higher level than this.

Tellos Athenaios

01-13-2011, 22:27

Vuk

01-13-2011, 22:44

You're basing the "he was a leftist" meme on his posted "favorite books" thing, right? The one that includes Mein Kampf and Animal Farm?

Secondly, read those two quotes back to back. Who is trying to define the loon's politics, mirror mirror? Admittedly, you go on to say that you don't think this was a politically motivated act, but then you circle back and drag the corpse of Bill Ayers out for good measure. I mean, really, Vuk, you can debate on a higher level than this.

And surely your reading comprehension is better than that. First of all, I am basing the fact that he was a leftist on things said by those who knew him, on the fact that he took drugs and believed in their legalization, hated America, hated Cops, etc.
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/40980334/ns/us_news-crime_and_courts/

She described his politics in the past as "left wing, quite liberal, & oddly obsessed with the 2012 prophecy.
http://blogs.phoenixnewtimes.com/valleyfever/2011/01/jared_loughner_alleged_shooter.php

Parker "tweets" that she and Loughner were in the band together and were friends until 2007 when he became "reclusive" after getting alcohol poisoning and dropping out of college.

She describes him as "quite liberal" and as a "political radical."

He was described by those who knew him as a "Left-wing Pothead". Almost everything I have heard said about his politics by those who knew him was that he was far-Left.
You have been reading up on this, no? I am not sure how you could have missed it. Maybe too much Huffington Post discussion boards...

As far as what I said being contradictory, it is not...at all. I did not say that it was Leftist ideology that made him shoot her. What I said is that IF it was ideology, it would stand to reason that it would be Leftist ideology...not Right-wing ideology. I made it quite clear that I thought it was neither, but warned him that such arguments would quickly turn against him (case in point (http://michellemalkin.com/2011/01/10/the-progressive-climate-of-hate-an-illustrated-primer-2000-2010/)) if he made them in the presence of someone who has even a tiny idea of what he is talking about. On a board where everyone shares the same opinion though, that is not likely to happen.

al Roumi

01-13-2011, 22:55

More on the "Blood Libel" from what is simply THE best inter-tube glob site: Gotmedieval! (http://www.gotmedieval.com/2011/01/libels-blood-and-otherwise-a-quick-primer.html)

Would you believe it, there is also such a thing as Ass libel and Lepper libel! No wonder Palin chose the one she did...?

I never thought I’d see the day that “blood libel” was trending at Twitter, but here we are. And even though the Wikipedia page for “blood libel” is currently embroiled in a mini edit war over whether to include this most recent popular reference to it under the “Contemporary” trivia section and a simultaneous rush to edit in as many instances of non-Jewish blood libel as possible* , guides to the history of blood libel are popping up all over the web even as I type, so I’m sure you all have adequate tools for determining just how outraged you ought to be over the whole thing without my input. This is all for the best, really, since for the most part I try to keep this blog ambivalently apolitical.**

My only worry is that in all this hubbub, the indexical value of “blood libel” is being overlooked. The reason why we need a special phrase like “blood libel” to denote lies told about what Jews do with the blood of baby Christians is the sheer number of libels which Jews have had to contend over the years.

Take for instance, the “ass libel.” According to Josephus’s Against Apion*** , deep within the holiest of holy chambers in the Temple at Jerusalem Jews secretly keep a golden statue of an ass-headed man which they worship. The Greeks of Late Antiquity and the medieval Christians after them found the idea of worshiping a donkey uniquely hilarious for reasons that escape me, though I suppose it’s just a very specific manifestation of the ever-present Christian fear that the Jews are up to naughtiness when no one’s there to police them.

Then there’s the “leper libel,” which charges that the real reason Moses was allowed to lead the Jews from Egypt was that they were actually a leprous mob that the Egyptians drove out for public health reasons. As descendants of lepers, the Jews’ natural resistance to disease was thought to have been compromised sufficiently that they could no longer safely be around unclean animals like the pig, and thus the Jewish prohibition against eating pork. And further, since they had all been infected with Leprosy Lite since birth, Jews were also thought likely to cause leprosy outbreaks amongst their Christian neighbors.

Leper, ass, and blood form the Big Three of Jewish libels, but we might add to them a demi-relation, the “sow libel,” more properly the story of the Judensau (literally, “The Jew’s Pig”),**** a late medieval German belief that Jews secretly did naughty things to pigs when Christian backs were turned. Jewish rabbis were often depicted lifting a sow’s tails in order to go peering up it’s ass, while below Jewish children suckled from the teats. Less often, the slur progressed to full on accusations of pig fucking.*****

So as you can see, it’s vitally important we keep our libels straight. If we let us the phrase “blood libel” come to mean any pernicious lie told about a group of outsiders by the majority, the next thing you know we’ll have to start using “ass blood libel” and “leper blood libel,” and then where will we be?

--

1. * I count 103 edits over the last six hours. [↩]
2. ** Though I can note that it is probably advisable to avoid the casual usage of inflammatory language when one is making a speech responding to accusations that one uses inflammatory language too casually. [↩]
3. *** Or Contra Apionem for purists and Konami fans. [↩]
4. **** Which I’ve mentioned here before, back in the waaaay early days of the blog. [↩]
5. ***** Wikipedia has a rather extensive Image gallery, for those interested. [↩]

Edit: The best bit: "for the most part I try to keep this blog ambivalently apolitical. Though I can note that it is probably advisable to avoid the casual usage of inflammatory language when one is making a speech responding to accusations that one uses inflammatory language too casually."

Sasaki Kojiro

01-13-2011, 22:55

@Sasaki: actually my argument is much simpler, but you need to read in the context of ACIN's post to which you replied. Don't dismiss the opinion of the guy/gal who studies a problem on a daily basis merely because you don't understand it, or merely because it conflicts with your idea of “common sense” when it comes to that same problem?

Ah, so acin made comments in context, which I talked about (mentioning that I was going broader than that context) and you were back in that context...well Frags is just saying that because he wants to I think, nothing to do with common sense or the issue of trusting expertise.

All the talk about dismissing opinions and common sense is irrelevant.

It might work for the individual, but it doesn't for the whole of society. To show how that doesn't work: once it was “common sense” that one should use leeches to cure a fever.

But this is just my point :no:

Everyone should have an idea of what they know and what they don't. It was a common belief (never common sense but that's another debate) that leeches cure a fever precisely because people trusted authority without reminding themselves that the only reason they had to believe leeches worked is that doctors said so.

The “crappy reasoning” you mention might turn out to be entirely correct, especially if it involves statistics or probability.

So, your weatherman says that he can give you an accurate forecast a month ahead of time, would you believe him? Can't you know that he's full of it without having any special education in meteorology? I can't believe you would advocate this. If someone makes a fallacious argument and you don't have the expertise to judge the conclusion outside of the argument he made, you obviously don't accept it. It's equally obvious that the fact that someone made a bad argument for something doesn't mean the conclusion isn't true for some other reason. Who are you talking to?

What's your opinion about it besides "not dismissing an expert just because it conflicts with traditional beliefs". Since that is just you talking to yourself. I actually think this is tremendously important, since we live in democratic societies where we need to be on good footing on a huge number of complex issues. It's staggers me that someone would advocate intellectual submission. I refuse to believe you mean it.

edit: And don't tell me I'm strawmanning you because all your advocating is "not dismissing someones opinions just because you believe otherwise". Because if that's your real argument your strawmanning and insulting the whole thread, and failing at describing how to act on an important issue miserably.

Lemur

01-13-2011, 23:09

And surely your reading comprehension is better than that. First of all, I am basing the fact that he was a leftist on things said by those who knew him, on the fact that he took drugs and believed in their legalization, hated America, hated Cops, etc.
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/40980334/ns/us_news-crime_and_courts/
Actually, reading that he sounds more like a loon than a leftist or a rightist. I don't doubt that he was a liberal when younger, but honestly he sounds like a guy who went through adult-onset paranoid schitzophrenia. And if you've ever known a paranoid schitzophrenic (as I unfortunately have), then you know their divorce from reality is total. Things from our world can set them off, indeed, but their reasoning and logic is beyond anything we can comprehend.

I think Sasaki is in the right of it, that the other incidents, such as the gun left at her town hall meeting, or the brick through the door, are much more indicative of the environment than the shooter or his despicable actions. All of the other violent rhetoric and actions appear to be unfortunate, congruent, and ultimately unrelated to the madman.

That said, note that the a black Republican official in the Arizona state party just stepped down out of fear for his family's safety (http://www.azcentral.com/community/ahwatukee/articles/2011/01/11/20110111gabrielle-giffords-arizona-shooting-resignations.html) after being harassed and stalked as a RINO by tea party activists.

Also note the atmosphere in the first part of this video (http://www.theatlantic.com/national/archive/2011/01/an-unbelievable-video-of-political-madness/69530/). Clearly something is going on, and it's not just politics as usual.

Vuk

01-13-2011, 23:31

Actually, reading that he sounds more like a loon than a leftist or a rightist. I don't doubt that he was a liberal when younger, but honestly he sounds like a guy who went through adult-onset paranoid schitzophrenia. And if you've ever known a paranoid schitzophrenic (as I unfortunately have), then you know their divorce from reality is total. Things from our world can set them off, indeed, but their reasoning and logic is beyond anything we can comprehend.

I think Sasaki is in the right of it, that the other incidents, such as the gun left at her town hall meeting, or the brick through the door, are much more indicative of the environment than the shooter or his despicable actions. All of the other violent rhetoric and actions appear to be unfortunate, congruent, and ultimately unrelated to the madman.

That said, note that the a black Republican official in the Arizona state party just stepped down out of fear for his family's safety (http://www.azcentral.com/community/ahwatukee/articles/2011/01/11/20110111gabrielle-giffords-arizona-shooting-resignations.html) after being harassed and stalked as a RINO by tea party activists.

Also note the atmosphere in the first part of this video (http://www.theatlantic.com/national/archive/2011/01/an-unbelievable-video-of-political-madness/69530/). Clearly something is going on, and it's not just politics as usual.

If that really happened, then that is a shame for Miller. It seems that Arizona is home to some very fiery people, but that is nothing new.

As far as the video, it is very disturbing, that is NOT how politics should work. Unfortunately though, it is not something new, nor is it something of the Tea Party. During the 2004 election I was threatened several times and three people were attacked on my campus for wearing Bush/Cheney pins. I was backed into a corner and threatened by several martial artists (IN my TKD class!) during the last Presidential election because of my support of Palin. The only reason I have gotten away with displaying my political allegiance on campus is because I am a big guy, and liberals are too afraid to attack me. Coincidently, the only conservatives I know on campus who wear affiliation pins during elections are large males, because everyone else is too afraid. Living in fear at your school is not normal politics either, but that is human being for you, and it has been around a lot longer than Sarah Palin. There were actually times when things were a lot worse. (I am thinking of Andrew Jackson)
It would not be honest to deny that politics in America today have their dark side, but it would equally as dishonest to say that that is something new, or something related to Sarah Palin. You will ALWAYS have crazies on both sides, but it is not politics or rhetoric that make those people crazy. Crazy people are simply crazy, and they will get worked up about anything. (Working at Arbys this summer the police had to take a guy and his wife away because they were screaming, getting violent, and destroying our poster...I highly doubt that that had anything to do with Palin.)

As far as politics being what drove this guy to kill people, I would only buy into that if they found out that he had a politically motivated accomplice who drove him to do what he did. By himself though, I would put it down to utter insanity and heavy drug use. He should have been institutionalize a long time ago.

a completely inoffensive name

01-14-2011, 03:43

Megas Methuselah

01-14-2011, 05:26

No Hore Tore, you and ACIN pulled a Godwin and tried to tie Hitler to the Right. My point is that the American Right is NOT related to the European Right, as we have very different definitions. We were talking about the American Right, and if you look at the definitions of Right and Left in America, Hitler and Stalin were both far Left. You Euroweiners can call him whatever you want in you own little continent, but to start applying your definitions on a discussion of American Right and Left is total BS. They are completely different things.

What the hell, man? Pulling some pages out of my book, and you don't even belong to this continent. What kind of a person comdemns his own people? Now listen, this is something that I've been working hard on for the past while. You need to open your eyes and your mind. It's difficult to do this after all the needless hardships I've experienced in my life, but... hatred is wasted energy, mah man. Chill out. Smoke a cigar or something.

Louis VI the Fat

01-14-2011, 06:33

That said, note that the a black Republican official in the Arizona state party just stepped down out of fear for his family's safety (http://www.azcentral.com/community/ahwatukee/articles/2011/01/11/20110111gabrielle-giffords-arizona-shooting-resignations.html) after being harassed and stalked as a RINO by tea party activists.

Also note the atmosphere in the first part of this video (http://www.theatlantic.com/national/archive/2011/01/an-unbelievable-video-of-political-madness/69530/). Clearly something is going on, and it's not just politics as usual.It remains frightening to see. Both these examples. Let's hope and pray the brownshirt shock troops do not manage to permanently destabilise American democracy. In fact, let's hope they don't permanently take over the GOP, but I'm not even sure they won't.

Crazed Rabbit

01-14-2011, 06:34

a completely inoffensive name

01-14-2011, 07:20

bollox. what facts?

both sides have used targets.
both sides have talking of killing, or "taking out" the other.
both sides support base has been responsible for broad demonisation of the 'other'

you talk of me only seeing what i want to see and reality disagreeing, i say that is a crock, and the evidence witnessed in the tea-party years in no substantial measure outweighs that of the anti-bush days.

You are really not getting what I am saying. Both sides have shown to produce violent rhetoric. One however in present day America produces much, much more violent rhetoric than the other side. And tihs side has been outprodcing the other side by a wide margin for over 30 years. That is the point I am trying to make. When Bush was around you had comedians making fun of how stupid he was, now that Obama is around you have talk radio hosts telling the public to load their guns and stand ready.

I think it's entirely possible that the right uses more violent rhetoric. There are trends of pacifism and anti-gun beliefs on the left, a liberal president in office, a general ability to get upset about dolphins being killed, etc.

But I just don't see it as an important statistic. What are we supposed to do with it? I have a general disdain for anyone who uses crappy rhetoric in politics period. I vastly prefer someone I disagree with who writes or speaks well to someone who I agree with in general who doesn't. So why should the question about which group does it more interest me?

You expose the source for what they are, agitators and saboteurs of the political discourse. By pumping out violent rhetoric, the divide between the parties becomes harder to bridge, the country becomes inherently harder to run and everyone's life is made worse for it. Why do ever call out people here in the backroom? When someone goes to far, ideally we call them out and say "Not good." and we try to promote a higher standard so we don't become TWC. Why is it acceptable to have the discourse of the entire nation become on the level of TWC?

This argument is great in theory. Obviously a phd's opinion is worth more than a non-phd all else being equal. But in practice I prefer to use the patended sasaki "does this guy know what he's talking about"-o-meter. All you need to verify that he knows what he is talking about is:
A. Does he have a high level degree?
B. Where did he get his degree?

At some point you have to look at yourself and say, you know what even though I distrust people when they try to tell me what's happening maybe this PhD graduate from Harvard/USC/MIT knows his stuff and I should take him for his word.

Because it's actually true that you can know that an argument advanced by someone with a phd is wrong without knowing much about the field. There are broad trends and biases that people fall prey to, there are theories that are too neat and tidy for the real world, theories that misuse words to reach a conclusion (gardner's theory of multiple intelligences comes to mind, he redefines intelligence). This is why I say it is good to critically review what any one person says, but not to throw out the entire community's established compilations, collections and theorems.

About modern economics, you ought to read the book "The black swan" by nicholas taleb. I honestly can't imagine you not being interested.I will check that out, thank you. :happy:

Yes you would. But I might prefer the Tellos version of this meter, Fragony would definitely use his own revolutionary&magical version, and I'm sure Furunculus would cast an appraising eye on the configuration of my version and decide to buy himself a more conservative one preferring to save money for arms&armour upgrades.

And while we are on the subject of the Common-sense-Sasaki-o-meter: does Sasaki, in fact, have anything to recommend him over the Phd? Do you honestly feel that you know what you're talking about for any given subject? That is something to take into account when you pass “common sense” judgment. What if you are wrong? Not being an expert you will overestimate your own ability and lack the understanding needed to see and analyse your errors. You will be completely unable to fathom why your common sense fails when the expert can point out plenty of beginner's mistakes.

So I think you'll agree that this Sasaki version of the common-sense-o-meter doesn't work for people in the real world. Might be fine for your needs, but the broader market requires something else. Something more researched, and well informed. Perhaps the opinion of an expert?

Agreed completely with this statement.

About Nazism being rightwing, nice try.
Of course, no one of any ideology wants to be associated with Hitler, and everyone wants to associate their opponents with Hitler. The Left has simple done a better job (coincidently, most people with PhD's are on the Left).
The core of Right Wing ideology (at least in terms of the USofA) is economic (aka. The Free Market). There is also social conservatism, which while important, always plays second fiddle to economic ideology when determining someone's 'Rightwingness'. How you or anyone else can classify Nationalism as Rightwing (at least in the sense of the USofA) is beyond me). Economically, Hitler was far Left. Socially, Hitler was polar Left. What the American Right stands for is the absolute freedom of the individual, and the limiting of the government to the point where it just has the power to perform a few, essential tasks. Hitler's social and economic policies contradicted these absolutely essential principles in every way imaginable. Hitler was just as Left wing as Stalin.
Both were dictators (something the Right does not believe in) who used their governments to control industry and the lives of their citizens (again, things the Right does not believe in), both emphasized the government over the people (which is the exact opposite of the Right). In Stalin's case he did so by preaching that the whole was greater than the individual, and Hitler did it with his fascist ideas. In the end, communism (socialism) and fascism were just different means to the same, Far Left end. To categorize it as Right Wing is simple to try to distance it from yourself and attack the Right (something that people with PhD next to their names looooove to do).

As SFTS says you are just being reactionary and anti-intellectual. From reading this, I am starting to agree with SFTS's statement that applying past ideologies to current views of the left-right spectrum is futile.

No, not at all. If you had read the posts of the last page Lemur, you would see that it was on topic. Funny then that you did not tell ACIN that.
And no, I am not saying that ALL people of the Left are Nazis, but that ALL Nazis were on the Left. There is a big difference.

@StrIKE And yet, what ACIN tried to do just a few pages ago was equate Nazism with the US Right. My point is that by US definition, but Stalin and Hitler were Far Left. Euroweiners can have whatever definitions they want, but when talking about American Right and Left, you must use the American definitions of Right and Left (because that is how Americans identify themselves).

Complete nonsense. You really are lacking when it comes to reading the important nuances of what people say. I never suggested that the Nazi's belong o nthe American right, I simply held that according to all the sources I can find, the academic community seems to label the Nazi's as more right wing while using large left wing economic policies to bolster the strength of the government. Never did I say that the American right are Nazi's. You are either not reading thoroughly or you are purposely making a strawman.

It is not anti intellectual. I believe that everyone owes it to themselves to be an intellectual, and I place great value on it. You see, the problem is that many people posing as intellectuals are not. In fact, they are just politically polarized people who used the fancy methods they learn at their Universities to try to make their position sound as good as possible, and their opponents worse.
In fact, I would go as far as to say that the better a wordsmith/orator/writer a person is, the more cautious you should be when considering their arguments, as such a person in the worst case could simply be doing a good job at making a bad argument look good.

So please, quit throwing out the soundbytes and read my post. :bow:

EDIT: Actually Strike, Mao got a huge part of his support and some of his top men from Colleges in China. If it weren't for the College students, Mao would not have been successful.

The intellectuals are those with Master's and PhDs, those who are talking without one of those degrees is fake and it is as easy as a google search to see if they are legit or not. Universities don't teach fancy methods, they teach knowledge and a way of critically viewing situations impartially actually.

Your edit doesn't really help your case. Someone advocating for something better took advantage of idealistic youth? Must be that left wing thinking sigh. You seem to skip over the part where the college kids were rolled over by tanks a couple of decades later. Was the new generation of Chinese college youth suddenly right-wing and the left-wing government put a stop to them?

a completely inoffensive name

01-14-2011, 08:01

really..... go down the list of every fox host you can find. your world view is tainted if anyones is. you called furnunclus and told him on that yet you meander along in your blisssfully unaware life telling people you are completely unbiased and know absolutely the political climates of the major US parties. what world experience do you have? your a university student, one of the most left polarized institutions in the country. No one lives like a university student. I am too, but at least i admit i am biased to some extent and cannot speak and generalize about millions of americans.

that list? utter bullshit.

Why is it that every time I argue with someone right wing on this forum that isn't CR, they inflate what I am saying to mean something that I quite frankly didn't say. I said he has confirmation bias. I didn't not say he was an ignorant neanderthal living in a cave, only that his perspective is not as unbiased as he thinks. My world view is not that tainted. Considering I have subscribed to every train of political thought in my life at some point, I would say I am somewhat well rounded. Before how I was now, I was a libertarian, before that I was a nanny state socialist, before that I was a neoconservative. Universities are not really politically polarized, it all depends on where you go. You think University of Arizona is some haven for liberals and doesn't have a large proportion of conservatives? Do you know what you are talking about? No one lives like a university student? Umm reality check here dude. Everyone lives like a university student. Here in America, once you hit college you get saddled with debt and have to live under a tight budget unless you are rich. And then you graduate, get a job and live with a slightly larger budget, still saddled with debt for many years. Then you pay it off and some other problem like new furniture, a house or a medical emergency puts more debt on you. Life begins at college in many ways. If you recognize you are biased, then why not attempt to shed that bias. That should one of the important lessons to learn at uni. Let's check my list again and see where you are wrong:

Palin is not as popular as everyone thinks she is a novelty and i know very few fellow conservatives who want her in office (this is called anecdotal evidence and not applicable on a statistically significant level)
Rush- is an old blowhard. no one gives a damn about him (wrong, millions listen and love him, that is a fact. check his ratings)
Hannity- is really not the great devil everyone makes him out to be. the worst he does is latch onto tiny liberal foibles and not let go..... (your opinion which you have admitted is biased)
Romney- mitt romney was governor of a very very liberal state. he is an intelligent and pretty reasonable man i havent heard much hate speech from him.... (he actually is one of the better ones, you can strike him from this list)
Huckabee- an affable idiot from (is it missouri) (promotes having the military execute Assange in cold blood, not really a good example of the restrained and polite conservative is he?)
Gingrich- old newt? yeah he uses inflammatory speech but i dont think one could call it hate speech inciting violence (every single negative term the right has manufactured has been slung around by newt, from death panels to un-american)
Beck- really...... hes an imbecile and he isnt that hateful just stupid. (he suggested on air about killing Micheal Moore)
Napolitano- yeah if you think hes spouting hate speech your blind and deaf. (good come back. did your excuse "he is just an idiot" too tiresome for you as well?)
O Reilly- is a ego inflated jackass not a hate mongerer (he spreads lies and fear into his viewers about anything that seem left so that they grow to hate the entire left, often based on baseless lies such as his attack on amsterdam: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sTPsFIsxM3w)
Greta van Susteren- GRETA! lol i just lol'ed (you are not helping your case)
Doocey- steve doocey this list gets worse and worse. the men is a pretty boy anchor with a reasonable intellect on morning fox news the equivalent to fox news comedy central. (he reads the teleprompter and subsequently the lies)
Carlson- yeah not really (dude, before you hit the reply button, make sure you typed a reply)
Bill Kristol- bwahahaha (see above)
Rove- the man is not hateful (see above)
Ingraham you mean ingrahm? (you caught me, I made a typo)
and Lou Dobbs bwahahaha (just watch some of his illegal immigrant rants)

Mr. Intellectual doesn't know what words mean? Couldn't be...
I do not have a mistrust of PhDs, I am merely not willing to give the argument of one with a PhD anymore consideration than that of someone without a PhD. Not having your love affair with professors is not the same as deeply mistrusting them. Maybe if you have read that 'daunting wall of text'... Forgive me that my thoughts cannot be summed up in four syllables...

This is the problem. That is anti-intellectual. Wait, SFTS has already pointed this out and you replied with more nonsense. nvm.

But this is just my point :no:

Everyone should have an idea of what they know and what they don't. It was a common belief (never common sense but that's another debate) that leeches cure a fever precisely because people trusted authority without reminding themselves that the only reason they had to believe leeches worked is that doctors said so.
I don't think it is logical to apply the past in this way to the present. Technology and human knowledge has expanded dramatically. We actually know stuff for real (guys please don't nit pick me on that) and to tell a doctor to back away, I need to look at wikipedia first because I am not going to be the fool with leeches on his face is somewhat silly.

Also, at this point in the collection of human knowledge, many things that are true about the world and the universe is strikingly anti-logical. When a PhD in Physics starts talking about how light can be a wave or a tiny particle, someone who has no knowledge about the subject (average citizen) is going to either reject it or it will go over their head completely. There are quite frankly, somethings just better left to the experts and I don't see how challenging modern day established knowledge as determined by tens of thousands of individuals with PhDs (not a small collection) is going to get us any further.

So, your weatherman says that he can give you an accurate forecast a month ahead of time, would you believe him? Can't you know that he's full of it without having any special education in meteorology? I can't believe you would advocate this. If someone makes a fallacious argument and you don't have the expertise to judge the conclusion outside of the argument he made, you obviously don't accept it. It's equally obvious that the fact that someone made a bad argument for something doesn't mean the conclusion isn't true for some other reason. Who are you talking to? Some weathermen don't have degrees and are just talking heads, most of them probably have degrees but not masters. None of them probably have PhDs. Just saying. Lots of people with degrees still don't get the issues that come with extrapolating the data too far.

Sasaki Kojiro

01-14-2011, 09:10

All you need to verify that he knows what he is talking about is:
A. Does he have a high level degree?
B. Where did he get his degree?

At some point you have to look at yourself and say, you know what even though I distrust people when they try to tell me what's happening maybe this PhD graduate from Harvard/USC/MIT knows his stuff and I should take him for his word.

"Daryl J. Bem (born June 10, 1938) is a social psychologist and professor emeritus at Cornell University"

A. Yes
B. Cornell University

"It is independently established on the basis of this work alone that Extra-Sensory Perception is an actual and demonstrable occurrence.”

Your move.

********

Oh, and the other, fundamental, mistake which I forgot to mention earlier. You make the assumption that expertise in a field is possible at this point in time. On what basis do you make that assumption? It's certainly true of some fields but not others. You also assume that the claim made is one in which the person truly has expertise, but the subject matter is not always so clear cut. And you assume they are free from personal bias, and you assume they have not made a mistake. These are, I'm sorry to say, preposterous assumptions to make about someone.

Ok, and the other fundamental mistake, which is equating phd with expertise. I would tend much further towards the "it takes one to know one" view of expertise...

*********

There are quite frankly, somethings just better left to the experts and I don't see how challenging modern day established knowledge as determined by tens of thousands of individuals with PhDs (not a small collection) is going to get us any further.

Ah well, this is the kind of thing tellos ended up saying. Yes this is all fine, don't dismiss expert opinion just because you don't like it, don't challenge established knowledge with a scientific consensus in a field you don't know much about, yadda yadda. But I think that says very little about a question that is very important.

The weatherman example makes the main point. I can't know what the weather will be better than him. My predictions will never match up. But, quite possibly, I can know that his prediction is worth a lot less than he thinks it is. I can know that the psychology researcher is biased in favor of his subject. I can know that the economist is defending his pet theory. I can know the political pundit is talking out of his ***. I can know that an argument is fallacious and that a conclusion is a platitude dressed up to look profound.

I think you are severely underestimating your own ability and overestimating the expertise of educated people. Instead you should think about what their knowledge makes them trustworthy on and what it doesn't.

We live in the information age. The main bonus is that we have incredible amounts of information at our fingertips--the problem is filtering it. "Accept it if they have a PhD" is an awful filter.

Furunculus

01-14-2011, 09:49

The Tories are the very embodiment and representation of the ruling political and economic elite of the country. It's hardly surprising that they have existed for so long! It's probably more surprising that anyone else has held power. Although when they have they've been Torified.

so what, how does this make them intellectually moribund?

you argument has two logical conclusions:
1. that despite universal sufferage the gov't are using black heicopters with mass mind control rays to bring about unrepresentative election results.
> in which case we should have a revolution
2. that despite being adults of legally sound mind the electorate are still a bunch of idiots who cannot be trusted to vote over their own governance.
> in which case create a benign technocratic dictatorship (the EU?)

i don't accept either of those argument, and nor should you.

so i am left struggling to understand how the most successful and lon-standing force in british politics can yet be intellectually moribund, with the implication that they have always been so...........

a completely inoffensive name

01-14-2011, 10:45

"Daryl J. Bem (born June 10, 1938) is a social psychologist and professor emeritus at Cornell University"

A. Yes
B. Cornell University

Your move.

********

Oh, and the other, fundamental, mistake which I forgot to mention earlier. You make the assumption that expertise in a field is possible at this point in time. On what basis do you make that assumption? It's certainly true of some fields but not others. You also assume that the claim made is one in which the person truly has expertise, but the subject matter is not always so clear cut. And you assume they are free from personal bias, and you assume they have not made a mistake. These are, I'm sorry to say, preposterous assumptions to make about someone.

Ok, and the other fundamental mistake, which is equating phd with expertise. I would tend much further towards the "it takes one to know one" view of expertise...

*********

Alright then, you got me. Let me back up and revise some of what I have said and rescind some other things. Can a PhD be wrong? Yes. Can PhDs be bias, yes absolutely. I didn't want to give the impression that I assumed that they are flawed. I have mentioned before that it is ok to criticize a person, but not the general consensus. However, I still hold that at this point in human progression that the general consensus of academia in a subject is now more advanced, no matter what subject whether it be physical science, social science, economics. The original point of contention that this discussion came about was Fragony rejecting all the sources that claimed that Nazism was right wing with a good dose of leftist economic policy mixed in. My original point which I don't think has been refuted is that the overall collective narrative of academia is for the most part impartial, unbiased and much more accurate and reliable then your own intuition. In the collective narrative everyone's bias and ideas are challenged and scrutinized and only the stuff that has been proven beyond all doubt gets puts in the textbook (it may not be this rigid for the social sciences but it is still pretty damn neutral). Could you look it up? Certainly, however you are not going to know 1/10th of what they know about the subject just from an entire day or week of reading wikipedia and other sources. Let's leave out the discussion of what makes someone an expert. Because you are making the point that it is to be a much more subjective than empirical manner.

In regards to how do I know expertise is possible? I am just going by the definition of expert. Someone who basic knows their stuff to a very high degree. When dealing with academic subjects, it's just likely that those who have been award high degrees for their pursuit of such knowledge would in fact, know there stuff to a high degree. Are there outliers? Yeah, you pointed one out. So criticize and debunk the individual not the consensus that is put out, which is what ultimately Fragony was doing.

Ah well, this is the kind of thing tellos ended up saying. Yes this is all fine, don't dismiss expert opinion just because you don't like it, don't challenge established knowledge with a scientific consensus in a field you don't know much about, yadda yadda. But I think that says very little about a question that is very important.

The weatherman example makes the main point. I can't know what the weather will be better than him. My predictions will never match up. But, quite possibly, I can know that his prediction is worth a lot less than he thinks it is. I can know that the psychology researcher is biased in favor of his subject. I can know that the economist is defending his pet theory. I can know the political pundit is talking out of his ***. I can know that an argument is fallacious and that a conclusion is a platitude dressed up to look profound.

I think you are severely underestimating your own ability and overestimating the expertise of educated people. Instead you should think about what their knowledge makes them trustworthy on and what it doesn't.

We live in the information age. The main bonus is that we have incredible amounts of information at our fingertips--the problem is filtering it. "Accept it if they have a PhD" is an awful filter.I think their knowledge makes them trustworthy on bring up the facts of the subject. Of course, it is a good thing we live in the information age to check whether their interpretations are correct. I have to ask you where that quote comes from because if it came from a book he wrote then it is quite obvious that you would go into the book knowing that it is going to be his view of the facts. I really doubt you found that statement from a textbook did you?

Yes, people with PhDs are human. Perhaps I glorified them a bit too much. But active resistance to what the men with PhDs say unless you try to double check their ground breaking research with wikipedia, is in my opinion, backwards.

The problem of determining your own filter is that peoples filters imo, are worse than taking a PhD's word at face value. I might be wrong, but I have seen no evidence that suggests the public is better at gathering information for themselves then when someone sits in front of the tv or microphone and tells them what the latest findings are and what they might mean.

If all this knowledge does not amount to anything because we still have concluded that they are prejudiced, biased humans like the rest of us, then there really is nothing that makes them any more trustworthy then the regular joe. But I refuse to believe this because it is only by these prejudiced but educated humans that humanity has become better then it was 1,000 or 100 or 50 or 10 years ago. Why should I not trust the men who have made our lives better?

al Roumi

01-14-2011, 12:07

Don't have the time to keep up, but this appears to be Stupid Law Proposal Number Two (http://thehill.com/blogs/floor-action/house/137601-gops-gohmert-plans-to-introduce-bill-to-allow-firearms-on-house-floor)

Good grief. Of course, weapon-handling and the ability to draw and fire from the hip are skills rather essential to the prosecution of democracy.

Even suggesting congress replace the auditorium benches with a flat field for armoured pope-mobile like dodgems would be more sensible.

Furunculus

01-14-2011, 12:30

your world view is tainted if anyones is. you called furnunclus and told him on that yet you meander along in your blisssfully unaware life telling people you are completely unbiased and know absolutely the political climates of the major US parties.Why is it that every time I argue with someone right wing on this forum that isn't CR, they inflate what I am saying to mean something that I quite frankly didn't say. I said he has confirmation bias. I didn't not say he was an ignorant neanderthal living in a cave, only that his perspective is not as unbiased as he thinks. My world view is not that tainted.
you don't suffer from confirmation bias, and your view is thus pure and untainted? how nice for you, lol!

Idaho

01-14-2011, 14:36

so what, how does this make them intellectually moribund?

you argument has two logical conclusions:
1. that despite universal sufferage the gov't are using black heicopters with mass mind control rays to bring about unrepresentative election results.
> in which case we should have a revolution
2. that despite being adults of legally sound mind the electorate are still a bunch of idiots who cannot be trusted to vote over their own governance.
> in which case create a benign technocratic dictatorship (the EU?)

i don't accept either of those argument, and nor should you.

so i am left struggling to understand how the most successful and lon-standing force in british politics can yet be intellectually moribund, with the implication that they have always been so...........

Those are the two logical conclusions? :laugh4: Neither strike as very logical.

Furunculus

01-14-2011, 14:48

Those are the two logical conclusions? :laugh4: Neither strike as very logical.

how are the Tories intellectually moribund? demonstrate.

Fragony

01-14-2011, 15:16

It wasn't me who pulled the Godwin. The first person to bring up Hitler is the Godwin and that is Fragony, defending the right by declaring Marx and Hitler to be evil leftists. I then corrected him saying I believe most scholars place him on the right side of the spectrum. Now you are claiming that I painted Hitler on you as if it was a trump card I pulled out.

This is exactly what I am saying when I told you Vuk that you see what you want to see. The very first mention of Hitler is from Fragony doing exactly what you are claiming me, SFTS and HoreTore are doing.

I have more to say, but I have to go to a meeting and then dinner. Brb, 4 hours lol.

Did no such thing, just pointed out it's unlikely to be found on rightwingers bookshelve. Seems like he's a loony after all anyway no, we will see as things progress

@TA, I'm quite familiar with political theory, but I just don't buy them. Doesn't mean I don't understand them. Got a few theories on that btw

Centurion1

01-14-2011, 17:26

Why is it that every time I argue with someone right wing on this forum that isn't CR, they inflate what I am saying to mean something that I quite frankly didn't say. I said he has confirmation bias. I didn't not say he was an ignorant neanderthal living in a cave, only that his perspective is not as unbiased as he thinks. My world view is not that tainted. Considering I have subscribed to every train of political thought in my life at some point, I would say I am somewhat well rounded. Before how I was now, I was a libertarian, before that I was a nanny state socialist, before that I was a neoconservative. Universities are not really politically polarized, it all depends on where you go. You think University of Arizona is some haven for liberals and doesn't have a large proportion of conservatives? Do you know what you are talking about? No one lives like a university student? Umm reality check here dude. Everyone lives like a university student. Here in America, once you hit college you get saddled with debt and have to live under a tight budget unless you are rich. And then you graduate, get a job and live with a slightly larger budget, still saddled with debt for many years. Then you pay it off and some other problem like new furniture, a house or a medical emergency puts more debt on you. Life begins at college in many ways. If you recognize you are biased, then why not attempt to shed that bias. That should one of the important lessons to learn at uni. Let's check my list again and see where you are wrong:

Oh im sorry you decided to adhere to marxism for a few weeks so your an expert on communism you decided you were a conservative for a year and therefore you are the worlds premier expert on conservatism. This all prevents you from being the archetypal liberal who knows whats best for all of us. Furthermore your obviously an upstanding young man who doesnt have an ounce of bias in his body.

Excuse me while i go barf.

And yeah i know what im talking about. UNIVERSITY IS NOT REAL LIFE. GET OVER IT. Dorm life and even living off campus is not how life is when your out of university. Your saddled with debt unless your rich? yeah not always buddy watch your step.

want a list of liberal hate speech.

Obama
Frances Fox Piven
Richard Kirsch
roland martin
Norman Leboon
"Rev." Jeremiah Wright
Charles Barron
Michael Feingold
Spike Lee
Howard Dean
John Kerry
PETA
Farrakhan
Randi Rhodes

.........

oh an by the by theres supposedly a 2-1 difference between republicans and democrats at the university of arizona. really even environment your right.