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Joel and Isaac prepare to hijack another thread Isaac Send a noteboard - 30/03/2010 01:15:40 AM
The woman would snap in two in a strong wind. :P Maybe I'm sensitive from the days when wotmaniacs would teasingly offer her up as a "leggy blonde" but politics weren't the only problem for me there; I don't want to be impaled by my girlfriend. ;) As to the politics, I'll go further: They raise your blood pressure and do other things that are bad for you. Moore has been known to make some good points, and maybe Coulter has, too, but in both cases it's buried in such sensationalism and hyperbole that the VALID arguments are easy to miss and seldom worth the trouble to find.


Oh, Coulter has had some very excellent points both on McCarthy and the Scopes Trial, but her actual books are much more detailed and thoughtful, when she does interviews or Human Events Articles I think she's really just advertising the books by taking a deliberately confrontational stance. I've never really fact-checked Moore myself, I know that I won't be able to make it through his movies based on my response to Fahrenheit 9/11, so I simply list him as controversial and avoid his work. I'd not be surprised if both were very accurate in their facts. But they sell outrage, I've no problem with that but I know better than to watch Moore and I don't advise liberals to read coulter. Every choir needs somebody to sing to them. Coaches rallying their team aren't known for being especially accurate either "I want 110%, we will win this thing!" vs "I want you to go out there and give a slightly above average performance compared to normal which may increase our odds of victory"



Each dangerous though, particularly the ones clearly promoting purely political agendas under the cloak of religion. Honestly, the right wing takeover of the Southern Baptists has done more damage to the Church than to the nation (and the damage to the latter is significant. ) I'll send you an article on how it began later, if I can keep it in my head long enough; it happened to be in my hometown so I've got a special edition of the Chronicle printed for the week long Southern Baptist Convention that turned into a political sideshow with enduring consequences for the whole country. These people are a threat to the country and to the Church, which makes them doubly inexcusable to me.


I'd hesitate to call it damaging or dangerous, I nominally consider the left-wing takeovers of civil rights and environmentalism less than ideal but not exactly cyanide in the veins of liberty. ;)

No win situation; believe it or not, Dukakis was attacked for a non-emotional response to the prospect of his wife being raped and murdered. Of course, if he goes off in a justifiable rant at Bernard Shaw he's equally screwed. "Governor, did you beat Kitty again last night?" :rolleyes: I don't think asking Bush about Quayles qualifications was out of bounds, though the manner was pretty over the top. But then, I was always in the camp that believed Bush only picked Quayle as a running mate who wouldn't overshadow him, since, at the time, he was widely seen as a weak candidate (at least until he decided to "fix" the "wimp problem" by lashing out at Dan Rather in an interview, the start of a feud that would ultimately end Rathers career after what I strongly suspect was a setup, but that's a whole other debate I'd prefer not to reenter. )


I view both as poor debate questions, though I'd say the one aimed at Dukakis was worse. I think he could have answered the question in a way that would have scored some points, but it would take a very good delivery thrown together on short notice, of course, I would have been expecting that style of question on any POV I held that was unpopular so I'm not too sympathetic for him. If you can't prepare a decent defense for an unpopular stance, it's an indicator it's a bad stance, at least politically.

Necessary evil; if you're going to ban something from the schools you better be able to justify the law. That's one of the things the courts are for, y'know, and the best way to expose and draw attention to a bad law is to get someone prosecuted for doing the right thing. Which is why the ACLU ran ads in Tennessee papers looking for a teacher willing to teach evolution. Not the point though, my point was that Darrow and Bryan were very much on the opposite side of THAT issue, but had a life long friendship built around all the other populist issues for which they fought long and hard together.


I think the ACLU stepped over the fine line encouraging someone to break the law. But I certainly agree, there's nothing wrong with two advocates taking opposing sides on an issue and being cordial, so long as it doesn't interfere with their case, and there is a school of thought that says it does.


I don't know that the lefts fringe is all that out of control nationally; they certainly haven't floated anything like a Constitutional amendment against gay marriage or banning late term abortions they already got banned. The last one is kind of impressive, really; the far right wouldn't let a little thing like already getting their way on an issue keep them from using it to lure uninformed voters to the polls. Sure, the fringe left has gotten out of control in local areas where they aren't considered "fringe" but on a national level I can't really think of much. The Assault Weapons Ban, maybe? Bush took care of that one though, so Kalashnikov owners everywhere can sleep free and easy.


Both sides have people who use BS to gather votes, note all the dems who told endless sob stories that wouldn't really fit normally into the current system, the proposed one, or the GOP alternative. By and large though, the sudden appearance of proposed unnecessary kneejerk laws tends to be more weird, IMHO, from the left. Right-wing ones tend to be formal banning something already illegal or favoring something previously legal, so we already know what the fallout is going to be. A constitutional ban on gay marriage - which I do not favor - is very predictable in it's consequences, banning salt or adding a cap and trade tax are not.

I'd be happy to see some real federal insurance regulation, but I'm not holding my breath and don't think it would do a darned thing to expand coverage. Of course, long term, neither will this bill, because without effective cost controls health insurance will ultimately become too expensive for the government to afford, too (as is already happening with Medicare, just not at the rate of private insurance because Medicare is single payer. ) The bottom line is that no industrialized nation can let the price of things everyone needs to survive be set by market forces alone, because the one (and only) time suppliers set prices is when they're supplying something without which people can't live.


Well, I don't believe the evidence supports that statement about price controls, I must object to the fundamental assumption that price controls on a universally needed commodity are necessary. I do favor limited regulation but there are a number of items which are life necessities and by and large operate fine under levels of free market and regulation well below what is already in place on health insurance. Food, clothing, etc ll have little to no price controls on them, in terms of federal regulation. Milk, juice, shoes, coats, these are all necessities whose price is almost entirely controlled by free market, the gov't can step in, and should have the power to step in, if a wrench is tossed in to the gears but it's actions when stepping in are not necessarily preferable. "Obamacare" and healthcare reform are not synonymous, anymore than mammal and cat are, and a lot of times gov't attempts to fix blips and muck ups in the free market amount to milking a cat and sending a cow to hunt mice.
The intuitive mind is a sacred gift and the rational mind is a faithful servant. We have created a society that honors the servant and has forgotten the gift.
- Albert Einstein

King of Cairhien 20-7-2
Chancellor of the Landsraad, Archduke of Is'Mod
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If you could ban some words from political discourse, which would you ban? - 13/03/2010 06:35:25 AM 1313 Views
Working Families, Red Hot Go, Silver Bullet - 13/03/2010 06:46:43 AM 536 Views
I'm not sure if you're against labels or just Bob Seger. *NM* - 13/03/2010 05:15:20 PM 282 Views
well, anything to do with the other side. - 13/03/2010 03:41:12 PM 521 Views
Especially concerning their youth and inexperience *NM* - 14/03/2010 11:22:13 AM 306 Views
all of them. - 13/03/2010 04:42:02 PM 554 Views
I'm sure the one-fingered salute would turn up more frequently, then. - 14/03/2010 02:31:34 PM 495 Views
nah, it would just require the radio people to be more creative - 14/03/2010 06:52:29 PM 584 Views
Two: Bipartisan and progressive. - 13/03/2010 05:14:36 PM 517 Views
"progressive" was created to get around the "liberal" label the right uses - 13/03/2010 06:00:40 PM 533 Views
Does the right really have the power to make a word dirty? - 13/03/2010 06:27:46 PM 548 Views
considering that "liberal" has taken the place of "communist" for "something bad" i'd say yes - 13/03/2010 07:07:21 PM 485 Views
There's a flawed premise in there though - 13/03/2010 10:43:58 PM 560 Views
Re: There's a flawed premise in there though - 14/03/2010 09:34:58 AM 597 Views
Re: There's a flawed premise in there though - 14/03/2010 02:56:45 PM 549 Views
If that's the case you should try to reclaim the word, not demonize it. - 15/03/2010 08:14:11 AM 608 Views
It probably will be down the road - 15/03/2010 04:59:58 PM 626 Views
Good...? - 15/03/2010 09:17:22 PM 672 Views
Re: Good...? - 15/03/2010 10:20:53 PM 698 Views
Re: Good...? - 29/03/2010 04:15:16 PM 603 Views
Joel and Isaac prepare to hijack another thread - 30/03/2010 01:15:40 AM 735 Views
As long as I get top billing. - 03/04/2010 11:54:38 AM 685 Views
Re: As long as I get top billing. - 03/04/2010 12:50:54 PM 633 Views
Re: As long as I get top billing. - 04/04/2010 01:33:27 PM 554 Views
Re: As long as I get top billing. - 04/04/2010 02:59:07 PM 683 Views
Re: As long as I get top billing. - 06/04/2010 03:18:15 AM 615 Views
Heh. It's not what you say, it's how you say it. *edit* - 14/03/2010 02:26:12 PM 487 Views
I know, but it's still a bad description. *NM* - 14/03/2010 05:14:26 PM 221 Views
Not CREATED for that purpose, just dusted off for it. - 15/03/2010 07:34:19 AM 490 Views
I woulkd say the left made the word liberal dirty - 15/03/2010 05:15:24 PM 481 Views
it must be a terrible terrible burden on you to have all the answers to everything... *NM* - 15/03/2010 11:08:04 PM 321 Views
just as being stupid must be a burden for you *NM* - 16/03/2010 02:06:43 PM 243 Views
what? no sandy vagina comment? you're slipping.... *NM* - 16/03/2010 02:51:19 PM 275 Views
but you are still boringly predictable - 16/03/2010 03:23:26 PM 457 Views
actually, no it's just you. *NM* - 16/03/2010 11:12:21 PM 256 Views
How's that paranoia treating you? - 16/03/2010 12:53:31 AM 517 Views
how is that head in sand treating you? - 16/03/2010 02:19:54 PM 523 Views
Re: how is that head in sand treating you? - 16/03/2010 09:07:09 PM 670 Views
Which fringe group do you believe I belong to? - 16/03/2010 10:23:53 PM 424 Views
if all of this is true.... - 16/03/2010 11:17:19 PM 524 Views
I am a militant moderate - 18/03/2010 01:45:40 PM 465 Views
as always, i have to disagree - 18/03/2010 05:30:09 PM 518 Views
unlike the way you use right-winger? - 18/03/2010 06:50:12 PM 1137 Views
*NM* - 14/03/2010 02:25:01 PM 305 Views
Pro-torture *NM* - 13/03/2010 06:27:10 PM 407 Views
I get your point, but it wouldn't work anyway - 13/03/2010 07:20:58 PM 549 Views
transparency - because english politics fricking isn't. *NM* - 13/03/2010 10:11:59 PM 222 Views
none are these days - 13/03/2010 10:23:03 PM 689 Views
hope and change *NM* - 14/03/2010 03:32:34 PM 391 Views
i hope you could change your mind about that *NM* - 14/03/2010 07:35:39 PM 239 Views
bah. - 15/03/2010 12:24:51 AM 739 Views
None, - 15/03/2010 11:08:11 AM 576 Views
Words/phrases that I would abolish: - 15/03/2010 02:41:51 PM 646 Views
Bah. - 15/03/2010 03:05:20 PM 574 Views
Re: Bah. - 15/03/2010 03:11:47 PM 562 Views
Save the puns for damookster! - 15/03/2010 03:15:24 PM 561 Views
ROFL *NM* - 15/03/2010 03:17:07 PM 293 Views
XD *NM* - 15/03/2010 05:51:13 PM 319 Views
Re: Words/phrases that I would abolish: - 15/03/2010 04:27:21 PM 627 Views
Re: Words/phrases that I would abolish: - 15/03/2010 04:48:48 PM 581 Views
Re: Words/phrases that I would abolish: - 15/03/2010 05:32:30 PM 629 Views
I thought we settled that issue long ago here (well, wotmania) - 15/03/2010 04:48:02 PM 468 Views
hahaha *NM* - 15/03/2010 04:50:29 PM 236 Views
leave to a liberal to want to ban words they don't like *NM* - 15/03/2010 05:10:19 PM 263 Views
Re: leave to a liberal to want to ban words they don't like - 15/03/2010 05:38:24 PM 501 Views
That was weak - 15/03/2010 05:48:34 PM 490 Views
at least it mirrored your original comment. *NM* - 15/03/2010 05:53:34 PM 285 Views
to bad it didn't mirror reality - 15/03/2010 08:33:18 PM 447 Views
sure, the right doesn't say "don't say that" - 15/03/2010 11:00:56 PM 464 Views
which terms that the left uses did he suggest removing? - 16/03/2010 03:20:21 PM 520 Views
you misspoke - 16/03/2010 12:36:23 AM 586 Views
that is often true but I don't think it is true now - 16/03/2010 04:12:18 PM 636 Views
Re: that is often true but I don't think it is true now - 16/03/2010 09:34:42 PM 679 Views
Al Franken is a joke right? - 16/03/2010 10:31:41 PM 485 Views
Re: Al Franken is a joke right? - 17/03/2010 05:34:25 PM 528 Views
Getting a bit excessive - 17/03/2010 05:49:42 PM 485 Views
Hear, hear. *NM* - 18/03/2010 03:30:33 AM 232 Views

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