Letters to the Editor
Paul Daniel Ash
Published Letters: 662 Editor's Choice: 2
-
@Fool
[Read the article: You are the river: An interview with Ken Wilber]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]my policy is go with the flow until I die, at which point I will begin an intensive program of no-thought.
I'm with you!
A Zen master visiting New York City goes up to a hot dog vendor and says, "Make me one with everything."
The hot dog vendor fixes a hot dog and hands it to the Zen master, who pays with a $20 bill.
The vendor puts the bill in the cash box and closes it. "Excuse me, but where’s my change?" asks the Zen master.
The vendor responds, "Change must come from within."
-
concern troll
[Read the article: Why the Jeremiah Wright story deserves more attention]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]The Wikipedia definition is unsatisfying:
he concern troll posts in web forums devoted to its declared point of view and attempts to sway the group's actions or opinions while claiming to share their goals, but with professed "concerns". The goal is to sow fear, uncertainty and doubt within the group.
but close enough for rock 'n' roll.
-
@quicks
[Read the article: Why the Jeremiah Wright story deserves more attention]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]It's a habit... I went to college in the 2000s, so I have the Firefox right-click menu ready at hand, etc. It's pretty much allowed my medium term memory to atrophy, but that's... that's... what was I saying?
-
@NoMoreBlatherDotCom
[Read the article: In defense of Lou Dobbs]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]Various non-profits and even elected officials have direct or indirect links to the MexicanGovernment, and that government has not only said they're going to be using non-profits to push their agenda, but they encouraged their citizens in our country - and even Mexican-Americans - to push their agenda.
I'd be interested in how much power you really think the "MexicanGovernment" has in this country. What "agenda" are these non-profits pushing (can non-profits "push?") that's different than the program shared by money interests on both sides of the border: move dirty industries south, bring cheap labor over to drive wages down but keep those people technically "illegal" so they can be controlled.
I'm serious. What does this "MexicanGovernment" want that they haven't got already? I'm hoping you're not going to bust out ameros and NorthAmerican SuperHighways... but even so, isn't that something that's supposed to be on the agenda of both major parties?
-
@RWatkins, @jamesmartin
[Read the article: You are the river: An interview with Ken Wilber]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]Ever read any of Wilber's books? Or just this interview?
Just curious.
-
"an overt racist speaks clearly"
[Read the article: Why the Jeremiah Wright story deserves more attention]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]What has Rev. Wright said that was "racist?" Let's see if you can answer that without twisting the term to mean "any mention of race as a problem in America."
Tell me... do they have classes in forming the false equivalence, or is it something you wingers just pick up from each other?
-
@Gerry
[Read the article: Why the Jeremiah Wright story deserves more attention]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]Marx's teaching of historical dialectical materialism is the exact rationale Stalin and Mao used to justify mass murder.
That's a very confident, erudite sentence. Presumably, since you stated that so blithely, it won't be hard for you to tell me exactly where in the writings of Marx he called for "mass murder."
-
@Baldie
[Read the article: Brian Williams' "response" to the military analyst story]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]Yeah, I noticed that too.
I'd add that "I'm as liberal as they come..." is pretty much an infallible marker for concern-trollery - I think they teach that locution at Troll U.
-
meh
[Read the article: Brian Williams' "response" to the military analyst story]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]By coming on here, and, bless 'em, really trying their damndest to defend the indefensible, they are showing the precise limitations of their own worldview
I'm not convinced that our trolls represent the most robust defense of that worldview... they come here for the meager entertainment of yanking our chains, and in return provide the meager entertainment (to some of us) of shooting fish in a barrel.
By definition, intelligent advocates of a particular worldview don't troll. I have "slummed" on some right-wing sites and occasionally had a decent debate; however, the level of abuse you have to filter out at such places generally takes all the pleasure out of the experience.
Shooter and Nasalfiber are like Wile E. Coyote - no matter how many times they get blown up, they'll be back with another foolish gambit. It's funny sometimes, but you do end up feeling like you've seen the cartoon before...
-
straw-grasping
[Read the article: Brian Williams' "response" to the military analyst story]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]Are you asserting the left is without sin
Yes, Shooter. That's exactly what we're asserting.
On a related note, when was the last time you commented regarding bad behavior by conservatives? By your own definition, does that make you a hypocrite, or not?
-
hey um...
[Read the article: Brian Williams nominates Peggy Noonan for a Pulitzer Prize]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]where'd all the comments go....?
-
@quickstrategy
[Read the article: Brian Williams' "response" to the military analyst story]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]Add deucey to your taxonomy of concern trolls: the "tone troll..."
-
@omooex
[Read the article: Brian Williams' "response" to the military analyst story]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]I think of you as more a concern platypus... neither fish nor fowl.
;->
-
@sunny
[Read the article: Brian Williams' "response" to the military analyst story]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]Is GG being punished?
He posted - what? - four times on Tuesday?
I figure Salon's just paying him piecework...
-
@shooter
[Read the article: What backroom conniving are Steny Hoyer and the Chris Carney Blue Dogs up to on FISA?]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]There are only two possibilities...
Why only two? You may be right, but you didn't make your case - just saying "there are only two" is not especially persuasive. What does "impetus brought to bear" mean? Can you bring "impetus" to bear? Do you mean "pressure?" Why are you assuming that Hoyer and Carney are being "pressured" rather than the alternative possibility Glenn raises and has raised - that they actually support telecom immunity?
To continue: what does HBIC mean? Why must we assume the second most powerful member in the United States House of Representatives has to ask for permission from the Speaker before he does anything? Why does it make sense to target someone other than the person actually taking the action you are protesting?
Sorry for all the questions, but there is a reason why the argument by assertion is such an ill-regarded rhetorical technique. It generates little heat, and no light.
Cheers.
-
@Jan R.
[Read the article: Who needs Dana Perino when you have the NYT's Michael Gordon?]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]I agree, this subject is certainly fraught with emotion, on both sides.
May I suggest, if a dispassionate "discussion" is your goal, that it might not be the best approach to start with the statement that someone is calling for the suicide of all Israeli Jews?
best,
Paul
-
@Jan R.
[Read the article: Who needs Dana Perino when you have the NYT's Michael Gordon?]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]I'd like to know - if at all possible, free from scornful condescension - what you find "practical" about a garrisonned monoethic enclave surrounded by walls and bristling with nuclear weapons, and "Utopian" about the idea of a negotiated settlement.
Do you think the current status quo is in any way sustainable over the long term?