Letters to the Editor
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Bucky1 is the thing that speaks for itself
RWA pure and simple. Seeks the "strong daddy" to "save the country" from itself by enforcing the strict discipline required by a particularly myopic and narrow interpretation of constitutional principles informed by a limited and faulty understanding of original intent. Calls me a neocon. You are with him or against.
A question for the group --- do you want another flame war between I and the tiny cabal lead by LWM?
Taking hostages, issuing ultimatums and making threats? Just like Bush with the troops in Iraq. A terrorist! We all knew you were an extremist. Going to blow up another thread, are you?
Wal-map is far more complex, intelligent and sophisticated but none the less an evangelistic zealot, a Jacobin purist. Calls me a neocon, too. He is intelligent and sophisticated enough to distinguish between a realpolitik pragmatist and a neocon but chooses not to. You are either with him or against him.
The more intelligent and sophisticated readers here will see the similarities in manner, style and approach between these two not too dissimilar polemicists and notice little contrast between them and the current neoconservative movement's widely documented practices. Trotskyite, Leninist, evangelistic, absolutist, Jacobinian "never pure enough" and totalitarian. The farther right you tend to lean, the more appealing this rhetoric is. I cede this thread to you both. Quagmires are for the foolish, even in this ethereal, one dimensional space. I'll just sit this one out and watch while you chase your own tails. That'll be fun.
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@adnoto
Bucky, perhaps. Walter, not a chance. Well, unless you consider harsh language and sticking the truth in the faces of those that would rather not see it as nutbar-ish. Read his other "letters." I did and it was quite illuminating. I found precisely two things I disagreed with. His defense of the ATF at Waco and my assumptions as to where he stands on gun ownership and the second amendment. Otherwise his rhetoric and outrage are perfectly tuned IMO. But I can understand why you don't like him. IIRC, you still believe that America is "a pretty great place."
-- adnoto
1) I don't think any "place" is the best of all possible places but I'm stuck here now and at least it's not Iraq and ask anyone here, I'm addicted to harsh language and the "utterance of the truth" as I perceive it. It's my truth. It's hardly universal.
2) It really doesn't matter to me what I and Wal-Map may agree upon. I agree with WFB, Jr. on two issues. There are some Marxists I agree with on some issues. The difference between myself and Wal-Map is a matter of style, not substance, (and harsh language and "the truth" have nothing to do with it), as illustrated by statements like this one:
Because we're patriots, determined to win our country back from vicious brainwashed treasonous barbarians like yourself. It could be a nice country without the likes of you ruining it for everybody else.
http://tinyurl.com/2g85jx
I understand the anger and the vitriol. I've been angry enough to lapse into it myself on occasion. We are only human. And I'm sympathetic to many of his positions but we have seen that rhetoric before all over the world long before the neocons adopted it.
PATRIOT, n.
One to whom the interests of a part seem superior to those of the whole. The dupe of statesmen and the tool of conquerors.
PATRIOTISM, n.
Combustible rubbish read to the torch of any one ambitious to illuminate his name.
- In Dr. Johnson's famous dictionary patriotism is defined as the last resort of a scoundrel. With all due respect to an enlightened but inferior lexicographer I beg to submit that it is the first.
A.B.
If you want to know how a patriot would act, keep reading this blog. Let wal-map get his own blog. Perhaps he and Bucky1 can share one.
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LWM says no, not today
LWM ---> "... I cede this thread to you both. Quagmires are for the foolish, even in this ethereal, one dimensional space. I'll just sit this one out and watch while you chase your own tails. That'll be fun. ..."
Why the term both? I am just one person.
I am old enough to have seen flame wars destroy local bulletin boards (300 baud access) before there was universal access to the net. I do not like to be attacked, nor do I like to see others attacked. Several here can not see the difference (or do not know how) between disputing a man's words or his position and attacking the man. I hope those folks will google it up or use wikipedia.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ad_hominem
All you need do is not mention my name, nor me. Wait until you see words that reflect error in your view, and then tell the crowd why you think the words are erroneous or constitute a fallacy. If you are correct; then others will see it. If I think you are wrong, and I have time, I will debate the issue. I will not, however, discuss anything politely with you if you are attacking. You will get back a mirror of yourself just as last weekend showed.
For now, I take your comment quoted above to mean that Glenn's comment section means enough to you to act decently around me at least for the near term.
We will all see how it goes. After all, if I am half as deranged as you have claimed you have no excuse for not "winning" every exchange, eh?
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PS: What threat? It is a promise that I will treat you exactly as you treat me. Allowing for the differences in style, I may have heard a few much more vulgar retorts over the years from wing-nuts that frothed at the mouth yelling at me but I will just give back as I get. The say, what goes around, comes around. The also say that is hillbilly karma. :-)
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@Djinn, genie-ghost of 7th-grade Mrs. Sullivan ;)
This is absolutely my last word on the subject, promise.
My 7th-grade English teacher? She was a nice lady, but I don't think she knew that much about grammar. No, I wrote the original post in my professional capacity. I get paid to be nitpicky about grammar and language. And it's a job I couldn't do if I didn't absolutely love it.
That's the definition of a grammar geek. We love language. You don't read books like "The Deluxe Transitive Vampire" for kicks if you don't love grammar. And it's my endless enjoyment of the art that makes me push for precision. Half the reason I read this forum is because I enjoy the many ways the participants argue their points eloquently and often poetically.
As for English being a living language, that's absolutely true. My favorite poet is Gerard Manley Hopkins, a nonsensical user of words if there ever was one. What I object to is muddiness and ugliness. When someone says, "I feel nauseous" when they mean "I feel nauseated," it expasperates not because it's incorrect, but because we're losing one perfectly good word and forcing another to perform two functions. As for the -izing, I just find most of them aesthetically unpleasing. There's objectivity for you!
With that, I'll permanently shush on this topic. Karen et al , please email me at nmalchik@hotmail.com for any news on wheres and whens.