Letters to the Editor
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I'm 14 Pages Into This Thread And...
I think Healthy Skeptic is a twatwaffle. The left fringe won't deter moderates but boring the crap out of them sure as hell will. Skeptic, get over yourself. I'm going to fast forward through the rest of the comments because of you. If I miss one of Bepop-O's posts I'm going to be really pissed.
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bucky1, with regrets
Thanks for your reply.
"Robert, is it not obvious?"
Well, no, it wasn't to me. Hence my question, followed by the qualifier, "Honest question."
Besides, the older I get, the less obvious I find things in life to be. But perhaps that's just me.
"There is a war for the "hearts and minds" of the normal working Americans who are not into politics as you are."
I don't know what to say about that except that I'm about as into politics as I am into golf, which is to say, not at all. I find myself forced into caring about politics because of the fear-induced abandonment of the rule of law and Constitutional integrity that seems to have run rampant in this nation in recent years. If there is a war "for the hearts and minds" of folks like me, well, then in the years of the George W. Bush administration I submit it has also been a war on the hearts and minds. Having been so forced, I have come to realize that it is important to participate in our democracy (our Republic, if we can keep it, and I'm sorry I didn't pay closer attention sooner, Mr. Franklin), not just live in it, which is hard when you're like me and don't want to give a tinker's damn about politics because there are books you'd rather be reading, mountains you'd rather be hiking, intelligent and beautiful women you'd rather be meeting, music you'd rather be listening to, friends you'd rather be spending time with, wild animals you'd rather be sighting, travel you'd rather be undertaking, and so forth. Well, here I am, tinker's damn and all. In the Small-Victories-To-Be-Thankful-For column, I have not yet encountered some national condition that forces me to care about golf.
"I personally think it is better to lose than sell out principles, but he is just telling you old time political wisdom."
I agree with the first part of that statement, and thank you for shedding some light on healthyskeptic's position with the second part.
Sadly, I must now be blunt. Though I agree with almost nothing I've read in your posts since you've joined the discussion, you have been, in your interaction with me, at least civil, and for that I am grateful. However, I suspect you won't want to interact with me much in the future, as I am one of those "cowards" who hasn't seen fit to declare my voting allegiance despite the arrival of the campaign season, something you have decried on several occasions in past weeks. I'm also a fan of Glenn's work and while I don't always agree with every point he makes, I often agree with much he has posted, and therefore also, no doubt, fall into that category of Glenn's "cabal" you mentioned recently. In fact, just today I received my official "Glenn Greenwald Fan Club Inner Circle Membership Certificate!"
Which reminds me, Glenn, I e-mailed you the contents of my refrigerator, and I'm hoping you can get back to me with what I should have for dinner tonight, since, as a regular member of the "cabal," I can't seem to make any decisions without your declaration, and was hoping to eat sometime around 7:30 p.m., Central. Thanks!
No kings,
Robert
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Healthy Sheptic Is Right!!!
Not really, I'm just a self-obsessed peacock looking for attention.
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counter culture movement
anti-authoritarianism" (is this "out of control"?)
Yes, anti-authoritarianism, for it's own sake, most certainly is detrimental, and tends to encourage a kind of snowballing mob mentality where every authority is automatically not, creating a kind of insane feedback loop. On the left and right it usually takes the form of anti-intellectualism, and the worst kinds of populism.
In China for example the "cultural revolution" snowballed from legitimate complaints against corrupt government, that grew into a lynch mob where anyone educated was considered a conspirator, and the majority of Chinese continue to be dirt poor.
In the American CC movement of the 60s, it led to drug culture where being "radical" and "far-out" were goals in themselves. There had always been a very small counter-culture movement, bohemians and such, but they were very small and relatively far more conservative compared with hippies. Hippies were far more radical, aimless, and numerous than previous CC movements, and they inspired far greater blowback from the right and middle.
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Fringe Liberal Bloggers?
Oh! i thought you said 'FRIDGE Liberal Bloggers', and I'm hungry.
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Cripes
He sold good music, and some people agreed with his plitcs more or less. It doesn't mean he, or his politcs, could run for office.
Only an insignificant percentage of America's 300+ million population ever owned a Johnny Cash album, so you're not doing much towards any point.
What a pathetic argument. The guy was and still is an icon. The last music he sold "Hurt" was a huge video hit on MTV. You're just making an ass of yourself. My point was true. You chose to lie about even what you specifically posted. I do not understand why people think they can deny the words they wrote that are only a click away.
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The Man in Black in Office
"It doesn't mean he, or his politcs, could run for office."
I bet a metric shitload of citizens of the United States of America would've voted for Johnny Cash if he had run for office.
And I believe the correct weights and measures term for that number of people is, in fact, "a metric shitload."
No kings,
Robert
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Complete BS
Excuse me, but when someone makes the completely asinine statement: "Nixon was socially and economically left on many issues by today's standards." -- I have to call BS.
Does the person who made the above statement not see the commonality between Nixon's methods and the Bush movement's methods? Apparently not, which tends to indicate hopeless blindness.
Also, Ronald Reagan was elected the first time on a groundswell of repudiation for Carter, just as whoever runs on the Democratic side will be elected overwhelmingly by a groundswell of repudiation, not just for Bush, but for the entire GOP party, which has shown itself to be unworthy of trust. The difference is that, in 1980, people voted against Carter but didn't have much coat-tails. What's going to happen in 2008 is going to be a tsunami, and it may very well sweep the GOP as it currently exists into the dustbin of history.
Nixon, as has been extensively reported by his biographers and apologists, basically didn't really care about domestic politics except for being elected, re-elected, and continuing in power.
When one side of the American political scene makes strategic errors and displays an inability to provide anything remotely resembling good government, they should be soundly repudiated by those on the other end of the political spectrum. (I use the term "spectrum" advisedly here: the actual map more closely resembles some kind of multi-dimensional rorschach test.)
Since "Conservative" government has proven such an unmitigated disaster, the pendulum should swing far to the left in response. Those on the left should be pulling the discussion their way as hard as possible. Political movement in the American public sphere doesn't act like a glacier. It acts like an avalanche.
We've seen the bankruptcy of the right. Let's invest some money in ideas from the left.
I don't usually speak personally to others here, but the following is for "healthyskeptic".
Anybody who has to call themselves "healthyskeptic" automatically makes me suspect that they suffer from monomania to such an extent that they're probably in a halfway house for the "socially challenged." Wired has an article today which discusses your trouble: it's called "Pugilistic Discussion Syndrome", with a touch of Narcissistic Blog Disorder by proxy.
HS, I don't know how to tell you this nicely, and "nice" is not what I'm good at, so I'm just going to be blunt. You are full of crap. Besides being a concern troll, you apparently have no idea what has happened in the past or why it happened.
If you cannot contribute insight, at least try to remain civil.