How the Hypocrite Leftwing Argues

[Jackalope]

Well, traditional American marriage led to interracial marriage, so clearly the slope is slippery and may lead to who knows what allowances on which consenting adult (or adults!) one might be allowed to marry. Not letting ANYONE marry seems to be the only permanent way off the slope.

No, no, no... that won't work at all.

Traditional unmarriage will lead to interracial unmarriage, same-sex unmarriage... and we're right back on the slippery slope again.

We can't possibly have that.

[DeistPaladin]

Not good enough. We must avoid slippery slopes at all cost. Since all arguments of any kind eventually lead to the use of slippery slopes, or at least I assert without reason that they all do, we should avoid making any kind of arguments at all. Ever.

[Dee Dee Ramone]

“If there is ever a fascist takeover in America, it will come not in the form of storm troopers kicking down doors but with lawyers and social workers saying. "I'm from the government and I'm here to help.” ― Jonah Goldberg

NObama! NOway! Impeach Barack OUT!

Still bashing same-sex marriage? Look who's whining about state interference in his signature, while depending on the same state for blocking gay people's love-life huh?

Hypocrite.

[Voltron]

to redifine marriage to include gay marriage, polygamy, incestual marriages, etc...will fracture the strength of our identity and create a cultural distortion...

Setting aside polygamy and incest marriage for a moment and focusing on the gay marriage issue, that is afterall a hot button topic of the moment in our country...Can you specify exactly how and why gay marriage will "fracture the strength of our identity"?
That type of rhetoric is always in plenty of supply, but I've never heard any convincing specifics.

[DeistPaladin]

A Theist, you are a paradigmatic example of a spoiled american,

He's also a good example of the effect of brainwashing and propaganda here in America. Those outside America should understand that to live here these days is to be subjected to a steady diet of propaganda akin to the former Soviet Union and their "Pravda".

It's not just Fox Noise but all the other mainstream sources of media as well. They're ALL owned by a few major corporations who skew our perceptions of what goes on in the outside world and what issues are important, all in favor of their interests. Unlike with Pravda, it isn't a government dictatorship but the corporations that control our information. And then there's hate-talk radio. Glen Beck still has his show. The "serious" Sunday morning talk shows are almost universally structured around the "both sides do it" meme to lend cover for the worst of conservative abuses. There are liberals like Maddow on MSNBC but even these pundits are kept carefully in line. They made a good example out of Olbermann, who's nowhere to be found these days.

If you're an American and want to know what's really going on in the world, you have to go to foreign journalism. Most "low information" voters don't have the time or inclination and so the corporate agenda is served.

People like A-Theist are the other extreme, pumped so full of hate and fear that he now lives in an alternate reality. I wish he could be dismissed but he represents a good third of our voting bloc if not more. That's why clowns like Bachmann and Santorum are serious politicians and not crackpots on a street corner selling pencils, where they surely would be in any rational soceity.

It's nothing less than embarrassing for me as an American to watch.

To paraphrase Jesus, "forgive us world, we know not what we do."

The kind that joined 2 world wars late so that you could reap the profits.

So we could make a big heroic entrance and save the day just in the nick of time, like in our movies.



Some on this board may recognize this image from Hetalia, a Japanese animation that depicts nations as anthropomorphic characters.

Just a bit of self-deprecating humor to lighten this otherwise glum post.

Time will teach you a lesson, not god or gods, but time. I hope you don't have any children, because they shouldn't pay for your idiocy.

Neither should we, the rational ones in this country.

America needs a "dumb-ass tax" to pay for the Iraq War and all the care our veterans will need with PTSD, brain injury, artificial limbs and other care. Anyone who voted for Bush in 2004 needs to pay a share of the costs of the war. Anyone who did so and voted for McCain in 2008 needs to be stripped of their voting rights for being too dumb or too brainwashed to be trusted with that power.

@Whateverist, I'll respond later tonight.

---

I think it is important for more people to hear from you and others who have become disenchanted with the republican party and its extremist policies. What might really help would be to identify what it is that attracted you to the party in the first place. Anything you can say that would help me understand the mindset of a conservative would really help me to understand the other side. I can't believe they're all callous or evil people but it is hard for me to fathom what positive motives move them.

I was raised in a sheltered environment, a wealthy suburb as the son of two workaholic parents. In a way, my family represented the ideals of capitalism, or at least that's how I saw it. No one could doubt they worked their asses off for all that we had and they raised me with a similar work ethic. The ideals of Reaganomics had a strong appeal. Give to those business owners and they'll hire more people, producing more wealth. I also initially had some socially conservative ideologies but with no religious root, they were quickly abandoned.

Getting out of my sheltered home into the wider world in college was the first time some of my faith in the Invisible Hand was shaken. I made friends with all walks of life and, what do you know, poor people aren't necessarily lazy. How about that?

Going to business graduate school, in Dallas no less, was a re-indoctrination for me. I'm not saying a business education isn't also useful but at times it was a bit like going to a theology school. I learned about "perfect, rational markets" that are impossible to fool, how LBOs (heavy debt, leveraged buy outs) of the 80s were good for the economy and how raising the minimum wage increases unemployment. I emerged a True Believer.

So my identity as a Republican was a sincere belief that what was good for Wall Street was also good for Main Street. The rising tide would lift all boats and prosperity would benefit all of society.

Losing my religion was a gradual process, like with any conventional faith such as Christianity. First, there was the bullying nature of Newt and other Republicans at the time. Then, there was the false prediction of how Clinton's raised taxes would kill the economy. The actual economy of the 90s flew in the face of my ideology.

I voted independent in 1996 (Ross Perot, and yes, I knew he had no chance but Bob Dole was "too old and too evil"). I voted Democrat in 2000 (Bush was "too dumb"). I officially re-registered as Democrat at some point around 2003. The move was a gradual one, one that ran over about 10 years.

[Quid]

This video seems less like a commentary on perceived flaws in liberal debating tactics and more like an attempt to legitimize conservative talking points.

It also reeks of racism and misogyny as the "intelligent, wellspoken" character is a blond male and the "dumb, misguided" character is a dark haired female.

[A Theist]

A Theist, you are a paradigmatic example of a spoiled american,

He's also a good example of the effect of brainwashing and propaganda here in America. Those outside America should understand that to live here these days is to be subjected to a steady diet of propaganda akin to the former Soviet Union and their "Pravda".

It's not just Fox Noise but all the other mainstream sources of media as well. They're ALL owned by a few major corporations who skew our perceptions of what goes on in the outside world and what issues are important, all in favor of their interests. Unlike with Pravda, it isn't a government dictatorship but the corporations that control our information. And then there's hate-talk radio. Glen Beck still has his show. The "serious" Sunday morning talk shows are almost universally structured around the "both sides do it" meme to lend cover for the worst of conservative abuses. There are liberals like Maddow on MSNBC but even these pundits are kept carefully in line. They made a good example out of Olbermann, who's nowhere to be found these days.

If you're an American and want to know what's really going on in the world, you have to go to foreign journalism. Most "low information" voters don't have the time or inclination and so the corporate agenda is served.

People like A-Theist are the other extreme, pumped so full of hate and fear that he now lives in an alternate reality. I wish he could be dismissed but he represents a good third of our voting bloc if not more. That's why clowns like Bachmann and Santorum are serious politicians and not crackpots on a street corner selling pencils, where they surely would be in any rational soceity.

It's nothing less than embarrassing for me as an American to watch.

To paraphrase Jesus, "forgive us world, we know not what we do."

LOL! The lady behind the curtain is right...you're a Dork!

[Whateverist]

I think it is important for more people to hear from you and others who have become disenchanted with the republican party and its extremist policies. What might really help would be to identify what it is that attracted you to the party in the first place. Anything you can say that would help me understand the mindset of a conservative would really help me to understand the other side. I can't believe they're all callous or evil people but it is hard for me to fathom what positive motives move them.

I was raised in a sheltered environment, a wealthy suburb as the son of two workaholic parents. In a way, my family represented the ideals of capitalism, or at least that's how I saw it. No one could doubt they worked their asses off for all that we had and they raised me with a similar work ethic. The ideals of Reaganomics had a strong appeal. Give to those business owners and they'll hire more people, producing more wealth. I also initially had some socially conservative ideologies but with no religious root, they were quickly abandoned.

Getting out of my sheltered home into the wider world in college was the first time some of my faith in the Invisible Hand was shaken. I made friends with all walks of life and, what do you know, poor people aren't necessarily lazy. How about that?

Going to business graduate school, in Dallas no less, was a re-indoctrination for me. I'm not saying a business education isn't also useful but at times it was a bit like going to a theology school. I learned about "perfect, rational markets" that are impossible to fool, how LBOs (heavy debt, leveraged buy outs) of the 80s were good for the economy and how raising the minimum wage increases unemployment. I emerged a True Believer.

So my identity as a Republican was a sincere belief that what was good for Wall Street was also good for Main Street. The rising tide would lift all boats and prosperity would benefit all of society.

Losing my religion was a gradual process, like with any conventional faith such as Christianity. First, there was the bullying nature of Newt and other Republicans at the time. Then, there was the false prediction of how Clinton's raised taxes would kill the economy. The actual economy of the 90s flew in the face of my ideology.

I voted independent in 1996 (Ross Perot, and yes, I knew he had no chance but Bob Dole was "too old and too evil"). I voted Democrat in 2000 (Bush was "too dumb"). I officially re-registered as Democrat at some point around 2003. The move was a gradual one, one that ran over about 10 years.

So it sounds like a self-confirming hypothesis. You grow up watching your hardworking parents accumulate wealth and being told that hard work is all it takes. Never mind opportunity or educational expectations within your family. It is simply hard work so those who have less are lazy. And, conversely, those who have more worked harder and therefore deserve it. Simple.

Somehow the role of good fortune in addition to hard work is ignored. It is hard to see why the republican party seems to work so hard to prevent an evening of the playing field. I suppose if they acknowledge the need for an even playing field it would undercut their belief that hard work is the whole story.

Thank you for sharing but it doesn't exactly provide a reasonable rationale for conservatism, does it? I wonder if it is possible to do so without assuming a necessary relationship between hard work and success.

[DeistPaladin]

LOL! The lady behind the curtain is right...you're a Dork!

Who do you think got me into Hetalia?

---

[TaraJo]

LOL! The lady behind the curtain is right...you're a Dork!

Actually, his story is quite similar to what I've heard from my boyfriend. His previously conservative political beliefs were entirly dependant on his being in what I call 'the mormon bubble.' When he went to college, even just a local community college, it broke the bubble and he saw that the minorities and how they were treated. He learned facts about how the government works that went specifically against the Fox News dogma he had been raised with. He learned about geology and astronomy, defying the creationist beliefs he had been taught. Most importantly, he met other queer people and realized we're not the evil deviants he thought we were. And once his mind had been stretched by these ideas, these experiences and even these people, it can't go back no matter how hard you try.

I'm wondering what those business classes say about a shrinking customer base for business, because that's what why I suspect the economic recovery has been so sluggish. Big corporations and banks bounced back pretty quick because they got so much government assistance. Little guys, like the home owners who had their home repossessed or the millions of people who wound up laid off, they didn't get any help. When they lost their money or home or whatever, the demand the created was suddenly taken out of the market and hasn't really been replaced. We need a champion for demand side economics.