I am wondering about their accuracy, but it is obvious you don't care about those sort of things. Carry on.
again, if you were unaware of the facts that can only mean one of two things...you are comically uninformed OR you are lying about being unaware of all the racist things trump has said and done. for the umpteenth time, if you have any points you want to challenge me on then go for it.
being a mindless troll and trump butt-kisser. trump has said and done racist things and everyone knows it. ive given you multiple opportunities to discuss even one of the dozen examples i provided and you are totally unable to do so...sad. again, if you are unaware of the racist things he has said and done that means one of two things...you are ignorant OR are lying about not knowing about them...which is it?
If I may respectfully interject, I believe I see a disconnect. I think you see this as you simply doing due diligence, but others see it as a waste of time that will not help further the conversation in the least. We don't need any quadratic equations to prove out that 2 plus 2 equals 4. It's well-known, going back and re-hashing what is already established is not adding to the conversation. For example, you previously asked me for examples of why I felt Donald was racist. I was able to immediately rattle off 3 or 4 examples (and I still missed a lot, but side note, isn't it a really sad commentary on a person when you can so easily call out SEVERAL examples of somebody, anybody, having so many racist tendencies; but I digress). So you made a request, I addressed your request, and my reply went ignored, you did not reply to me. I did not mind really, because it literally took 60-90 seconds, but perhaps others observe this style of arguing/delaying/ignoring facts and relying on gut feelings that fly in the face of reality, and others decide it really isn't worth their time. Just my humble opinion, I could be off base, but I just wanted to throw it out there.
Good you're making an argument on the op-ed. Let's look at the text. Hazony writes: "Until 2016, America sill had two legitimate political parties. But when Donald Trump was elected president, the talk of his being “authoritarian” or “fascist” was used to discredit the traditional liberal point of view, according to which a duly elected president, the candidate chosen by half the public through constitutional procedures, should be accorded legitimacy. Instead a “resistance” was declared, whose purpose was to delegitimize the president, those who worked with him, and those who voted for him." This is the crux right here of the Blind Spot that I spoke of and why I brought up the TEA Party, Rep Wilson yelling "You Lie!", and Mitch McConnell. Hazony says that up until 2016 that there were two legitimate political parties and what made the Democrats not legitimacy is that tried to delegitimaze President Trump. That completely ignores that for 8 years the GOP was trying to delegitimize President Obama. Even going so far as to question whether he was a natural born citizen. The "resistance" under Republicans was things like the TEA Party and Birtherism. Hazony writes: "and therefore to two-party democracy. They will not demand the delegitimization of just President Trump, but of all conservatives. We’ve already seen this in the efforts to delegitimize the views of Senators Josh Hawley, Tom Cotton, and Tim Scott, as well as the media personality Tucker Carlson and others. " As I pointed out Democrats worked with Trump and other Republicans and showed examples. Hazony has a strange idea of a "resistance" that seeks to delegitimize while they still confers legitimacy in terms of working with the people he claims they are out to delegitimize. Looking again at history just before 2016 the Republican Congress refused to work with Obama on any major legislation. To quote McConnell again their job was to make Obama a "One term President." Hazony's idea that there were two legitimate political parties based upon that one wasn't trying to delegitimize the Constitutionally elected President fails in the evidence of recent history. Hazony writes: "Then they will move on to delegitimizing liberals who treat conservative views as legitimate, such as James Bennet, Bari Weiss, and Andrew Sullivan." While yes these people have disputes with NYT, other media and certainly others who resist Trump they also resist Trump. Hazony specifically cites that the people he is criticizing is based off of opposition to Trump. Hazony: "I know that many liberals believe that this rejection of Trump’s legitimacy was directed only at him, personally. They believe, as a liberal friend wrote to me recently, that when this particular president is removed from office, America will be able to return to normal." Yet the very liberals (note Andrew Sullivan isn't a liberal) he is saying are being targeted are also anti-Trump. In other words these people are part of the "resistance." he is criticizing. Regarding Fox News Hazony himself specifically cites Tucker Carlson as a conservative that is being targeted for delegitimacy so it is not just personal pique but it is relevant to the discussion specifically bringing up Fox News. Hazony writes: "As was the case in the universities and media, many liberals will accommodate these Marxist tactics in the belief that by delegitimizing conservatives they can appease the Marxists and turn them into strategic allies." He is arguing that media and university are being used as a tool to go after conservatives. In that case then it is also relevant to point out that media sources like Fox News, like the Federalist, like Washington Examiner and so on do act as echo chambers for the Right. Now It is a personal opinion that the Federalist has surrendered to Trumpism but I think it is pretty obvious that they aren't that open to views from all sides of the political spectrum. Regarding the point of "Cancel Culture" Hazony doesn't use that term but that is clearly what he's talking about. Hazony writes: "But nothing of the sort is going to happen. The Marxists who have seized control of the means of producing and disseminating ideas in America cannot, without betraying their cause, confer legitimacy on any conservative government. And they cannot grant legitimacy to any form of liberalism that is not supine before them. This means that whatever President Trump’s electoral fortunes, the “resistance” is not going to end. It is just beginning." He's talking about in different terms cancelling conservative and/or liberal ideas that don't fit what he considers a Marxist view point. "Cancel" as it is used colloquially now is a synonym of "delegitimize" such as "Charlie Rose isn't considered a legitimate journalist anymore" is basically the same as "Charlie Rose has been cancelled." Hazony's whole argument is that Marxists are out to cancel conservatives and liberal co-travelers. Again then it's fair to look at who they are cancelling. He specifically cites Trump and we see with Trump and his supporters frequently seek to delegitimize those who don't agree with them. Trump does it in cruder terms such as calling opponents "losers" and "no one likes them" which is pretty much saying they don't have legitimacy. He's gone further as we saw last week with calling for a boycott of a private corporation. IN other words making delegitimizing them economically. In fact Trump was part of the resistance that sought to delegitimze Obama through Birtherism. Again a blind spot that Hazony shows when he says that such tactics only started in 2016 and only by those opposed to Trump.
I’m just going to go ahead and say it. Wattafan and Generalthade are just not that bright. This is less about their political views and more about the incoherent non sequiturs, dodging, basic inability to string together coherent thoughts or have a basic discussion. It is a lot like that person at work that you speak with about a project and after about 15 mins, you are thinking what the eff is he/she talking about. Maybe we’re being too demanding of them. Maybe we just need to leave them alone. Maybe we’re bullying them by making all these demands for responses, thoughts, and reasoning.
I wanted to respond to this. Yes. That is a slight at you. I agree there are other posters who share links, I do it too, and others such as NewRoxFan who mostly post links. I've noticed he's come in for criticism by other posters also. Why I'm picking on you is that you certainly seem well read but it seems like almost all you post are opinion pieces and almost all (I admit I don't follow every one of your posts) appear to be slanted to the Right. I have no problem with people being on the Right, I can disagree but still not consider someone a bad person, what does bother me is that you never seem to willing to articulate your own thoughts or views. In the post above you still don't really articulate views but at least address the substance of what was posted. It seems like all you do is essentially engage in appeal to authority to push a view point yet hide behind the argument that you're just mulling things over, or worse that you admitted you didn't even read the piece you posted. Everyone has a viewpoint. NewRoxFan is pretty clear about his viewpoint and why he is posting what he is posting. As I told you before if you are just trying to hide what you believe or just posting stuff to get a response, the term for that is "troll". As it should be obvious I enjoy debating and because I'm way over educated for my own good and also that my work has been very slow recently I'm spending more time on here than I should. I have no problem debating Hazony or Turley and personally would be delighted if they actually posted here. I am certainly willing to debate Os Trigonum too instead of debating what is essentially just an outlet for Turley et al.
At the risk of sounding like a cyber nanny I want to say that personally I appreciated GeneralThade for being one of the first to donate when I put the challenge out to help rebuild Minneapolis and also that he wanted to help me personally. I don't agree with him on several things and will say he has a very abrasive style but I don't think he's a bad guy. There's are very sensitive and tough issues and I don't know if it feels like people are bullying GeneralThade. It seems to me like he's tough enough to take it. I just want to keep some perspective here before completely dismissing a poster.
While i can agree to the sentiment, there's also the element where Black GOP members are slandered for their blackness because they don't appeal to traditional mainstream stereotypes. Not saying the Twitter poster went there but could it equally be true that black speakers are appealing to center right Black Independents? Numbers game says likely not, but it's that numbers game that turns the Black vote into one homogenous bloc.
I don’t care others. I am not going to vote a racist for a president which is pretty much against democratic system.
Really good perspective. I ebb and flow in and out of posting in D and D depending on what the temperature feels like in here, and might just ebb on out. I find it particularly interesting to read you and Os and a few others like Juan Valdez, and it’s not necessarily about agreeing or disagreeing with ideas or positions, rather it’s nice when statements are backed by some reasoning and intellectual honesty.
fair enough I don't have a problem with this; in fact I think this is a fair characterization of the response to Trump from 2016 on. That response differs not in degree from the response of Republicans to Obama (throughout Obama's two terms) but rather in kind. I think the resistance to Trump is real, and that this author is not necessarily exaggerating the point of "Until 2016, America sill had two legitimate political parties." While Republicans disliked Obama, and worked to undermine him (partly enabled by Obama's own ineptitude), they did not seek to delegitimize Obama as president in the same way that the organized resistance to Trump has tried to delegitimize his presidency since the election. I'll respectfully disagree and for the reasons I gave above. On this we can just agree to disagree. I don't share Hazony's harsh view about this prediction, but I don't think that prediction is all that far off base. Just look at the reactions to "conservative" thought on this board: liberal views are the norm and are de facto trust-worthy, whereas conservative views are automatically viewed with suspicion, derision, and outright rejection without being considered. So I don't think Hazony is far off. there is no "strange idea" of resistance. The fact that you don't agree with him is simply a reflection of your own political leanings--and I don't say that to criticize, it is merely an observation. Lots of Democrats and left-leaning folks disagree that Trump has faced any "resistance" as president. On this again we will have to just agree to disagree. I agree with this statement. But I also think it takes two to tango. Obama's arrogance made it easy for Republicans to stonewall him and still look good in the process. A more effective President (think Clinton or Reagan) might have had things go differently for himself. Again, I don't disagree. But I think this is simply politics. And no one worked with the Bush administration to undermine Obama before Obama even took office. that's fine. I don't think that's really central to his main argument--or at least what I take to be his main argument. which will probably have to wait until a different posting. I just don't have much to take issue with here, but I also didn't consider this to be central to Hazony's overall argument. this hits the character limit, will continue in the next post
continued now you are getting closer to what I think is his real argument, and here is where I find myself in sympathy with Hazony's thesis. As a center-right, right-center or even right-leaning academic in a liberal university (depending on who is trying to label me), I've seen this in my own career. yes perhaps, but perhaps this is also your blind spot. There is a difference between a "right-leaning" opinion leader/voice, and an "echo chamber." This is why it bothers me so much to see people here default so easily and so quickly to simply dismissing (typically right-leaning) arguments as "you're just echoing right- or left-wing talking points." That is not considering an argument on its merits: that is dismissing an argument without considering its merits. I happen to believe that some Federalist pieces are in fact VERY well-argued. Same goes for Turley or Ann Althouse. These are VERY smart people who have been very successful at being lawyers, law professors, or whatever--and when I see posters here simply dismissing those perspectives out of hand, that tells me more about those posters than it does about weaknesses in Turley's et al's arguments. Since I don't watch Fox News I can't speak to that; my hunch is that Fox News is the MSNBC of the right, and that your criticisms of Fox are justified. There's a big difference, however, between Fox News/MSNBC and the Federalist etc. that's fine, I don't disagree. I don't have a problem with this. as a late-career academic I despair of what I see in universities today. I once was idealistic and valued the "marketplace of ideas" yadda yadda yadda, but as I've grown older I've personally seen those ideals honored more in the breach than in reality. There are still some very fine people in academia, and some very good and open-minded thinkers, but they are increasingly fewer and farther between. I'm not sure I would choose the same career path if I had to do it over, but who knows. the bolded is really Hazony's argument, and I think he's right. Because the university cancel culture (I'll speak to what I know) does in fact seek to "speak truth to power," and so even LIBERAL targets are now fair game from the formerly oppressed. Hence the surprise of feminists who have had the tables turned on them, or English professors who are now being told that English grammar is racist so we should abandon traditional academic norms of basic language competency. Or the critiques of physics or math as inherently racist/gendered/imperialistic disciplines that should be changed accordingly. So I don't think Hazony is all that far off here either.
@rocketsjudoka , I have started listening to this podcast, and it focuses pretty quickly on what Hazony himself takes the main argument of the essay to be. I'd be curious to hear your thoughts if you have time to listen to it at some point. It's really good so far.
O's? I can't believe there is this much debate about an author who uses Marxist so much in his article. It's getting really old, when O's loses a debate he makes it personal and plays the victim card.
Did you forget the whole birther issue or the fact that Trump rose to prominence as a republican because of it? You also seem to keep ignoring The Tea Party or the Freedom Caucus are they not organized. What's the difference?
