the difference is that the top image is the kind that's promoted by the rnc leadership. no one at the dnc approved the bottom one as a tactic democrats should run on. not that anyone could possible reason with you, st. elsewhere.
I'd love to take this r****d argument into court. I can just imagine: Us: Look, your honor, our clients might have made fraudulent or misleading statements in public filings, it's a real gray area, fianancial statements are notoriously complex....but plaintiff shareholder here once CALLED IN SICK TO WORK AND WAS NOT REALLY SICK! AND WE HAVE A DOCTOR'S REPORT TO PROVE IT! BLACK AND WHITE HE IS A LIAR!
When it's the people that lead your party promoting it, it's a hell of a lot different than some random dude living in his parents basement submitting a .gif to cafepress. But, of course, once again, these simple concepts are completely lost on you.
basso, have you read this yet? http://www.politico.com/static/PPM136_100303_rnc_finance_leadership.html
Do people realize how they vote in this poll might attract the attention of the secret service right? There are responses here that basically put you in a very dangerous positon
So many people have guillotines, and since our founding fathers almost changed the 4th Amendment to include the right to own a guillotine, it is practically a god-given obligation for lefties to have several of different widths and multiples of blades. We planned on craftily concealing them and pouncing on Bush, ignoring the Secret Service while we tied him down, raised the blade, and let gravity do the work of patriots. For some reason, we were never able to pull this off. Maybe we need to change tactics. (Incidentally basso, what's that big thing at the bottom of your photo that says "Ballot Box" and what could it mean?)
So - just so that we are clear on your position here, I have 3 things you need to verify: 1) the degree of violence and violent rhetoric shown by the anti-obama/tea party movement and 2) the degree to which such violence has been embraced or tolerated by the party's official and unofficial leadership - is absolutely no different from previous administrations? If the answer to 1) is yes, do you have any empirical evidence suggesting that this is true? I have a lot suggestng that it is not. PLease note, empirical evidence is not a cafepress t-shirt. That is anectdotal evidence. if the answer to 2) is yes, can you provide some concrete examples of Democratic leaders embracing (or at least tolerating) the violent overthrow of President Bush or other elected republicans 3) Are you positing that a contrversial and costly war, later found to be based on false pretenses = equally viable grounds for social unrest with: Regulating health insurance in an effort to decrease the number of uninsured americans? Thanks.
Here's the thing. We all think our beliefs are correct to the best of our knowledge, otherwise we would not hold those beliefs, right? And there is no final arbiter of which belief is correct when two conflict, correct? So while you may believe strongly that you are right, and that your position is rational and based on facts and evidence whereas the opposing opinion is irrational and based on misconceptions, the other person probably feels the just the opposite. So who is right? You can't logically act as if you must be right and the other person must be wrong because then that would imply the other person could do the same and you would get nowhere. So what do you do? You discuss it, you argue it, you present your facts and evidence and you rebut the claims of the opposing person. That's all fine and good. There are only two things I took issue with in this thread. The first was DonnyMost's suggestion that the two situations should not be compared as if his opinion that they are apples and oranges is the only relevant one. He (and you and I) think those other opinions are often based on misconceptions and irrational fears, but just because we believe that doesn't mean it must be true. Whether you respect the opinions or not, in my opinion it isn't logically valid to act as if they are inherently wrong. My second issue was with SamFisher's claim that because he believes that the facts and evidence are on his side, the other side must be stupid or disingenuous and it is therefore ok to insult the other person. Again, just because you believe the facts and evidence are on your side doesn't mean the other person doesn't feel the same way about their opinions. And if one wants to be so arrogant as to claim that their perspective must be the correct one then logically somebody who disagrees is free to do the same. And where does that get you? It might be therapeutic to say what you believe when someone seems so off base, but I don't think it's logically valid and it certainly doesn't lead to thoughtful discussion. (It's just a message board, so I don't care that much if the discussion is thoughtful, the more salient point is that it isn't a logically valid position to take.)
Some things are facts, and don't have two sides or room for two different beliefs. 2+2 = 4. The fact that some crazy GOP members might come out and say that 2+2 = 5 doesn't make it an issue that has two sides that come down to beleifs with there being no way to know for certain which one is correct. Health Care reform bill passed by congress is not a govt. takeover of health care. The fact that some believe it is doesn't change the facts.
It does if you use Grizzled's logic! If a large percentage of people believe something, THERE'S SOMETHING TO IT!
This is a good post, and I appreciate you taking the time to write it out. Just a few comments: Using the "wild claims of socialism" example, how is that supposed to be "debated" without addressing the obvious disjoint between the actual definition of socialism and what is being proclaimed as such? I suppose you could argue that definitions are subjective, but that would lead us far away from the rational discussion you seem to desire. As I said above, sometimes people are just wrong. The fact that they may not realize this is pitiable, but it does not change the underlying facts. In summary, it is "logically valid" to indicate that what's wrong is wrong - but it can be unhelpful to be a dick about it. However, I often ignore this advice when responding to certain parties...which segways nicely into my next nitpick: While counterproductive to honest debate, I believe Sam's point was that in this forum, certain folks have shown a marked disinterest in researching their own opinions' veracity - even after being repeatedly shown where factual errors or logical disconnects are taking place. Sam's argument was less about content per say, as it was about frustration relative to said content's consistently erroneous/manipulative usage.
It also doesn't mean that they are not wrong. Whether or not somebody is free to repeat lies, misinformation, etc and opinions based thereupon is really not the issue here - the issue is that you think it's impolite to point out that they are doing it (in many cases, again and again and again and again). That's very noble and patient of you.
But that is not a fact. "Government takeover of health care" is a subjective comment, so it's not so simple as to say it's true or untrue. The only way you could say it is completely wrong is if you prove that there is no subjective interpretation of the phrase that is accurate. I honestly don't know the full rationale of the people saying that (I would love to hear it), but if you tried real hard you could come up with a way to argue that it may be true. First, there are the new regulations and oversights available to the government and government agencies with regards to health care. With this bill, the government is mandating insurance, strictly regulating what types of plans insurance companies can provide and who they can provide them to. The government says no denial of people with pre-existing conditions, no charging more for more expensive women, and no charging exorbitant premiums (while deciding what exactly that is). I'm sure there are many other things I can't think of now. They may not be running the insurance companies, but they are adding a lot more regulation and rules to what those companies are allowed to do. And if the level of oversight is high enough, you could say that the government is controlling health care even if they aren't doing it directly. In addition, many (on the left and the right) believe that the failure of this system is inevitable and will lead to a public option or even a true takeover of health care with a single payer system. If such an outcome really is inevitable, then saying this bill "amounts to a government takeover of health care" is not inaccurate. I don't think the above explanation proves the government takeover of health care claim to be true, but I think it's enough to say that you cannot be certain that the claim is not true. And if that's the case, then my previous comment applies.
Absolutely. In fact, I think they are wrong. I'm not saying you can't have the opinion that they're wrong, I'm saying that you can't be certain and it is illogical to act as if you must be right. I hope you can see the distinction. It's only a little bit about being noble and patient or polite. Pointing out what you think is misinformation or a misconception is a great thing. I hope you can see I'm not against doing so, and in fact I think it's very important to do so. My beef is with assuming that just because you believe something is inaccurate, it must be inaccurate. You're assuming that you must be right. It is safe to assume the other person feels the same way. So if you each point out what you think is inaccurate in the other side's belief, then you both are making arguments and can have a good conversation. If instead you point out what is inaccurate and claim the other person must be stupid or lying to believe it, and they do the same to you, then there really can't be resolution or anything close to it. I know it seems like a silly semantic difference, and I'm having trouble articulating it well, but I do think it is an important difference. And the fact that understanding that difference should lead to more polite conversations is just a nice side-effect.
