Posting this reply in this thread rather than continue the hijack in the Trump thread:
Your position only makes sense if you assume illegal and wrong are de facto synonymous, which is a more imprecise use of language than I’d expect from you. I’d certainly expect you to split as many semantic hairs as possible when defending something.
I’ll readily agree ACORN did something illegal by the laws of Nevada. Was it wrong, though? That’s a wholly separate question. I’ll agree it was certainly stupid of them to break a law they didn’t have to break, and incentivizing workers by paying them per registration turned in was equally dumb, but I have a hard time calling it wrong. Just needlessly stupid.
Right, especially since I have explictly and repeatedly called O’Keefe a scum, said he was a liar, and expressed my utter disdain for him.
But somehow, that doesn’t register on your radar.
Meanwhile, we have at least Dio continuing to claim that ACORN is as innocent as a newborn babe.
And who steps up to say, Dio, no, c’mon. ACORN got shafted but they can’t be said to be completely inncocent. Why not admit that they did something illegal?
As Bosstone says, ACORN has obviously done something illegal by the laws of Nevada. For which they will be fined up to $5,000 in accordance with those laws.
…And? Were you in possession of this information during the O’Keefe threads when you were arguing that ACORN as an organization had committed wrongdoing? Moreover, are you contending that the illegal act committed by ACORN is in any way equivalent to “voter fraud”?
On reflection, what we have here is a conflation of meanings of the word wrong.
Dio is pretty clearly using it to mean morally wrong. Calling ACORN wrong is tantamount to calling it evil, which he won’t do. In that sense I agree with Dio.
Bricker seems to be using it in a more ethical sense, that it’s wrong to break a law you don’t have to break. In that I agree with Bricker.
It can also be that ACORN did something wrong in that it was counterproductive to their goals. That, too, I have no trouble with.
Isn’t language fun.
Oh yes. And O’Keefe is still a sniveling little turd who will undeservedly be remembered as the person who brought down ACORN. Just thought I’d get that in there.
OK, you’re correct that there’s an imprecision between ‘wrong’ and ‘illegal’ that needs some airing out. I have some arguments that it’s wrong, if for no other reason than other voter registration efforts presumably must conform their conduct to the law, and when ACORN does it, it gives them a certain advantage. Also, the law exists to reduce the incentive to falsify registrations, and the submission of false registrations seems to me to be a self-evident wrong.
But forget that. I’ll withdraw “wrong” if it’s causing confusion.
Was it illegal? You agree it was. I’m happy to concede that it may not have been wrong, just stupid. But Dio, and others, are not willing to advance even that concession. Their argument continues to be that ACORN did nothing wrong, ACORN did nothing illegal, and the criminal charge to which ACORN pled guilty was contrived.
Against that, I claim simply that ACORN did something illegal, and I readily concede, as I have many times in many threads, that they suffered a hugely disproprotionate and unfair penalty for the minor illegal acts they did.
Which of these two positions is more unreasonable?
The problem is that you poisoned your own well in the OP. If you had left it at, “ACORN did something bad, and the people who accused ACORN of voter fraud are correct”, you’d be fine.
But you didn’t. You brought O’Keefe into it, when this really has nothing to do with him. Yes, he was a hammer the GOP used to bring ACORN down, but he never exposed any voter fraud-related activity at ACORN, or even claimed to. He exposed completely unrelated “wrongdoing” by ACORN.
Yeeup. The most you can say O’Keefe did was turn the spotlight on ACORN. Hell, they probably would have gotten caught out for their method of incentives eventually anyway, but without the media spotlight it would have barely been worthy of a news brief.
I was certainly aware that ACORN had been credibly charged in Nevada in 2009 with this offense, yes. And when I pointed this out, the defense was that while ACORN director Christopher Edwards might be guilty, that didn’t mean that ACORN, the organization, was guilty.
So I waited, bided my time until ACORN the organization was found guilty.
And here we are. Two years later, and we seem to have forgotten that distinction and are running on a “Bricker, you’re better than that,” defense now.
No. Never said it was, except perhaps two years ago, got called on it, and since then have carefully maintained that they were guilty of voter registration fraud, not voter fraud.
Your position on ACORN is more reasonable than that of Dio. Congrats on your great victory.
What next for you Bricker? Beating up a 4 year old? Proving Glenn Beck has been factually inaccurate? Challenging a monkey to a game of chess? Maybe a footrace with a sloth?
Agreed. It was foolish of me to leave O’Keefe’s name in the OP quote section.
But I did it because I thought that if I didn’t, the defense would be, “I was just saying ACORN wasn’t guilty of what O’Keefe accused them of. How convenient, Bricker, to edit out the O’Keefe portion!” and then I’d be backpedaling trying to show that the defense of ACORN was NOT limited to the O’Keefe accusations, but was universal as to all accusations, including voter registration fraud.
It’s not just Dio, is it?
Seems to me Lobohan is right there on board with Dio’s position. Euphonious P is as well, just to name two.
Are they also in the 4-year old, monkey-chess group?
ETA: now we can (hopelfully) see the groundswell beginning. Bosstone and Gadarene have acknowledged it. You have acknowledged it. The more people that do, the more the others will think it’s safe. I suspect eventually it will be just Dio, because he’s not a follow-the-crowd guy, but right now it’s not solely Dio. If I thought it were, I wouldn’t have started this.
You need help, Bricker. I can’t even remember any of the details of the ACORN discussions from TWO FREAKING YEARS AGO and you’re lovingly holding them to your bosom like they’re the children of your freaking loins.
Yes, ACORN was legally guilty of voter registration fraud in Nevada. Done. Can I drive you to a therapist now?
And at the time the accusations were made, there was no evidence of registration fraud, was there? The people declaring their innocence at that time were right.
What you are doing now is the equivalent of accusing a man of robbery when he didn’t do that particular robbery, then when he is caught later robbing somebody else, you pop up and claim that you were right all along.
I remember them very well. And I remember the impotent fury at the bland, idiotic arguments, the drooling morons who know they’re wrong, but know that a cite is impossible, so they spout “Cite? Cite?” and grin self-importantly.
And your attitude helpsthem. Because they know that when the cite finally does appear, your reaction is, “Hey, it was two years ago, does it even matter now?”
Yes, it does matter. Anyone honest rhetor would have conceded two years ago that ACORN was guilty of voter registration fraud. But no – it had to be cited, or it wasn’t true.
OK, fine. That’s the rule, and I can play by the rule.
But now that the cite is available, the argument is too old? Bullshit.
“Can’t point to a single instance of that with me, Chuckles. I have readily admitted both error and ignorance on these boards more times than I care to count.”
So I pointed to a time where you didn’t. Your convenient I didn’t see it (twice) schtick is reminiscent of a Reganesque “I don’t remember” sort of thing but it is not convincing in the slightest. I’ll leave it to readers to decide which was more likely here.
Now you move the goalposts suggesting a “single instance” hardly merits mention despite a single instance being your challenge and not mine.
I will also note this whole thread you started rests on a single instance.
“ACORN did absolutely nothing wrong” no longer true
You found ONE instance of “guilt” and base a whole thread around it telling people they can no longer make a claim.
So, by your standards, I found one instance where you did not admit being wrong so therefore you can no longer run around telling people you admit to your errors.
No. As I linked above, the guilty plea from Christopher Edwards happened in 2009.
There was no “later.” There was the ridiculous assertion that just because the Nevada director of ACORN admittted to the illegal scheme, that didn’t make the organization itself gulty. Using your analogy, the robbery had already happened.